Matthew 16:13-17 says this, when Jesus came into the coast of Caesarea Philippi, He asked His disciples saying, “Whom do men say that I am the Son of Man am?” Verse 14, and they said, “Some say that thou art John the Baptist, some say Elias and others Jeremiah or one of the prophets, but here’s the key verse that I want us to think about. Here he said unto them but whom say ye that I am? Verse 16 says then Simon Peter answered and said, “Thou Art the Christ the son of the Living God!”
Who do you say that Jesus is?
Look what Jesus said in verse 17, He said answered and said unto them, “Blessed art thou Simon Barjona for Flesh and Blood hath not revealed it unto thee but my Father which is in heaven.”
Amen thank you Lord amen. What prompted this message was I was watching a social media post I don’t know maybe a month or two ago maybe longer than that and this person was going up on the street and he was asking random strangers who was Jesus and here are some of the answers that he got, “I don’t know,” “I have no clue.”
Church, isn’t that sad in this day and age that a grown adult in his 50s said, “I don’t know, I have no idea.” A middle-aged woman said He was a marketing genius because He got people to believe in Him. Another person said, “I don’t believe that he was the Son of God.” This breaks your heart doesn’t it? An older gentleman said He was a magician, the David Copperfield of His day.
This is people in America with a church on every corner, people who have access to any information pretty much from their cell phone, and this is what people are saying! Another person said He was God’s Son, listen to this, but so was Gandhi and Muhammad because we’re all children of God! I don’t really like that statement, “We’re All God’s Children.”
We’re all God’s creation, but we’re not all God’s children because if you’re my child you have to be born from me, right? If we’re all children of God, we have to be born again, right? We have to be birthed by the Spirit of God. Am I right now? Pastor Lane correct me if I’m wrong. I submit myself to the elders and leadership here that’s present.
Someone else said that He was extremely enlightened both politically and morally. Someone else said He was a messenger and, lastly, someone said He imparted wisdom to others and tried to make the world a better place. That’s so sad, isn’t it? This kind of broke my heart reading this. Here’s what some of the false religions of the world say about Jesus:
Islam says that He was sinless, which that’s true. They say He was virgin born, which is true. They said He was a miracle working Prophet, that’s true, right? He was a wise teacher, that’s true, but here’s the problem, Islam says Jesus was not God, He will come back and judge one day, that’s true too, but you see how the devil puts truth in there and then he’ll mix that err in there which makes what they’re saying false.
False religion Hinduism says that He was a holy man. He was a wise teacher and He was a god. How many gods are in Hinduism? A million plus, right? Hinduism says Jesus was just one of the gods.
Buddhism says He was a holy man, He was an enlightened man, He was a wise teacher and I’ve never really heard of this religion until it was brought up uh Baha’i. I don’t know much I had to look these up. They believed some of the Christian views of Jesus, but He is just one prophet among many religions that progressively reveal the truth, and I was just like, “Lord this is so terrible! You know all this, the thoughts of everybody saying who Jesus is, but you know what, we have to look to what the Bible says about who He is, Amen!
I want to ask you to keep this question in the back of your mind, “Who do you say that Jesus is?” Who do you say that He is church? Praise God because our modern day people in this modern day, they have so many different things, so many different ideas, and their mixed up false religions. They think they know who Jesus is. People on the street act like they know something about Jesus, but they don’t know Jesus and I believe the Lord asked His disciples this because He wanted to make sure that they knew truly who He was before He left this earth.
Jesus was almost ready to be crucified and pay the ultimate price for our sins and die and be resurrected and go to Heaven, and He wanted to make sure His disciples knew. I believe who Jesus was and today church I want to make sure that we know who Jesus is! Amen! My prayer tonight is that somebody in this room knows Jesus in a different way than you’ve ever known Him before.
I want to look at some scriptures tonight and ask the Lord to help us. I want the Lord to reveal to us a different side of Him because some of us, many of us, I believe, all of us hopefully in this room, we know Jesus as Savior and I and I’m not taking anything away from that, but the Lord wants to be more. Once we’re saved, He wants to be more to us than just our Savior! Amen!
I’m reminded of a scripture that Jesus says, “I no longer call you servants, but I call you friends.” Jesus wants to be our friend, amen, and the best thing about friends is the more time you spend with somebody and the more you get to know about them, the more you get to know about what they like and the things that make them tick, and the things they love to do. Amen.
I know brother Steve and brother Jim and brother Jim back there they love the outdoors they love hunting they love fishing I know that because I spent some time with them. We’ve whetted a line in the lakes many times, and I’ve asked them the fisherman’s joke, “What’s the best kind of fishing line to have?” You’ll get all kinds of answers, but brother Steve, you know this one, “A wet one, that’s the best kind of fishing line to have is a wet one,” Praise God! I don’t care what kind it is, it just needs to be in the water, Amen! Hallelujah!
So I want to look in the Bible tonight and look at some Scriptures about some different characters in the Bible and how Jesus revealed Himself to them, okay? Let’s let’s look at this together. Let’s look at Luke 19:1-9. This is a story of Zacchaeus The Bible says he was a tax collector. He wasn’t just a tax collector. Scripture says he was a chief tax collector, and the Bible says that he was very rich. Now back in those days, Pastor Lane, I’ve done some research and it says that a lot of these tactics used by Tax Collectors were corrupt, so I’m sitting there thinking he’s the chief of the tax collectors so he was very rich the Bible says. How do you think he got very rich? Ripping people off, right? And, so, Zacchaeus, you know, according to Scripture, from what we know of tax collectors, I would have to assume he was an evil man.
Zacchaeus was somebody that was probably not well liked. How many of you all love it when you see on your caller ID IRS is calling you? Your heart drops, doesn’t it? You’re like I don’t want to answer this call I know they aren’t calling me to say hi, they’re wanting some money, right? I’ve never had the IRS call me and say, “Hey you’ve paid fifteen thousand dollars too much in taxes, here’s a refund.” It’s usually not a good sign when the tax collector calls, so here’s here’s the key as the Bible talks about a tax collector, a chief tax collector, and I would have to assume he’s a wicked man. I don’t want to put words that’s not in the Bible but being a tax collector, he was not people’s favorite. Let’s just say the Bible says he was a man that was short of stature. He was a short brother and he heard one day that Jesus was coming to his town wherever he was at at that time, and so because he was a short man he read he ran on up ahead of the crowd and he climbed up into a tree so he could just see Jesus.
