And I say unto thee, that thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build My church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. Matthew 16:18
Ever since he was elected, the new pope has been receiving rave reviews as a humble man of the people. From his decision to ride the bus with the other cardinals rather than take the papal limousine, to his rejection of some of the fancy frills of his office, Pope Francis has been noted for being a refreshing change from the stuffiness of many of his predecessors. It is far too early to know, of course, what his reign will be like, although his papacy will travel through very interesting times and will involve some controversial issues. We don’t know if he will encounter any of the scandals and crimes that marked many of the 265 popes that the Roman Catholic church recognized as coming before Francis. But we do know that he holds a position that Scripture does not give him, and that he leads an organization that is headed for eventual destruction as the great whore of Revelation 17 and 18. As we consider the vile atrocities of Catholicism, and the papacy in particular, how thankful we should be that the Lord Jesus did not establish His church upon it.
In our text, the Lord Jesus is speaking of that which the gates of hell shall not prevail against. Revelation 18 makes it clear that the gates of hell will surely prevail against the papacy, its trappings, and its entire organization. So what is the Lord Jesus speaking of in our text? Two verses previous, we find Peter declaring of the Lord Jesus: Thou art the Christ, the Son of the Living God. This great truth is the rock that preserves every born again child of God for time, and for all eternity. All of those who have discovered, like Simon Peter, that the Lord Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the Living God, have this great rock as our foundation forever.
Peter’s great confession contains an acknowledgment of Who the Lord Jesus is, where He came from, why He came to us, what He accomplished for us at Calvary, and what a great salvation he offers to sinful mankind. Pope Francis and a billion other Catholics may make a nominal acknowledgment that the Lord Jesus is the Son of God, but they place their faith, not on His finished work on the cross, but on their observances of the rituals of their religion, and on the unscriptural superstitions that they have assembled. in contrast, the Christian has the rock of simple faith in the Son of God.
The gates of hell speak of eternal judgment against our sin. But that judgment was borne for us at Calvary by the Christ, the son of the living God. And that rock is our refuge forever. -Jim MacIntosh