Have a look in Matthew, Chapter 16 and you'll see again how Jesus exposes that, behind the self-centred way of life, there is a demonic power. I want you to have a look with me, we referred to this the other day, Verse 21 in Matthew 16. So Jesus spoke, and from that time, Jesus began to show to His disciples He must go to Jerusalem, and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes, be killed and be raised on the third day. So notice what He's saying; I'm going to suffer. I'm going to die, and then I'll rise from the dead. That's quite a good deal isn't it really - if you focus on rising from the dead. But here's the thing. Peter, as he heard Jesus say that, immediately his mind goes into overload, what will happen to me? So this is what he says. He said pity Yourself Lord. He began to rebuke Him, he took Jesus aside and said now listen, don't You go talking cross. Don't You go talking about death. Don't You go talking about suffering, be it far from You Lord, or pity Yourself Lord, this shall not happen to You. Now notice behind it there's an agenda, because if Jesus dies, what's going to happen to Peter? His whole plan of being next to Jesus in the kingdom is going to be ruined, so he looks at Jesus' clear statement of the will of God, and it's just foreign to him, because when we walk in the ways of God, they just are crazy compared to the self-centred way of life.
You know in the world you grab as much as you can, save as much as you can, hold on to as much as you can, you'll get ahead. The kingdom of God, it says learn how to sow, learn how to give, learn how to be generous, and it'll be given to you. No, well that doesn't make any sense at all, so for the natural man thinking from a natural perspective, he will run his life totally different to the spiritual man, who thinks from a kingdom perspective. Our challenge is, as believers, to shift and trust God, and begin to learn to live out of kingdom principles. Okay then, so notice what Jesus says straight away. He turned and said to Peter, get behind me Satan, you are an offense to me! Now notice, what Peter is doing is he's advancing his own agenda, and Jesus says what's behind that is demonic, and it's a stumbling stone to me, because it's so easy to go down that route. So He said, if I listen to you, if I listen to your good plans about saving myself, and come up with an alternative plan, I will miss totally why I'm here. This was a major destiny question for Jesus; I know what I'm called to do, and if you're trying to tell me to feel sorry for myself and back up, you are a stumbling block to me.
When you set out to seek God and to walk with God, there will be times when people near to you will quite oppose the decisions you make. They will be just appalling to them, because their frame of reference is completely different to yours. You would think that when I left school teaching and become a Christian school teacher, Dannevirke Christian School, that people would be very happy with that. They were not happy. The ones around me, family, were not happy at me doing this. When I got called into pastoring they were not happy about me pastoring, not happy at all. Their perspective was, this goes against how we see life ought to be done. We're not thinking from a kingdom of God and eternal perspective. Getting the idea? Okay, so you all know someone who has this kind of issue don't you aye?
So what Jesus did was, He revealed that the cross is at the core of the way of life of the kingdom of God, that when you walk to fulfil the things of the kingdom of God, there'll be times when the purpose of God crosses your will, clashes with your will and you have to choose whether you'll trust God and yield to a bigger plan, or whether you'll just do what you want. Now was this difficult for Jesus? Yes, it was difficult for Jesus. We read in Matthew, Chapter 27 and also in Luke 22, it said when He went into the Garden of Gethsemane He prayed like this, and He said Father, if it's at all possible, let this depart from Me, I don't want to die. So how did He feel about suffering and death? I don't want to do it. He said Father, strengthen Me, if this is the only way that You can accomplish Your purpose, then not My will, but Your will be done. So you find there, right in the Garden of Gethsemane, a huge clash over the desire to save self and to look after self, with embracing the will of God, which at times involves suffering and death.