This coming Sunday is the 23rd Sunday in Ordinary Time. The previous two Sundays have focused on the gospel narrative that is set at the site of Peter’s great confession of faith: Caesarea Philippi.  This is also the place where Jesus’ first passion prediction occurs which leads to Peter’s exclamation: “God forbid, Lord! No such thing shall ever happen to you” (16:22) – in effect denying the revealed nature and role of the messiah. Jesus corrects Peter in v.24: “Get behind me, Satan! You are an obstacle to me. You are thinking not as God does, but as human beings do.” Despite his confession of faith and the blessing in response to it, Peter initially rejects the possibility that Jesus’ messiahship could involve suffering.  This leads to Jesus’ instruction to the disciples about the true nature of the cross and the willingness to carry it in accordance with the will of God.

At this point in Matthew’s narrative the scene changes: “After six days Jesus took Peter, James, and John his brother, and led them up a high mountain by themselves. And he was transfigured before them” (17:1-2).  But even after the revelation of the glory of God in the experience of the Transfiguration, the disciples are still plagued by their “little faith” and their inability to perform great signs and wonders (17:16, 19) – almost a counterpoint to the glory just witnessed.  Yet in using the symbol of a mustard seed, Jesus still witnesses that through faith, he is present to the disciples.

The relentless movement towards Jerusalem continues as the disciples gather in Galilee (17:22).  This is a community gathered from the “faithless and perverse generation” (v.17).  Jesus’ witness of the second passion prediction serves to announce the focal point and bases upon which this new community gathers.  Nonetheless the gathered disciples are sorrowful because they as yet do not understand.  The disciples have a way to go, but slowly they are becoming church.

This perhaps the subtle but often overlooked element of Matthew’s narrative. Throughout the arc of the storyline Jesus has been addressing the gathering community. “But who do you say that I am?” is addressed not the singular “you” of Simon Peter, but the plural “you” of all the disciples – Peter is simply the one who steps forward to give voice to the response of the community.

Chapter 18 is considered by most scholars as containing the 4th of the 5 discourses, often labeling this section as “Instructions to the Community.”  The fourth major collection of Jesus’ teaching is concerned with relationships among Jesus’ followers, who are clearly seen as a distinct community (as 16:18 has led us to expect). Within such a community there is opportunity both to harm and to care for others, and the health and effectiveness of the group will depend on the attitudes to one another which are fostered. Matthew has brought much of the stories together in this compact form with a view to the needs of the developing church. It is not so much a ‘Manual of Discipline,’ with regulations parallel to those of the so-named document from Qumran, rather it is a guide to relationships within the community. It is only in vv.15–17 that specific procedures are set out, and those are not so much ‘disciplinary’ as pastoral.

Image credit: Sermon on the Mount (1877) by Carl Heinrich Bloch, Museum of National History at Frederiksborg Castle, Public Domain