There is some confusion here about who Jesus is. Herod is sure he beheaded John, so Jesus cannot be John raised from the dead. The disciples report that others too, think Jesus might be John or Elijah or another prophet.
There is great confusion today about who Jesus was. Some say He was merely a great teacher. Others deny He ever existed despite historical evidence outside the Bible and the intrinsic historical evidence of this great movement called Christianity that resulted from something.
I subscribe to C.S. Lewis’ theory, “Lord, Lunatic, or Liar.” He is one. But He cannot be any mixture of the three. Erhman is wrong. Nobody dies for a legend they know to be false.
And so we are confessing with Peter. “You are the Christ of God.” I suspect we will have more and more opportunities to make that confession in the years to come. God give us strength to do it. And remember that when we confess just who Jesus is, it means we confess what He did. He was crucified and rose from the dead. His teaching is vitally important, yes. His actions on our behalf, on behalf of the whole fallen world, that’s the real content of His teaching. He is God’s Christ. He is as Peter stated on Pentecost, both Lord [Kyrious, aka Yahweh] and Christ [aka Messiah].
Thanks be to God.
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