Who do men say I am?

Jesus’ conversation with the disciples at Caesarea Philippi  in Matthew 16:13-28 includes eight statements, alternating between Jesus and the disciples:

1. Jesus asks who people think he is

2. Disciples: various answers

3. Jesus: Who do you think I am?

4. Peter’s confession

5. Jesus: build church

6. Peter: God forbid

7. Jesus: Get behind Satan

8. Jesus: life by losing life

This seems to have some connections with the creation week.

Peter’s confession that Jesus is the Anointed One, the Son of the Living God, the New David, is in the “Day 4” slot of the conversation.  Jesus is the one who rules from heaven, the Sun and Morning Star.  Jesus responds by promising to build the church on the Rock of Peter, and this fits with the gathering of teeming, swarming things on Day 5.  Peter’s rebuke to Jesus is an Adamic sin, and Jesus’ return trebuke to Peter as Satan is a Sabbatical judgment, the rebuke that Adam should have issued against Satan in the garden.  Finally, Jesus moves beyond the seven-day sequence into an eighth day, a day of new life, where His disciples will find life by losing it.