"Palatable Jesus"

Matthew 16:13-28

Sandwiched in between the greatest confession of Jesus's Deity and the clearest call to total surrender found anywhere in Scripture, we find that Jesus is predicting His death and resurrection. We will take the month of March to prepare for Easter. I hope each week we can get a more precise picture of who Jesus was and what He demanded of His Followers.

Claiming to be religious, invoking the "mush god", convenient faith are certainly not new phenomenons. There has been an expectation that every politician at the end of their speech is going to say, "and God Bless America", and at the acceptance of an award every celebrity will thank God for the win. We hear it and rarely think about the context and the character of the person using God's Name.

While "God" was used at will, the name of Jesus seemed to always be reserved for those who were actually Christians and were genuine in their desire for Him and appreciation of Him. "I want to thank my personal Lord and Savior Jesus Christ" was the statement that got our attention. That is what Joe Gibbs, Toney Dungey and Tim Tebow said.

Over the last year or so, we are hearing more and more from Jelly Roll, Post Malone, Kidd Rock etc. about what Jesus has done for them. I am just not sure their Jesus and mine are the same. I assume if I am confused then others are as well.

Jesus told Peter, "...... you are not mindful of the things of God, but the things of men".

I fear there is a lot of that going on today.

In Christ,

Pastor Todd