“But what about you?” he asked. “Who do you say I am?” Peter answered, “You are the Christ.” (Mark 8:29)
WHEN OUR SON BRIAN WAS TEN, our family visited a church close to our home. The preaching was good, and so was Sunday school, with one exception. Brian’s teacher expressed the opinion that Jesus was a great man . . . but not the Son of God. Further, the teacher asked his students not to tell the pastor what he had said.
Of course, the Sunday school teacher’s opinion of Jesus was heretical and dangerous. Like all false opinions of Jesus, it was not based on Scripture. If we trace the life of Jesus in the Gospels, read what He said, and observe the miracles He performed, we will arrive at the solid conviction that He is the Son of God. (See John 20:31.)
The disciple Peter often misspoke because his mouth was in drive while his brain was in park, but he spoke correctly and with deep conviction when he identified Jesus as “the Christ, the Son of the living God” (Matt. 16:16).
If we share the good news about Jesus by word and deed, perhaps some faulty opinions about Jesus will give way to the conviction that He is the Christ, the Son of the living God.
We may hold opinions, but convictions hold us. Let’s share our conviction that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God!
Jim Dyet is a retired editor, a part-time pastor, and an avid golfer. He and his wife, Gloria, have been married fifty-five years.
