Saint Peter and This Life We Live

For some reason I can’t explain
I know Saint Peter won’t call my name
Never an honest word
But that was when I ruled the world - Coldplay


A few weeks ago as I drove along, heading to Sam’s Club, the Coldplay song, Viva la Vida came on the radio. I have heard this song many times and knew most the lyrics so I sang along. When the stanza citing Saint Peter came along I belted it out and suddenly it gave me great pause. Thoughts rushed in and I found myself quite perturbed over this idea of Saint Peter calling my name at heaven’s gate. Now don’t get me wrong. I love Peter to death; he has always been my favorite apostle but when I get to heaven he is not the first person I want to see. How on earth did Peter end up in Christian tradition as heaven’s bouncer anyway? Well, in all fairness, Peter did not receive that role through legitimate tradition but assumed that role more for the sake of making good jokes. But needless to say throughout Church History there was indeed a strange affinity for Peter and his supreme pontific role, and so I must analyze why this was.

Let me begin by working backwards… I could work forwards but I always prefer to take you along the thought process I used and in this particular instance I traveled backwards.

When I arrive in heaven at the end of this life the first person I want to see is my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. I want to see his face at the gate. I want him to speak my name in love and say to me, “I know you.” I want him to take my hand, lead me inside those pearly gates, and show me all the wonderful things he has prepared for me. I don’t want to see Peter (sorry Peter, no offense). But what would it take for Jesus to truly “know” me?

Jesus’ character is quite complex. That’s the greatest understatement of all time. We’re talking about the character of God here. Jesus embodies the characteristics we love to dote on – the fruit of the Spirit – love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self control. When we think of those characteristics then of course it is easy to love Christ. But what happens when we do not have those characteristics in our own lives and the nature of Christ comes into conflict with our very own flesh nature? What then? I believe that when Christ comes into contact with our flesh there is a battle waged. He is all of the sudden transformed into the Christ of Matthew 21:12 and God forces us to witness the “Cleansing of the Temple”. We literally see the very essence of Christ enter in and overturn the selfish ambitions we cling to, the idols we have erected, and the thrones we have set up. Have you met this Christ? I dare say you cannot meet one without meeting first the other. The fruits of the Spirit cannot be cultivated if the temple is not first cleansed. It is a conflict of interest.

Early Gnostics fell into the trap of thinking that somehow the God of the New Testament differed from that of the Old Testament. They never made the connection between the God who hates sin and the God who loves humanity. Well, they are one and the same but come to fullness within the person who is Christ. As you study Christ throughout the New Testament you will realize that his tolerance of sin remains the same as that of the God of the Old Testament. The only difference is that his presence here on earth finally made it possible for God to confront and remove the sin that plagues us. Christ does not ever ignore or tolerate sin but instead cleanses us and removes it.

In the final judgment when the entire world comes face to face with the reality of sin, the image of Christ that appears is one that sparks a great amount of fear. Regardless of what your “end-times” views are, if there is sin in your life, that sin will experience God’s wrath.

All of this to say, there are many facets to the character of Christ and if we are to follow him we must truly know him and all that is him and not just take the parts that are pleasing to us. If we take only those parts of his character that make us feel good but fail to recognize the part of Christ that confronts our selfish sin nature then he can never truly transform us.

So what does that all have to do with Saint Peter? It’s not just Peter but all forms of intermediaries and buffers we attempt to place between us and Christ. We act like the Israelites of old. “God, don’t speak directly to us! Speak to someone else and he’ll pass it along to me. Coming face to face with you is too terrifying!”

If you follow Church History closely you can see that in the presence of saints and earthly intermediaries we begin to look very much like that unclean temple; full of all sorts of practices and purchases guaranteed to grant us access to heaven. Once we remove these obstacles we gain a much clearer view of Christ. But beware of the opposite extreme that accepts only the pleasurable, intimate characteristics of Christ and ignores his Lordship and confrontational aspects making him instead a God who tolerates all manner of sin. The result is that when we take on the command to become “Christ-like” we also become tolerant of all manner of sin in our own lives and in the lives of others and we never truly encourage each other to grow and change. Loving God and loving others should never translate to loving sin.

The true nature of Christ in addition to loving humanity is also confrontational, terrifying, angry, and saddened in the presence of sin. The mentality of having an intermediary other than Christ is this: if we can place enough space between the hard to accept characteristics of Christ then perhaps we can rub shoulders with him without having to look him in the face or ever truly giving up those selfish ambitions that rule our lives. If I muddle through life in this mindset then when I finally arrive at that gate I may very well run into Saint Peter. Christ sure isn’t going to know who I am or come out to greet me. As difficult as the experience will be, I want to look my savior in the face, allow him to root out sin and cultivate his fruit in my life. Peter, my brother, out of the way… I want to see Christ. Who or what stands between you and Christ?