This is why Jesus reacted so affirmingly to the response of Peter to his question. You know Simon Peter. Normally, the only time he opened his mouth was when he needed to change feet. He was always quick with an answer, even when the words made only a brief stopover at his brain for processing.
But this time he happened to get it right. Jesus had asked, "Who do you say that I am?" Peter's answer was equally bold and determined: "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God." He confessed Jesus the same way we are to confess him — outwardly, publicly, verbally, and dogmatically.
The folly of private Christianity is that it is really a veiled attempt to keep a foot on both sides of the fence — to not commit one's self entirely to the notion that Christ is Lord, to pick and choose those instances when religious faith is of most comfort and benefit.
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If you know anything about the teachings of Christ, though, you know that fence-sitting is not an option in the kind of life he modeled and described. In the passage immediately following this one in Matthew 16, Jesus began revealing to his disciples the harsh realities that awaited him over the course of the next few months. Peter — this same Peter — "took Him aside and began to rebuke Him, saying, 'Far be it from You, Lord; this shall not happen to You?"' (v. 22 NKJV).
Just moments earlier, Jesus had been delighted by Peter's out-loud, in-public declaration of Christian faith. But now, notice Jesus' staggering admonishment of Peter's whispered, hushed, off-to-the-side appeal toward self-preservation: "Get behind Me, Satan!" Jesus said, "You are an offense to Me, for you are not mindful of the things of God, but the things of men" (v. 23 NKJV).
Then turning to the rest of his followers, he shared with them these serious, familiar words of surrender and submission that cut to the heart of Christian discipleship: "If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me. For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it. For what profit is it to a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?" (vv. 24-26).
The church is Christ's out-in-the-open declaration of who he is and what he is doing. We who are his followers must stand together in full view of the world, willing to suffer whatever price our association with him costs us, for "what will a man give in exchange for his soul?" (v. 26).