OUR FATHER WHO MAKES KNOWN THE SON TO US

The Lord Jesus and His disciples, traveling west from Capernaum to ease the political tension that was mounting between Jesus and the religious leaders (when He called them hypocrites), came to the Caesarea Philippi area where construction and urban renovations were underway which was one of the ways that the Romans set their mark in the lands that they occupied. While they were in that construction environment, Jesus asked His disciples a question to detect whether the Father in heaven had revealed the ongoing plan of salvation to anyone to them who Jesus actually was. The disciples listed some guesses such as Elijah, Jeremiah and other prophets that they had been hearing being mentioned by the people they had come in contact with. Matthew chapter 16 verses 13 - 17 recorded this interchange.

13 When Jesus came to the region of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, “Who do people say the Son of Man is?”

14 They replied, “Some say John the Baptist; others say Elijah; and still others, Jeremiah or one of the prophets.”

The fact that people were identifying Jesus as a re-appearance of various prophets demonstrated to Him that His  Father in heaven had not yet opened the understanding of the people of Israel. 

Jesus decided to narrow the scope of His inquiry to just the people who had been with Him from the beginning of His ministry and He asked this;

15 “But what about you?” he asked. “Who do you say I am?”

He asked a non-leading question of His disciples to see if any of them had recieved insight into who they had been following all that time and if so, Jesus was expecting to hear very specific words in their response. 

It was Simon Peter to whom the Father had given a grasp of the true identity of Jesus;

16 Simon Peter answered, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”

17 Jesus replied, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by flesh and blood, but by my Father in heaven. 

The Lord Jesus was thrilled by this development because He had been waiting for it and His Father in Heaven began this phase of Jesusˋ ministry by opening a window of spiritual undestanding to Peter, the humble fisherman who had left his boat to follow Jesus.

Jesus informed Peter that He was blessed of God because he had not arrived at the conclusion that Jesus was Messiah and the Son of God by the coporeal means of logic or study but rather that the heavenly Father revealed it to Him so that he was able to know what was otherwise concealed.

Amen.

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