With My Son at Caesarea Philippi
The place called Banias in the far northern region of Palestine was originally named Paneas by the Greeks, for here, in a magnificent cave, they built a shrine to the pagan nature god Pan. The nearby city of Caesarea Philippi was also the site of a beautiful temple of white stone built by Herod the Great to the honor and glory of the Roman Emperor. The location has significant connections to the false gods and idols of this world.
Jesus Christ chose this pagan region as the place where He would speak to His disciples about the most important question anyone can ever ask regarding Christ: “Whom say ye that I am?” Peter, illuminated by God, was enabled to confess, “Thou are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” The Lord Jesus declared, “I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it” (Matt. 16:15–18). Perhaps as He spoke of the “gates of hell,” the disciples involuntarily shuddered at the thought of the nearby idols devoted to the wicked pleasures and powers. Christ faced them unafraid, confident that He would build a solid church that Satan could not overthrow. Yet Christ also knew, as He proceeded to explain to His disciples, that this victory would require Jesus to “go unto Jerusalem, and suffer many things of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and be raised again the third day” (Matt. 16:21).
If we are going to be Christians, then we must confront the idols of this evil world, and set our faces against them. There can be no faithfulness to God without conflict with the gods of this world. The only way that we can win this spiritual war is by faith in Jesus Christ (1 John 5:5). Everything hinges upon Jesus’ question, “Whom say ye that I am?” If your heart rests upon Jesus as the Son of God, sent by His Father to be the Christ, the anointed prophet, priest, and king of His people, then you have a rock on which to stand that the whole world cannot shake.
Faith in Christ is not easy, but He is worthy. It is not a matter of merely confessing Christ with our lips, but of believing in Him with our hearts. In the shadow of pagan idols and human empires, it would have been easy for the disciples to look at the son of a carpenter and think, “Him? The Son of God?” Similarly today, false religion and secular powers may hang like mountains over the little flock of God’s faithful, ready to crush God’s church. And indeed, we must take up our crosses to follow Christ. But if we are convinced that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God, then all earthly powers are as grasshoppers before Him.
