The Rock of Peter’s Confession

February 20

God inspired Peter to speak his confession, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.” (Matthew 16:16–17) Jesus praises Peter for his insight, and says He will build His unconquerable church on Peter’s confession. And yet, just seven verses later, Jesus looks at Peter and says, “Get behind me, Satan!”

Why the sudden reversal?

It comes down to the second part of verse 23. “You are a hindrance to me because you’re not thinking about God’s concerns but human concerns.” (CSB) Apparently, Peter thought that Jesus was going to build His Church on him, but that is not what Jesus said and, since that fateful moment, millions of others have made this same mistake.

Jesus uses two distinct Greek words in His statement, and this is one place where knowing a little Greek (or at least having access to a Greek lexicon) can help avoid confusion and heresy. Until this point, Peter went by his Hebrew name: Simon. But here, Jesus gives Simon a new name: Peter (Gr., petros), which means “small rock.” Then, Jesus says, “And upon this rock I will build My church.” (v. 18) The Greek word here is petra, which means refers to a huge mass of rock, like a boulder or even larger, like a projecting cliff.”[1]

Think of the Rock of Gibraltar, and now you have the right idea! This is Peter’s confession, that Jesus is the Messiah: “You are the Christ—the Son of the Living God!” (16:16) Peter confessed Jesus’ identity, and the Lord took a moment to congratulate his daring disciple for not only hearing, but boldly declaring what the Father had shown him. Peter declared it, and then Jesus confirmed it: He was/is the cornerstone of the unconquerable church.

Application

Jesus says the gates of hades will not be able to overpower the church. The Greek word behind overpower means to prevail over something or some person so as to be able to defeat, with the implication that the successful participant has greater strength.[2]

A few years ago, I was considering this idea, that the gates of hades would not be able to overcome the church. (Matthew 16:18) I had always assumed that Jesus was referring to the church in a defensive posture, that He was portraying the nature of our warfare as that of the forces of darkness attacking, and the Church was defending its ground. But that’s not what Jesus said. He said, “The gates of hades.” That’s the defensive position. The church is making the offensive assault! Now, that’s a different image altogether, isn’t it?

To be clear, no one in hades can ever be taken out. But we, the Church, can be a part of God’s plan to keep people from going there in the first place by engaging in prayer on their behalf and urging them to turn to Jesus.

Some want to live within the sound
Of church or chapel bell;
I want to run a rescue shop,
Within a yard of hell.
— C.T. Studd —

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[1] 4073,  pétra, Helps Word Studies (Discovery Bible, 2021). https://biblehub.com/greek/4073.htm. Accessed February, 19, 2026.

[2] Louw, Johannes P., and Eugene Albert Nida. Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament: Based on Semantic Domains, Electronic ed. of the 2nd edition., vol. 1, United Bible Societies, 1996, p. 500.

© Copyright 2026 Craig Beaman