Eberhard Bethge - "Experiences with a Top-Text of the Churches" (April 23, 1995)

Sermon start time: 22:42. Sermon end time: 51:05.

Matthew 16, and Peter's confession of Jesus as the Messiah, is one of the central stories of the Christian faith, yet it has had a long and ambivalent history of interpretation, at times being used to oppress and abuse Jews who would not adhere to Peter's confession. What it teaches us, however, is that a confession of the person of Christ cannot be separated from adherence to his way of life, a way marked by humble suffering, not triumphalistic dominance. (Abstract created by Duke Divinity School staff.)

Key quotation: “So simple is the confession of Jesus the Messiah and so complicated at the same time. So God forlorn and so certain, so threatened and so firmly built on a rock, so much Good Friday and so much Easter.”