Having been greatly helped by the answers given in the "Editor's Private Corner," I should feel obliged if you could help me with a little study of Matthew 16:18-19. My chief difficulty is this: "You are Peter, and on this rock will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it." A little explanation would greatly oblige me and several other readers of Present Truth.
The Church's Foundation
Let us first read those two verses in their connection. "When Jesus came into the coasts of Caesarea Philippi, He asked His disciples, saying, Whom do men say that I the Son of man am? And they said, Some say that you are John the Baptist: some, Elijah; and others, Jeremiah, or one of the prophets. He said unto them, But whom do you say that I am? And Simon Peter answered and said, You are the Christ, the Son of the living God. And Jesus answered and said unto him, Blessed are you, SimonBarjona; for flesh and blood has not revealed it unto you, but my Father which is in heaven. And I say also unto you, That you are Peter, and upon this rockI will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. And I will give unto you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; and whatsoever you shall bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and whatsoever you shall loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven." (Matthew 16:13-19)
In this sentence, "You are Peter, and on this Rock I will build my church," (Matthew 16:18) there is a play on words, which makes the statement very striking and clear, where it is recognized. The word "Peter" signifies a stone. The word, however, is entirely different from "Rock." The Greek word for "Peter," petros, is masculine, while the word for "rock" is feminine, petra. This word signifies, "not loose stones, but masses of live rock."--Liddle & Scott's Lexicon.
It indicates rocks "such as run out from the beach; a ledge or shelf of rocks; [and] there is no example in good authors of petra in the sense of petros, a stone."
From this little study of words it will be seen that instead of a comparison between Peter and the rock, there is a sharp contrast. A loose stone, as Peter, petros, would not do for a foundation; nothing could be built on it; but the great ledge, petra, jutting out into the sea, against which the mighty waves dashed themselves and repair broken and defeated, is just the right foundation for a building.
Now who is this Rock? There is abundant answer in the Scriptures. The children of Israel in the wilderness "drank of that spiritual Rock that followed [went with] them; and that Rock was Christ." (1 Corinthians 10:4)
He it was who stood on the visible rock in Horeb when Moses smote it. (Exodus 17:6) Again: "The Lord is my Rock, and my Fortress, and my Deliverer." (Psalm 18:2) "He shall cry unto me, You are my Father, my God, and the Rock of my salvation." (Psalm 89:26) "The Lord is upright; He is my Rock, and there is no unrighteousness in Him." (Psalm 92:15)
Still more emphatic are the words of the Lord in Isaiah 28:16-17, to those who are making lies their refuge: "Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation a stone, a tried stone, a precious corner stone, a sure foundation; he that believes shall not make haste. Judgment also will I lay to the line, and righteousness to the plummet; and the hail shall sweep away the refuge of lies, and the water shall overflow the hiding place." (Isaiah 28:16-17)
Compare this with the assurance that those who come to God in Christ are "fellow-citizens with the saints, and of the household of God; And are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone; In whom all the building fitly framed together grows unto a holy temple in the Lord." (Ephesians 2:19-21)
This does not say that we are built upon the apostles and prophets (much less Peter), but on the same foundation on which they were built; "For other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ." (1 Corinthians 3:11)
There is more testimony; but nothing could make this more clear. You may ask why Jesus did not say plainly, "I will build my church upon myself," and thus make it impossible for anybody to mistake His meaning. So we might ask why when He stood in the temple, of which
He had just driven the buyers and sellers, He said, "Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up." (John 2:19)
He meant the temple of His body, yet the Jews thought that He referred to the building in which they were standing. They need not have been mistaken, however; and there is still less ground for misunderstanding His meaning in the verse that we are studying, for the words themselves, as I have pointed out, show the contrast between Peter and the Rock on which the church is built.
Peter's own testimony on the subject ought to be final, since he is the one about whom the controversy over Christ's words has raged. It was he who gave utterance to the conclusion of faith: "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God," (Matthew 16:16) thus indicating, what he at another time plainly declared, that Christ has the words of eternal life, and has life to bestow. (John 6:68-69) Now let us turn to his epistle, written long afterwards, and we shall see that he recognized the difference between loose stones and the solid foundation. Speaking of Christ, he says: "To whom coming, as unto a living stone, disallowed indeed of men, but chosen of God, and precious, You also, as lively stones, are built up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ. Wherefore also it is contained in the Scripture, Behold, I lay in Sion a chief corner stone, elect, precious; and he that believes on Him shall not be confounded." (1 Peter 2:4-6)
Loose stones, such as Peter and all other men, are not the proper thing for a foundation, but they are just the thing with which to build a house on a foundation already laid; and the great Master Builder takes just such poor, weak, vacillating, rash, impulsive persons as Peter, and forms them on the True Foundation into a beautiful structure that will share the eternally enduring nature of the Foundation itself.
For the Rock on which we are built is a living Rock. He was dead, but He lives for evermore, and He has the keys of death and the grave. (Revelation 1:18) The gates of hell (the grave) could not prevail against Him,--they were not strong enough to hold Him,--and so they will prove equally powerless against all who are built on Him. Yea, to those who are in Christ it is the same as though death even now did not exist, for: "[He] has abolished death, and has brought life and immortality to light through the Gospel." (2 Timothy 1:10)
And since over even death itself, "we are more than conquerors through Him that loved us," (Romans 8:37) it follows that in Him we are also victors over sin, for that is really the gate of the grave. Blessed are all they who, with Peter, recognize and continually confess this glorious truth in their lives.--Present Truth, November 6, 1902.