Don't get discouraged when the bulk of the people on your street are either sleeping, eating breakfast, or mowing the grass when you drive by their houses on Sunday morning. Right now, they may see the church as a pointless interruption in an otherwise relaxing weekend. They may not understand what anybody gets out of it. We'll continue to pray for them, stop by to visit them, and share the gospel of the kingdom with them every chance we get. But if some of them never have a brighter view of God's people than they do today, it will not diminish the power of the church or slow its march toward a victorious eternity. The church's authority does not rest on the whim of majority rule but on the authority of its Lord and Ruler.

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Nevertheless, Christ is concerned with our personal conviction. The key question in this conversation between Jesus and his followers is the second one — not "Who do men say that I am?" but "Who do you say that I am?" He wasn't really interested in the way they answered the question of his divinity according to their friends and neighbors; he wanted to hear them answer the question for themselves.

And his intention is just as true today. Who do you say Jesus is?

When he turns to ask you that question, is it relevant at that moment what your parents think or what your pastor thinks or what some professor of yours thinks about Jesus? No, the only thing that matters is what you think.

Who do you say Jesus is?

For while the Father has indeed ordained the Son to be "the head of the body, the church" (Col. 1:18), the church is built one person at a time as individuals are drawn into it under the conviction of the Holy Spirit. The church's victory is assured by the overcoming life of Christ, but its victory is revealed every time doubt is transformed into faith in the heart of a believer.

People's opinions about Christ come and go. The questions may be slightly different across the centuries, but all the questions in the world can be summed up in the one personal question every man and woman must ultimately answer:

Who do you say Jesus is?

Christ wants private conviction to become public confession. It would be a misunderstanding of Jesus' question to think that he is content for people to give a silent nod of assent to him without declaring openly their Christian faith and belief.

This is the point where many people stumble along the road to salvation. More indicatively, this is the point where many people minimize or completely do away with their need for the church. When someone says they can worship Christ in their own way or that their religion is a private matter between them and God, they are stopping short of Jesus' clear command and selling short the wonder of his Body. Jesus said, "Everyone who will acknowledge Me before men, I will also acknowledge him before My Father in heaven. But whoever denies Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father in heaven" (Matt. 10:32-33). The message is clear, and the consequences are profound.