You may have read in Wednesday’s Dominion Post how more than 1200 buildings in Wellington do not meet earthquake strengthening standards. This includes landmarks like the Town Hall, St James Theatre, and the City Gallery. And the cost to the Council and property owners, liable for the strengthening of their buildings, is going to be substantial - in the millions of dollars.
What you may not know is churches are not exempt from these standards. We too face the prospect of huge bills. In fact, a colleague told me recently how it was going to cost them $400 000 to upgrade their buildings. And if the work is not done within the given time, they risk being issued with a demolition order.
So they are asking themselves:
Is it worth preserving a building which may no longer serve their needs? And what would the church look like if they were given the chance to build it again?
Well, I have not yet received a letter from the Council, advising us that our buildings need strengthening or face demolition, and the issue may not affect us at all. We may not be on shaky ground! But it does make you think about how we enable the ministry and mission of the church here in Eastbourne, and it leads to an even deeper question: what are our churches built upon?
If we go back several thousand years, to the time of the Jerusalem Temple, we find these issues are not new. The people of Israel loved their Temple; it was the centre of their political and religious life, a visible symbol of God’s presence with them, and they believed it was founded on solid ground, unshakeable. 
We see this in today’s psalm: ‘Those who trust in the Lord are like Mount Zion (where God dwells) which cannot be shaken but stands for ever.’ These words, sung by pilgrims, on their way to Jerusalem, expressed a hope. The earth may quake, nations may rise against them, but the city of God will not be moved.
I learnt the other day the sacred rock, over which the Temple was built, was considered in later Judaism as the centre of the universe; it marked the navel of the world, the meeting place of heaven and earth. It was where Abraham was supposed to have gone to sacrifice his son Isaac, and where Jacob dreamt of a ladder reaching up to heaven and of the angels of God going up and down it.
So you can imagine how the people felt when their Temple was destroyed, not once but twice; first, by the Babylonians in 586BCE, and then, by the Romans, in 70CE. The Temple, the secure rock, upon which the Jewish people had built their lives, was no more. They were left to pick up the pieces and start again.
It was in the years following this latter event that Matthew wrote his gospel. Just as the Jews had to find new ways of worshipping God without the Temple, so the fledgling Christian community had to do the same. At first, since they were Jews, they worshipped in the synagogue, but once rejected, because of their commitment to Christ, they began to meet in each other’s homes.
In Matthew’s Gospel the word for church is ekklesia. He uses the term only twice; in today’s passage and in one a couple of chapters further on. What is significant is this word has nothing to do with a building, and everything to do with a people. Ekklesia refers to the community of God’s people.
So, unlike some of our churches, built as they are on fault lines, the 1st century church didn’t have to worry about changes to the building code; and they didn’t have to fear earthquakes or demolition teams; for the church was the people. A church building may point to the eternal, it may connect us to our forebears, it may act as a place of refuge and peace; but the building is not the church. We are the church. You and I are the people of God in this place.
But there is still the question. What is the ekklesia, the community of God’s people, built upon? What is the rock upon which our life is constructed?
I suggest we find an answer to this question in Peter’s response to Jesus. His words mark a decisive moment in the gospel. Jesus says, ‘Who do people say the Son of Man is?’ or ‘Who do they say I am?’ Then he looks the disciples straight in the eye and he asks them, ‘Who do you say I am?’
‘Who do you say I am?’
How would you answer his question? Is he a prophet, a teacher of wisdom, a person of great compassion? Or would you say he was, as C.K. Stead does in ‘My name was Judas’, an orator, intelligent and insightful, but also deceived?
Jesus has been called all these things over the years, and much more. But as Peter stands before his teacher, he doesn’t listen to the crowds; he listens to a voice deep within. ‘You are the Messiah,’ he says, ‘the Son of the living God.’
Now, to understand what he meant, we need to look at the Old Testament. Messiah, for instance, comes from the Hebrew mashiah, which means ‘one who has been anointed.’ It is the equivalent of the Greek word Christos, from which we get Christ. In ancient Israel, the term was primarily used for the anointing of kings. And it later became linked with the anticipated coming of a new king; a king, like David, who would rule over a renewed people of God. 
The early church believed Jesus was this messiah. We see this in Matthew’s Gospel where Jesus’ lineage is traced back to King David. But he wasn’t the kind of messiah the people expected. He wasn’t a political liberator, who would free the people from Roman rule. Instead, as Jesus goes on to say, in the very next passage, he was destined to suffer and to die, and then to rise again.
In a similar way, the phrase, Son of the living God, refers in the Old Testament to the people of Israel, and more specifically to the Davidic kings. But, in the New Testament, in Paul’s letters and in the gospels, the term is also used of Jesus to speak of his unique relationship with the Father. A few chapters back, Jesus says ‘Everything is entrusted to me by my Father; and no one knows the Father but the Son and those to whom the Son may choose to reveal him.’
Peter’s confession, of Jesus as the Christ, is also found in the gospels of Mark and Luke. The difference is they don’t include Jesus’ reply. Jesus, instead, tells the disciples to keep quiet and not to tell people about him. But, in Matthew, Jesus praises Peter, and he says to him: ‘You are Peter (or Petros, the Greek word for Rock); and on this rock (or petra) I will build my church.’
You may have heard these words sometimes quoted to give authority to successive Popes, as the legitimate successors of Peter. But though Peter did play a unique role in the foundation of the church, as did Paul, the other person we remember today, the real thrust of Jesus’ words is that the church is not built upon a person, no matter who they are, but on a confession of faith.
Peter’s faith is the rock on which the church was built; and it was this same faith in Jesus the Christ, the anointed one of God, that the early church held on to as they reached out into their world with their message of good news.
So on what are our churches built? Do they shake each time the earth moves? Or is our life together, as the community of Christ, founded on something much more solid? God’s love for all people made known in Jesus the Christ.
As the hymn declares:
Christ is made the sure foundation,
Christ the head and cornerstone
chosen of the Lord and precious,
binding all the church in one;
holy Zion’s help for ever,
and her confidence alone.
So, may our faith in Jesus the Christ be the rock on which we build our lives; may it shape all we say and do as a people of God; and may it mean more to us than bricks and mortar; for only then will the church stand forever. Amen.

A sermon preached at St Alban’s on the Feast of Ss Peter and Paul, Sunday 29th June 2008.