Big question this week: How do we make sense of church history’s persistent patterns of corruption, hypocrisy, and exploitation?

I wrote last week about the church being the Body of Christ, citing multiple verses from scripture that testify to the organic connectedness of church members and the supernatural power of Christ’s headship. 

My main point was that being physically away from “church”, the building, doesn’t actually separate church members who remain spiritually united with “church”, the Body of Christ / one another. 

My main goal was comforting those of us who are missing corporate worship and the tangible presence of one another (what we usually experience inside our church buildings) – as many of us are forced to stay away, by Covid or by winter storm damage. 

This week’s question has to be answered based on that foundational understanding of “church”, so I’ll reiterate the basics:

1. The church is the Body of Christ (not buildings); 
2. Members of the church constitute the working limbs of the Body of Christ under Christ, the head; 
3. Church connection is like bodily connection – we rely on one another for full function, and any disease or wound in one affects all the others; 
4. The church is God’s idea – Jesus called the disciple Peter “the rock” and specified that the church founded on that rock would prevail even against the gates of Hell (Matthew 16:18).

Friends, given that foundation, how do we make sense of church history’s persistent patterns of corruption, hypocrisy, and exploitation?

Church starts with Peter

It’s helpful to be reminded of the setting for Jesus’s declaration to Peter about his being the rock / the solid foundation for the church. Peter had just declared that Jesus was the Messiah – a gutsy, even audacious statement for the famously foot-in-mouth disciple to make. Where all the learned leaders of the Jewish people in Jesus’s day did NOT get it, Peter DID. Peter recognized in Jesus the One promised to the Jewish people centuries before – the One who was the Promise, in Himself. 

Here is the full passage:

¹³ Now when Jesus came into the district of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?” ¹⁴ And they said, “Some say John the Baptist, but others Elijah, and still others Jeremiah or one of the prophets.” ¹⁵ He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?” ¹⁶ Simon Peter answered, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.” ¹⁷ And Jesus answered him, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah! For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father in heaven. ¹⁸ And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not prevail against it. ¹⁹ I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.” Matthew 16:13 – 19

Incredible stuff, right? Peter, receiving divine truth from God and voicing that truth to God’s Son! Amazing.

But just a few verses later, as Jesus describes the excruciating ordeal (execution by torture) that awaits him in Jerusalem, things take a drastic turn: 

²² And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him, saying, “God forbid it, Lord! This must never happen to you.” ²³ But Jesus turned and said to Peter, “Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; for you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.” Matthew 16:22 – 23

Think about that: Peter goes from the divinely-inspired and insightful Rock on which Jesus will build his church, to Satan / stumbling block – in a paragraph! How did it happen? How could it happen? Further, given that Jesus is the Truth, how can both of His statements to Peter be true? How can Peter be both the rock on which the church will stand inviolable, and Satan?

From Rock of Ages to Satanic Stumbling Block

Clearly, some seismic shift has occurred in the few lines between Peter’s anointed declaration and Peter’s damnable exhortation. 

Jesus, ever the Light-shedder, makes it clear that the shift has happened in Peter’s head: “You are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things” Jesus rebukes him. 

Contrast that with Jesus’s commendation, “For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father in heaven.” 

Earlier, Peter receives wisdom, clarity, and truth from God. 

Later, Peter listens to his own heart, recoils from the thought of his beloved friend suffering, and voices his objections. 

Earlier, a supernatural insight. 

Later, a “natural” reaction – a human reaction. 

Jesus identifies each of Peter’s sources, and reacts accordingly. 

Jesus endorses the one source as anointed and trustworthy and rejects the other as flawed and potentially demonic. 

And Jesus teaches that the (short) bridge from one to the other is mindset.

Peter lives this mindset-is-matrix paradigm out for our instruction, multiple times, in the gospels and the book of Acts. Peter, the Rock on which Jesus built the church, has miraculous power to heal, to persuade, to escape from prison, to lead thousands to salvation! (See Acts 2, 3, and 12) 

But Peter, operating in his flesh nature, denies Christ three times, resists revelation about Gentile inclusion in Christianity, and even prompts a rebuke from Paul about caving to the opinion of the “circumcision party.” (See Luke 22:54 – 62, Acts 10:9 – 17, and Galatians 2:11 – 13) 

The best, most concentrated bit of mindset-teaching occurs in Matthew 14:22 – 23, when Peter briefly joins Jesus in a walk on the water… then sinks like a stone when he shifts his focus from Jesus to the water. 

What (who) holds Peter’s gaze… what (who) has Peter’s ear… what (who) shapes Peter’s understanding… determines Peter’s status: rock-solid church founder, or Satanic stumbling block.

Only Two Options

Discipleship, Peter’s example demonstrates, is all about the head. Headship (as in, who is in charge) doesn’t just matter – it’s the very heart of the matter. Critically important for us to grasp: Peter’s headship choices – God, or self – are the only options available when it comes to headship. 

In our age of limitless options, 24/7, in everything from fried chicken to sitcoms, this either / or proposition can be hard to conceptualize. We are trained – by every facet of our culture – to demand multiple options! In the case of spiritual headship, Friends, we have only two. (Although it must be noted that when we choose “self,” all kinds of other authority figures jump in with both feet. Money, image, power, ambition, comfort, cultural approval, popular opinion… watch the legion rush in, as soon as we turn away from God…) 

Peter, our fore-runner and elder brother in the faith, clearly reveals to us these two options. Peter shows us the consequences of our choosing one option or the other. Peter also witnesses to us the reliability of our assured Helper, the One who is ever ready to back us up in our choice of Him, the One who forgives us when we choose not-Him, the One redeems us for future right choices, to boot. 

In summary, Peter’s relationship with Jesus is a template for our relationship with Jesus – showing us how beautifully Christ’s headship operates over us; also showing us how ugly things get when we try to take Jesus’s job over and be “the boss” of ourselves. Peter is also a template for the church’s relationship with Jesus. Like individual disciples, the church – disciples operating collectively as the Body of Christ – has only these headship options: God, or self. 

Forgiveness: Gift of Grace

But acknowledging all this does not quite answer our question “How do we make sense of church history’s persistent patterns of corruption, hypocrisy, and exploitation?”, does it?

Even when we’re clear on the binary choice of headship and the one right answer – Christ — we are left wondering what to think about all that horrific church history. Indeed, knowing clearly what the church is supposed to be – the Body of Christ – makes the accumulation of actions contrary to Christ on the church’s record all the more troubling.

But here is where our understanding of the nature of “church” assists us. Recall that for the church, the headship of Christ must be in place… or it is not the church. 

If the church is the Body of Christ, then the church without Christ at its head is just a decapitated body. As such, all it is able to do is spew blood, twitching in death throes. 

Blessedly, when the church is truly Christ’s Body, when Christ’s headship is in full force and effect, then the heart of the church recoils and repents of its horrific history – turning from death to life, quite literally. And when the church repents, the church, (like Peter, like each and all of us) receives forgiveness.   

Peter’s model here, again, shows us the way. Encountering the risen Christ in the last chapter of John’s gospel, Peter is burdened by the guilt of his three denials of Jesus prior to the crucifixion. But Peter doesn’t allow his guilt to be a barrier – he literally dives into the sea and swims ashore at the first sight of Jesus, unwilling to wait until the boat is on the beach!

Jesus receives Peter’s eager humility and restores their relationship through a series of specific steps. First, Jesus gets Peter alone. Then, when it is just the two of them, Jesus takes Peter for a walk. Using Peter’s given name (his pre-church-founder-name), Simon, Jesus asks three times, “Do you love me?” 

Peter’s three “yes” responses re-establish Peter’s place as the rock on which Jesus is going to build His church. “Feed my sheep,” Jesus tells Peter. “Feed my lambs,” says the Lamb of God Shepherd. 

Jesus’s questions here allow Peter to voice full repentance, and Jesus’s instructions here reiterate Peter’s call to establish the church.

As in our other examples, Peter models for us the process by which the church is reconciled to Christ. Guilt must propel us back toward the Head of the Body, back toward Christ! Earnest humility must remind us that love of Christ is our healing as certainly as love of Christ is our vocation. 

When the Body responds “yes!” to Jesus’s question, “Do you love me?” we are echoing Peter’s church-establishing declaration: “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God!” 

And when the church, like Peter, responds, “yes!” to Jesus’s command: “Feed my sheep,” Christ’s Body receives again the keys of the kingdom, and the gates of Hades will not prevail against it.

Up next week:

Schism – 

divorce (dismemberment) in the Body of Christ