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He then began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and after three days rise again.  He spoke plainly about this, and Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him.

But when Jesus turned and looked at his disciples, he rebuked Peter. “Get behind me, Satan!” he said. “You do not have in mind the concerns of God, but merely human concerns.” (vv. 31-33)

Hello, everyone! (Let them respond). I have another story for you today, are you ready? (Let them respond.) Great!

One day, Jesus took his disciples on a trip to a place called Caesarea Philippi. That was a town that was a long way from home and where the people were very different than the disciples. Most of the people of Caesarea Philippi were not Jewish like the disciples, but most of them were Romans and Greeks. They spoke different languages, they wore different clothes, they ate different foods, and they believed in different gods than the disciples did. Have you ever been someplace that was very different and maybe made you feel nervous, or even a little afraid? (Let them respond.) Yes, well that’s how the disciples felt when Jesus took them to Caesarea Philippi.

And they got even more nervous when Jesus took them to the big rock cliff where the Romans and Greeks worshiped all of their gods. The cliff was really tall, and the people had carved pictures and statues of their gods all over the front of it. The big cliff was covered with all of those pictures and statues of gods the disciples didn’t believe in. They just didn’t understand why Jesus would bring them to such an evil place.

Then Jesus said, “These people think that I am just a teacher, or maybe some kind of prophet, but who do you say that I am?”

Peter said, “You are God’s son, the one God sent to save us.”

Now, sometimes Peter got excited, and since he was kind of nervous maybe he said that pretty loudly, but Jesus said to him, “Don’t tell anyone that around here, because if they hear you, it will make them mad, and they will arrest me and kill me.”

I’ll bet that made them even more nervous, don’t you? (Let them respond.) Then Jesus told them that, one of these days, he was going to be caught and arrested and killed, but he wasn’t ready for that yet, so they had to be careful now.

Well, Peter was still pretty nervous, so he jumped up and said, “NO! You can’t ever let them do that. Let’s just go back home and not cause any more trouble. Nobody will pay any attention to us, and then we won’t have to worry about anyone trying to arrest and kill you. Let’s just go home and go fishing and take care of ourselves, okay?”

Do you know what Jesus did? (Let them respond.) He looked at Peter and said, “Sit down Peter! You sound more like a devil talking than like God!” Jesus really scolded him.

All Peter said was that he thought they should go home and stop doing things that might make people angry. He just wanted to protect and take care of Jesus. That doesn’t sound all that bad, does it? (Let them respond.) Does anyone have an idea why Jesus got so angry at Peter? (Let them respond.)

Jesus said they were thinking the way people think and not the way God thinks. He said that God sent him to help everyone understand what God wanted them to do, and he knew that the only way he could do that was that one day he would be arrested and killed, so that’s what he was going to do. He said God did not send him to be safe and have a nice time going fishing. (Show the fishing pole.)

Jesus said they were thinking the way people think and not the way God thinks. There was nothing wrong with going fishing, (Show the fishing pole.) but they were just thinking about taking care of themselves, and God wants them to think about taking care of others, too.

Sometimes it is hard to do what God wants us to do and take care of others, isn’t it? Like when other people are laughing at someone or making fun of them. If we think like God thinks and decide to be nice to that person instead, we might get laughed at or made fun of too, right? (Let them respond.) Or maybe there is a time we have extra money or extra food and see someone who didn’t have any. If we think like God thinks and decide to give them some of ours, other people might laugh at us or make fun of us too, right? (Let them respond.) So, sometimes, it is easier if we don’t think like God, and just stay quiet and do something else to protect ourselves, isn’t it? Maybe we don’t go fishing, (show the fishing pole) but maybe we just stand there and not do anything at all, instead of helping the other person.

Jesus told his disciples they needed to think the way God thinks, and not the way people think. He said that what is most important for us to do is to spend our time thinking about how we can take care of all of the rest of God’s children, and not just take care of ourselves.

I hope you will remember how much God loves you, and how much God wants us to show everyone around us how much we love them, too.

Let’s have our prayer and ask God to help us remember to do the things God wants us to do to take care of each other.

Prayer:
Dear God, thank you for reminding us how much you love us. Please help us remember that you love all of the people you have created and help us let the people around us know that we love them just like Jesus loves us. Amen.