Jesus asked. “Who do you say I am?” Matthew 16:15

My husband and I just returned from  a two week road trip to Phoenix and back through Salt Lake City (to visit with our daughter’s family.)  We’ve never considered ourselves “snowbirds” but the winter was long, the snow and cold seemed endless and like so many others, we were tired of Covid-required sheltering in place.  It was time to get away into a sunnier climate. We traveled over 2600 miles in the time we were gone so it’s a good thing that Dan and I are seasoned travel companions having made numerous  cross country trips, once with three children in a Suburban. Most of the time, the vast expanses and variety of landscapes of this country remind and inspire with God’s creation, bounty  and beauty. (There is, however,  the one forgettable  time we drove across Canada from coast to coast which was about as exciting as Kansas without the sunflowers. ‘Nuff said.)

The vast, arid landscapes of the southwest  were as beautiful to me  as any tropical vacation spot. I can understand why artists emigrate to canyons and mesas shadowed with light and painted by sunsets. I wish I could describe the endless textures of clouds, hills and desert rolling like a scroll past our car. In the desert, I sense the God of the patriarchs, of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. I sense how Jesus walked in the wilderness not unlike what is splayed out in Nevada and Arizona. It’s not difficult to find Him anywhere and everywhere.

It was good to go away and recalibrate my perspective which tends to get pretty narrow  living in a small rural town like New Meadows. However, it was better to come home again. Today we attended church which I’ve missed. Admittedly, I’m not faithful to pray much sitting 8 hours in the car and then  settling into half a dozen  motel rooms. It was good to listen to the Word, to worship and reconnect with believing friends. Vacations are great, even necessary, but I’ve missed my quiet time with  the Lord .

Earlier before church, I pulled up my daily Tozer devotional and was struck by Tozer’s words:

What I believe about God is the most  important thing about me.

Tozer is saying that there’s one singular criteria by which we are defined: faith or unbelief. Either God is the God of the Bible revealed in Jesus or He is something else defined ( not revealed) by human ideas. It really stopped me in my tracks.  This week as  Holy Week  moves toward Christ’s crucifixion, death and resurrection,  I am asking myself, what do I believe about God? About Jesus?   C.S. Lewis made the statement that there are only three choices to believe  about Jesus.  He was either a fraud, a lunatic or Messiah as He claimed.  Your answer  defines you to the world.  Sadly, the same world rejects Jesus as Messiah and dares to make him either  fraud or liar. Or both.

Jesus  posed  the same question about Himself to the disciples.  In the 19^th chapter of Matthew, Jesus had  been alone in prayer when the disciples came to him. Jesus inquires what the crowd says about Him.  They replied,

…Some say John the Baptist; others say Elijah; and still others, that a prophet of old has arisen  v. 19

Jesus presses them. “But what about you?” Jesus asked. “Who do you say I am?”

It is Peter who gives the right answer and confesses  Jesus as The Christ of God under the power of the Holy Spirit. His confession of faith in Jesus as Messiah has to be the lynchpin of our own belief for it is  the only thing that will lead to the saving grace  of Good Friday and the power and joy of Easter Sunday.  Anything less than Jesus Messiah is meaningless.  Anything more is fraudulent. . 

And now I feel like I must speak to an issue which may tread on some toes. I don’t want to offend or be disrespectful to any songwriters or faithful worship teams. However, sometimes in church the  worship  lyrics  present a very  incomplete  picture of Jesus. We make  Him so accessible to us, to what we need and pursue  that  the  confession of our lips and hearts diminishes  the only thing that Jesus  accepted about Himself, Peter’s words, “ You are the Christ of God.”  As such, Jesus  describes Himself in John  14:6.

Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.

Only Jesus as Christ can make such an astounding claim which is  light years beyond what a currently popular song says about Jesus, insisting “that is  who you are.”  It’s got a catchy tune and catchy phrases, but it misses the mark of our confession.

What about you? Do you confess Jesus purely as the Son of God and all that is implied therewith?  Does your belief about Jesus  concur with Jesus’ own words?  Does the  person of Jesus as “the Way”  challenge  the description of  Him as Waymaker, (which is who  John the Baptist was.  The lesser before the greater)?  Is Jesus Miracle worker or the Fountain of life?  Promise Keeper or the Promise Himself? 

In this week before our Christian faith’s most important celebration of Easter, it would behoove us to honestly come before the Lord and respond to Jesus’ question. “Who do you say I am?”