9-9-15 - The New Elvis?

Conventional wisdom suggests that a healthy sense of self-worth does not rest on what other people think of you. Surely Jesus didn’t care what other people said about him, did he? Yet it is also wise for public figures to check their polls every now and then (maybe not as often as the pols of today check their polls…). So we find Jesus asking his disciples, ‘Who do people say that I am?’

They answer readily; someone as powerful and unusual as Jesus would surely generate debate, even an assumption that he carried the spirit of a luminary from the distant or recent past: And they answered him, ‘John the Baptist; and others, Elijah; and still others, one of the prophets.’

This reminds me of entertainment writers who compare up and coming stars to those of old. “She’s the new Audrey Hepburn,” He’s the new Springsteen,” as though the only way to apprehend someone is to categorize them in relation to someone else. Jesus was frequently asked if he was John the Baptist returned to life. To ask that question was to miss the reality of the man standing right in front of them.

Jesus thought his closer followers might have a different perspective. He asked them, ‘But who do you say that I am?’

How do you answer that question? It can be as hard for us to see Jesus for who he intrinsically is, apart from what we’ve heard about him through church, history, and cultural assumptions, as it was for people in his day to see him apart from the great prophets of old and their expectations in a time of national powerlessness. The only way we can truly answer that question is to seek to know him as he is revealed in the Gospels, as we see his power at work through the church, and as we experience him personally in prayer.

Which also means that, if we’re active in study, action and prayer, our answer will evolve. Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and for ever – but our discernment of who he is not fixed, not until that day when we see no longer “through a glass, dimly,” but face to face.

Peter's answer reflected Israel’s history, the promise of future redemption, and the knowledge of Jesus Peter gained in relationship with him: Peter answered him, ‘You are the Messiah.’
In naming him as the promised One of God, Peter also claimed Jesus as one-of-kind, not the “new” anyone, but new creation.

So we too, made in the image of God as unique persons, can get to know Jesus, the Lord who was, and is and is to come - and so discover the new creations we are in Him.