Identity Gift!

Sermon Summary:

This Advent message invites us into a profound exploration of identity—both Christ’s and our own. Drawing from Matthew 16, we encounter a pivotal moment when Jesus reveals that His path to the throne involves suffering, sacrifice, and humility rather than earthly conquest. Peter’s dramatic shift from being blessed to being rebuked reminds us how quickly we can fall into the trap of reducing God’s grand story to fit our limited expectations. The sermon challenges us to resist the cultural temptation of creating a ‘customized Jesus’ who accommodates our preferences rather than transforming our lives. At Caesarea Philippi, a place historically associated with pagan worship and humanity’s failed attempts to find meaning, Jesus asks the ultimate question: ‘Who am I?’ This geographic choice is significant—it represents centuries of people seeking identity and purpose apart from the one true God. The message powerfully asserts that true discipleship requires denying ourselves, taking up our cross, and following Jesus into His mission of redemption. Our identity crisis finds its only lasting solution in Christ, who offers us not just forgiveness but complete transformation. When we surrender our earthly perspectives and embrace His revelation, we discover our authentic selves—hidden with Christ in God, destined for glory. This is the Christmas gift that keeps giving: a new identity rooted not in what we accomplish or how others perceive us, but in being formed by Jesus as we follow Him.

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Sermon Points:

Key Takeaways:

• Jesus is a different kind of king with a different kind of kingdom than earthly expectations
• The mission of Jesus is the great plan of redemption, requiring His suffering and sacrifice
• True identity of Jesus can only be understood through spiritual revelation from God, not human reasoning
• The cultural temptation is to reduce the “good news” to “our news,” creating a crossless Jesus that robs the gospel of its power
• Every human being searches for the fundamental questions: “Who am I?” and “Why am I here?”
• A disciple is defined as “a person being formed by Jesus as they follow Him in accomplishing His mission”
• True discipleship requires denying ourselves, taking up our cross, and following Jesus
• Our most valuable possession is our soul—our core identity as human beings created in God’s image
• In Christ, believers become new creations; the old perspective is gone and the new has come
• Our identity is hidden with Christ in God, and we will appear with Him in glory

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Scripture References:

• Matthew 16:21-28 (primary text)
• Matthew 1 (Jesus named to save people from their sins)
• 2 Corinthians 5:17 (new creation in Christ)
• Galatians 2:20 (crucified with Christ, Christ lives in me)
• Colossians 3:1-4 (raised with Christ, life hidden with Christ in God)

Stories:

• The wise men bringing gifts to Jesus at the first Christmas, establishing the tradition of gift-giving
• Peter’s dramatic shift from being blessed by Jesus (verse 17) to being rebuked as Satan (verse 23) within moments
• The historical significance of Caesarea Philippi as a place of pagan worship, the Gates of Hades, where people sought gods for centuries without finding the true God
• Personal anecdotes of mistaken identity—people confusing the pastor with Joel Osteen at funerals, airports, and bookstores
• Frank Abagnale’s story from “Catch Me If You Can” as an example of forged identity
• Philip Cummings’ identity theft scheme in 2001-2002, selling 33,000 credit reports and causing over $100 million in fraud

Sermon Transcript:

And everyone just said, wow, right? Is that what we say? Thank you so much. Worship ministry. And certainly we are grateful that, brought snow. Found his way to Arlington, Texas. He’s such a fine young man. Proud of him.

So you know that, we are approaching the end of 2025. Hard to believe. And our theme has been flourishing together, rooted in Christ. And we’re going to continue this theme of flourishing together over the next couple of years, at least. And for advent, our theme is The King. And you may remember that I shared with you that beginning last Sunday morning, the sermons are actually connected to this acrostic king.

So last Sunday I preached the message born the king there a prince. Today the message is identity gift. We’ll get to that in just a moment. Next Sunday, now and not yet. And then the final Sunday of December. Go now. And so today, historically, when the church lights advent candles during this season of advent, on the third Sunday of Advent, we light the candle of joy.

And, we just had the Von Trapp family do that for us this morning. And, I’m just kidding. Alison, I, I told Aaron I was going to say that before y’all came out, and y’all just not come out. I was going to say the Von Trapp family.

The von Trapp family. Anyway, if you haven’t seen the movie, make sense to you, but nevertheless, we are grateful for that family as well. So you light the candle of joy on the third Sunday of Advent. You see that it’s typically it’s colored pink in the advent wreath. And one of the signs of human flourishing is the presence of true joy.

And at the heart of the advent, at the heart of advent, rather to me is this declaration Joy to the world, the Lord has come. Now why is this joy available to us? Well, you and I know that as much as this celebration is about the birth of Jesus, and indeed it is, we know that Christmas is one part of the entire message of the Good News.

The story does not end in Bethlehem. In fact, from an earthly perspective, that’s where it begins. And so at Christmas, as Christians, we celebrate and acknowledge all that that story brings. But what does the story of Christmas bring? What’s the new King and consequently a new kingdom, and then an invitation to be a part of that new kingdom?

That’s really the message of Christmas. And we know that Christmas so often is associated with gift giving. The tradition dates back to the very first Christmas, when the wise men, as we studied last week, brought gifts to Jesus. And so today, I want us to think about a gift, a Christmas gift that Jesus gives to us. And so I’ve entitled the message identity, gift.

And the text is found in Matthew 16. I realized this would not be a traditional advent text, but I want to connect it, if I may today, to the celebration of Christmas. So we’re going to begin reading in verse 21 of Matthew 16. It’s our custom if you’re able to stand and honor the Lord Jesus when we hear the gospel read today.

So I invite you to stand with me if you can. And let’s hear this text as Matthew shares this particular event out of the life of Jesus. In Matthew 16, beginning in verse 21, from that time on, Jesus began to explain to his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things at the hands of the elders, the chief priests, and the teachers of the law.

And then he must be killed, and on the third day be raised to life. Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. Never, Lord, he said, this shall never happen to you. Jesus turned and said to Peter, get behind me, Satan. You’re a stumbling block to me. You do not have in mind the concerns of God, but merely human concerns.

And then Jesus said to his disciples, whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it. What good will it be for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? Or what can anyone give in exchange for their soul?

But the Son of Man is going to come in his father’s glory with his angels, and then he will reward each person according to what they have done. Truly, I tell you, some who are standing here will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom. Thank you. You may be seated.

So today I want us to have a conversation about identity. And let’s begin with the identity of Jesus. Who is Jesus and what is his mission? In the first century, as we have been studying over the last couple of weeks, we know there are a lot of expectations in the ancient world. And certainly the Jews had expectations about the Messiah and his mission.

For many of the Jewish leaders, the vision that they had for the Messiah was an earthly vision, and it was their understanding that he would answer the power of the empires. They had already experienced the exertion of power from the empires around them, like Assyria and Babylon and Persia, and the Greeks and the Parthians and the Romans. And so they understood about the power of an empire, or of a kingdom.

It was their sense, hope, expectation that the Messiah would come, and he would establish his empire and restore the glory to Israel. And so there were expectations surrounding the messianic era. Well, Matthew 16, it records, Matthew records four episodes from the life of Jesus, where he reveals that the kingdom of heaven cannot be fully understood from an earthly perspective, because the kingdom of Heaven is a different kind of kingdom.

And Jesus, it turns out, is a different kind of king. Now that is good news. But it was hard news when it was first delivered, because these men in particular, who were following Jesus, they had expectation. So if you still have your Bibles open, let me just let me just look at it with you real quickly. If you go back to chapter 16, just the first episode, the Pharisees, the Sadducees said, show us that you’re the Messiah.

Show us a sign from heaven. Now what did that mean? That meant he needed to show them something that would prove to them he was the Messiah. So he had to fulfill their expectations. Does that make sense? I said, show us what we’re expecting, and then we will believe that you are who you claim to be. They wanted some kind of miracle.

Jesus will rebuke them. And then you come to the second episode in verse five, and the disciples are still trying to figure all this out. And Jesus basically says to them, don’t give in to the Pharisees and the Sadducees and their expectations of the Messiah. Don’t fall into their trap. Then you come to verse 13, and Jesus takes them about 30 miles or so north, and they are in the area of Caesarea Philippi.

And is there that Jesus reveals to them this powerful transformational message that the church is going to be this spiritual phenomenon on earth, connected to heaven, and the church will live out the reality of the kingdom of heaven on earth. Then we come to our text, verse 21, and Jesus begins to talk to them about exactly what kind of Messiah he’s going to be.

We’re about six months away from the crucifixion when you’re in Matthew 16. So we have about a half a year left. And what is Jesus going to pack into those final six months? Well, he’s going to help his disciples understand that he’s going to be a different kind of Messiah. His path to the throne is going to be one of suffering and one of sacrifice and one of humility.

But it is necessary because of his mission. Well, what is the mission of Jesus? It’s the great plan of redemption, and it can only be accomplished through his sacrifice and his suffering. It’s a matter of fact. It connects all the way back to Matthew one, when the angel spoke to Joseph and said, name this boy Jesus because he is going to make everyone feel better about themselves.

Right. He’s going to encourage you in whatever feels good to you. Now here’s what the angel said. You remember what it says. Name him Jesus because he will save his people from their sins. In other words, this is a spiritual eternal kingdom, and a part of the journey necessarily will be sacrificed so that sins can be forgiven because sins are real and and we’ve all been affected by sin.

And then Jesus says, if you will embrace this perspective, if you follow me as this kind of Messiah, you will then participate in the glory that’s going to be revealed. And guess what? They’re going to get a glimpse of it as a matter of fact, I believe what what verse 28 means some of you are going to see the coming of the Son of Man or the Son of God, and his kingdom is going to take place in the next event.

The Transfiguration. And so these some of these disciples are actually going to see the glory of God pointing to a greater day of fulfillment. So who is Jesus? What is the Messiah? What’s his mission? The great plan of redemption? Now, the true identity of Jesus, though, has to be revealed by God and discern, discern through spiritual sensitivity to God’s revelation.

In other words, you are not going to be able to recognize Jesus for who he is by just pure human reasoning. That’s what the Pharisees, Sadducees, religious leaders had. That’s not going to work. As a matter of fact, if you have your Bibles open, if you look back in Matthew 16, Jesus asks the disciples, there are Caesarea Philippi.

Who do you all think I am? You remember Simon Peter answers it. And then Jesus says this in verse 17, blessed are you, Simon, son of Jonah. This was not revealed to you by flesh and blood, but by my father in heaven. So the only way you can know this is to receive the revelation from God. That means that you and I have to open ourselves up, just like these men did, to the revelation from God about himself, his plan, and his son.

If you choose to approach Jesus from a purely earthly perspective, you will miss the very reason for his existence and you’ll never understand who he is. As a matter of fact, isn’t it interesting how quickly Simon Peter falls right back into the trap? So let’s look at it with me. Look at, what this text says in Matthew 16.

In verse 17, Jesus says this to Simon Peter, blessed are you, Simon. He affirms him. He applauds him. He blesses him. All right. Now look at verse 23. Jesus in verse 23 says to Peter, get behind me, Satan. Man, you quickly go from the penthouse to the outhouse, right? I mean, he is blessed by Jesus. And now all of a sudden he says, you’re being controlled by Satan.

Are you kidding me? Well, what happened? Wow. Well, Peter made a crucial mistake when he says to Jesus, I love how Matthew puts it, verse 22, don’t you? Don’t you kind of imagine? Don’t you wish Peter was there to read Matthew’s gospel? Say, come on. Don’t put that I rebuked him, I don’t really rebuke him. Matthew says, I was there.

I saw you were being too. I’m putting it in my book. Do you want that read about you. And Dennis rebuked Jesus. Okay. I do not want that sinners to be said. That’s another Dennis. That’s not me. Peter rebuked Jesus, and here’s what he said to him. He says, this is not the path. You’re not going to be crucified.

No, we’re not going to allow it. Because, you see, we know who the Messiah is supposed to be, and that is not messianic. He made a crucial mistake. It’s a common one. As a matter of fact, that mistake is still being made today. Here’s the temptation. The temptation. Peter faced the Pharisees and Sadducees. The temptation many people face right now.

And our culture is turning the big story into our story.

You reduce the good news to our news, and then you truncate or reduce the gospel to just accommodate the earthly perspective of our era. You see, Peter wanted a certain kind of Messiah. Well, today we have people who want our kind of Jesus. And, you know, the kind of Jesus we want in our culture. We want a warm, gentle Jesus full of grace, set by an understanding, an aging grandfather in heaven known sometimes as God.

That’s the mistake my culture makes. That’s the Jesus my culture wants. Well, I’m here to tell you Jesus rebuked it in his day. He’s rebuking in this day. If you want to turn the big story into your story, if you want to turn the good news into your news, then you will miss out on everything that Jesus stands for and everything he’s done.

You see, our news doesn’t lead to eternal life. Our news doesn’t lead to transformation of anyone. It’s the good news that leads to eternal life. It’s the good news that leads to the transformation of people’s lives. Because if you reduce the good news to your news, you robbed the gospel of its power. Sometimes that’s referred to as theologians as cheap grace.

And so often we have Christians in our day who want to offer our world a cross less Jesus.

It’s a dangerous mistake. You and I as Protestants, sometimes we shudder when we walk into the churches where our Catholic brothers and sisters worship, because they often have Jesus still on the cross.

What I would say about that is I believe powerfully in the resurrection, and I don’t believe Jesus is still on the cross. The Protestants need to be reminded he was on the cross, though. And if all you have is an empty cross, I would continue to have an empty gospel.

And it’s not good news. The good news includes the true message of Jesus. And you know what we need? We need the gospel. It’s a matter of fact. It’s the only answer. And without it, human beings remain trapped in an identity crisis. And they’re seeking an identity. As a matter of fact, our culture is infatuated with identity. We just are.

As a matter of fact, when we talk about identity and our society, sometimes we talk about mistaken identity, forged identity, stolen identity. We’re worried about our identity, aren’t we? Talk about it all the time. Let me ask you all this. Have you all ever heard of Joel Osteen? Yes. Have you? Have you ever seen him on TV or seen a picture of him?

Let me show you a photo of Joel Osteen. Okay. Do you know, people stop me sometimes and think that I’m Joel Osteen? It’s happened to me many times. I don’t see it. Okay. I was doing a funeral one time over at Shannon Hill. Funeral director came up from Houston, and he was standing there watching Fallon. When the funeral was over.

He walked over to me, said, I can’t believe you came all the way from Houston to do this Lalo funeral. He said, where’s your entourage? I said, well, I don’t, I don’t, I don’t have an entourage. It only took me like six minutes to get here. And then I realized and I said, oh, I’m sorry, I’m not who you think I am.

He said, aren’t you that preacher on TV? I said, what kind of.

But I’m not the one you’re thinking of. I was sitting in an airport in Houston one time, dressed in a suit, reading a magazine. A guy walked up to me and said, my wife thinks you’re awesome.

I knew exactly what he meant. I just kind of looked at him, and Guy sitting next to me said, what in the world does that mean?

I said, he thinks I’m the guy. I walked off. I said, he thinks I’m Joel Osteen. Two Christmases ago, our fan was in Barnes and Noble. A young man walked up to me and said, oh my God, in a bookstore. Of course, in a bookstore. Where’s all your people? And I just looked at him and he said, come on, man, I can’t believe you just walk into a bookstore right here at Christmas.

I said, I’ve got to call my wife. I said, before you call her. Let me introduce you to my son. Just out walked them. Said he ain’t Joel Osteen, okay? He’s not. It’s a case of mistaken identity. It happens sometimes. Sometimes identity, though, is forged. You all know the story of Frank Abagnale, right? The Catch Me If You Can movie where the supposedly in his life when he was younger, he pretended to be an airplane pilot.

You remember that story? And a doctor and an attorney. Some people have debunked some of those, but the bottom line is he spent a part of his life pretending to be somebody he wasn’t. So many people do that. It’s a fake expression of who they really are. But the one we’re most concerned about as Americans is identity theft, right?

I don’t know if remember the story, Phillip Cummings. I don’t know if you know this guy or not or remember what happened to him, but in 2001 and 2002, he worked at a at a helpdesk for a software company in Long Island. When he quit his job, he took this massive amount of information on a spreadsheet that had thousands of people’s credit reports printed, and he sold 33,000 credit reports for $30 a piece to a scamming company that ended up making over $100 million on people’s stolen identities.

So identity is incredibly important. So let me ask you this question this morning. Who are we? What’s our mission? Jesus is the Messiah. He’s the real Messiah. He’s the Son of God, his king. His mission is the great plan of redemption. Well, who are we? What’s our mission? You know, I’ve been on this earth a long time. I’ve watched a lot of people.

I would tell you, this is the fundamental search for human beings. Who am I and why am I on this planet? Every human being. What’s the answer to that question? Jesus offers the answer to this fundamental dilemma. So here’s what I would say this morning as followers of Jesus, we are called to be his disciples, and he invites us to a lifetime of intentional discipleship.

It’s a personal journey. Our perspective on everything changes as we join Jesus in His purpose. Jesus here in Matthew 16, six months before he’s going to die. Right before our text, he takes his disciples to Sisera. Philippi. Wonder why I did that? Well, says Philip, here’s a very famous place in Jesus’s day. In fact, it was a very famous place in the Old Testament where Jeroboam, who set up an altar there to build it, was associated with all kinds of pagan worship.

It had been for centuries. As a matter of fact, by the time Jesus was alive, it was associated with the gods of fertility and the goddesses of fertility. The great god of Roman god, a pan, was worshiped there. And just under the cliff, for Caesarea Philippi was located. It was a huge cave. That cave was known as the Gates of Hades, and there was a cave behind it.

And the ancient people believed that that’s where the gods and goddesses of fertility vacationed during the winter time. So they came there and made all kinds of sacrifices in hopes that they could meet a God, any God. It represented geographically, a place where human beings had been grappling with the fundamental question of life for centuries, without consulting the one and only true God of the universe.

In other words, a human perspective, limited in its horizon is a frail attempt that will always fall short. Jesus takes his disciples to that very spot where people have failed to meet the one and true God. And he asked them, who am I? And he offers them a transformative, eternal lesson that he is the son of the living God, not these dead gods and goddesses.

He’s the son of the living God, and His church will follow him in the fulfillment of his mission. And so, who are you? Well, you’re a disciple if you follow Jesus. Let me give you our working definition of a disciple here at our church. This is what we’re using as we’re launching the intentional discipleship effort at our church.

Disciples a person being formed by Jesus as they follow him in accomplishing his mission. Trying to study this succinctly as we can. Well, who’s a disciple? It’s a person being formed by Jesus. So they’re form it being formed and they’re following. That means we’re giving our hearts and our minds over to his revelation, rather than trying to conjure it up all on our own, because we have learned the lesson of history.

If you do that, you will always fall short, just like Simon Peter did, and you can do it really quickly. You can move from blessing to judgment quickly when you lose your perspective. So as disciples, our identity is no longer rooted in our earthly perspective or our earthly purposes. Because Jesus teaches us in this text, we have denied ourselves taking up the cross and we now follow Jesus.

You see, the calling of Jesus is not easy. That’s not the message of Christmas, but it does lead to life. As a matter of fact, look back and look back at our text. Jesus says this to us if you lose your life in my calls, you will then find real life. If you’ll surrender your perspective and receive mine, it’ll change you forever.

If you’ll take up your cross. Here’s what Jesus said to Simon Peter not only am I going to die, not only am I going to die. You’ve got to take up your cross to deny yourself. And he says, you know why? Because look at. Look at what he says. Look at verse 26. The most valuable possession you have is your core identity, your soul, who you are as a person.

You could gain the whole world and never come to grips with who you really are. And what good is that? Jesus says. You don’t want to miss it. You don’t want to lose your soul. You don’t want to lose your identity as a human being because you’ve been created in the image of God, destined for glory to share with his Son.

And Jesus offers that to us. The rest of the New Testament bears that out. Let me just show you really quickly. Here’s what Paul says in second Corinthians 517. Y’all still with me? And here’s what Paul says. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation is come. The old is gone and the new is here. The old perspective is gone.

Expecting everything to fulfill my expectations. That’s gone. Having my own image of Jesus that’s gone. Having my understanding the Messiah that’s gone. It’s been replaced by something brand new. My soul has been rescued, delivered, saved, recreated, reborn. And everything changes. My perspective changes. Augustine said seek not to understand. So you may believe. Believe so that you’ll understand. You put your faith in Christ first.

It’s a challenging journey, I get it. It’s a it’s a hard message. I understand it, but it’s the only one that leads to life, though. Here’s what Jesus said back in Matthew 16. Let’s look at it one more time. Jesus said to his disciples, whoever wants to be my disciple, you must resist your own understanding. Deny yourself, take up your cross, put that old self to death, and follow me.

Follow Jesus. And notice what he says. Whoever wants to save their life will lose it. But whoever loses their life for me will find it. There’s the great reward. Life. What good will it be for someone to gain the whole world, and yet forfeit their own core identity as a human being? What can anyone give in exchange for that core identity as a human being created in the image of God?

Your soul. He says, the Son of Man is going to come in his father’s glory with the angels, and he’ll reward each person according to what they’ve done. In other words, there’s a great reward in front of us. The hope is the future glory of Jesus and the restoration of all things. Paul puts it like this. How does Paul interpret this teaching?

Here’s what Paul says. I’ve been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ now lives in me. The life I now live in the body I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. Who’s the model of taking up a cross? Jesus. And he challenges us because, see, the reality is, I’m a sinner and I’m going to struggle with my sinful condition.

I’ve got to address my own sin. I don’t expect Jesus to accommodate my sin. He’s never done that for anybody. Why would he do it for me? Jesus is there for us to put sin to death. And he showed us how serious he takes it. He actually died on the cross for our sin. Come on y’all.

So I can live fully into my identity and my mission because of what Jesus has done. Here’s the good news though, y’all. One other thing it doesn’t end at the cross. As meaningful as it calls is. Here’s what Paul says. Since then you’ve been raised with Christ. There is the resurrection. Set your hearts on things above where Christ is seated at the right hand of God.

Set your mind on things above, not on earthly things. In other words, get this new perspective because you died and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. And when Christ, who is your life, appears, then you will also appear with him in glory. I love that text, y’all, because it turns out our identity is actually in Christ forever.

He shepherds us and he shapes us. And wherever he puts you, wherever he places you and your family in your neighborhood and your school and your vocation and your life, he’s giving you this precious gift of life. And he challenges me in you to live it among those who need it as well. So let’s close with this. It’s Christmas.

So here’s what I invite you to do. Unwrap your personalized gift from Jesus. You got a gift under the tree. He’s the king. Let him save you. Let him shepherd you. Let him shape you. And you will find true life as you serve him. And there it is, y’all. It’s a lifetime of intentional discipleship. Here’s what I hope it will lead to.

For each and every one of you. When it’s all over, you’ll hear this. Your name. And then. Well done. Good. And faithful servant. May it be so. Let’s pray together.

Father, we thank you for the message of Christmas. This incredible story that still draws us to the manger today. And we thank you that there’s power in this story and that it doesn’t end in Bethlehem. As beautiful as Bethlehem is. We thank you, Lord, that Jesus not just born a king, but he lived as king and he reigns as king.

May he rule as king in our hearts for his sake. In his name we pray. Amen.