“And I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven,” Matthew 16:14.
In this passage, Jesus tells Peter that He will give him the keys to the kingdom. What does this mean?
What is the kingdom?
The first thing to determine is, what is the kingdom of which Jesus spoke of. In Matthew 16:28, Jesus says, “Truly I say to you, there are some of those who are standing here who will not taste death until they see the Son of Man coming in His kingdom.” This is also recorded in Mark 9:1 and Luke 9:27, “And Jesus was saying to them, ‘Truly I say to you, there are some of those who are standing here who will not taste death until they see the kingdom of God after it has come with power,’” and again, “But I say to you truthfully, there are some of those standing here who will not taste death until they see the kingdom of God.” The first thing to note here, is that among those who were present when He was speaking, were some who would not die until the kingdom had come into being. As it is clear that all those present when He was speaking are now dead, indeed, were dead within the next 50 or 60 years or so, then the kingdom has already come. (That He meant their normal death, and not a miraculous extension of life so that they would live until He returns, may be seen in a similar situation in which it is clear that a normal death is indicated, that of Simeon, who had been told by the Holy Spirit that “he would not see death before he had seen the Lord’s Christ,” and which had it’s fulfillment when he held the baby Jesus in his arms in the temple, and said, “Now Lord, You are releasing Your bond-servant to depart in peace, According to Your word,” Luke 2:29, and again, in the explanation of how the Lord had answered Peter when he asked about John, “Jesus said to him, ‘If I want him to remain until I come, what is that to you? You follow Me!’ Therefore this saying went out among the brethren that that disciple would not die; yet Jesus did not say to him that he would not die, but only, ‘If I want him to remain until I come, what is that to you?’” John 21:22-23.)
So we have a clear declaration that the kingdom would be established in the very near future to when He was speaking, within the normal life span of some of His audience.
The second thing to note, is that it would, “come with power.” Before Christ ascended to the Father, He told the disciples to “stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high,” Luke 24:49, and again Luke says, “He commanded them not to leave Jerusalem, but to wait for what the Father had promised, ‘Which,’ He said, ‘you heard of from Me; for John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now,’” Acts 1:4-5. These sayings were fulfilled on Pentecost, when the Spirit descended upon the apostles.
So we have a kingdom that would come within the lifetime of those who heard Jesus, and that it would come with power. In Acts 2:29-36, Peter says,
“Men and brethren, let me speak freely to you of the patriarch David, that he is both dead and buried, and his tomb is with us to this day. Therefore, being a prophet, and knowing that God had sworn with an oath to him that of the fruit of his body, according to the flesh, He would raise up the Christ to sit on his throne, he, foreseeing this, spoke concerning the resurrection of the Christ, that His soul was not left in Hades, nor did His flesh see corruption. This Jesus God has raised up, of which we are all witnesses. Therefore being exalted to the right hand of God, and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, He poured out this which you now see and hear.
“For David did not ascend into the heavens, but he says himself:
‘The Lord said to my Lord,
Sit at My right hand,
Till I make Your enemies Your footstool.’
Therefore let all the house of Israel know assuredly that God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ.’”
David had received a promise that Christ would sit on his throne, and this came to pass when Christ ascended to the Father and sat down at His right hand. He is now our King, reigning from heaven, and this reign came with power, with the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, thus fulfilling the words of Christ, “Truly I say to you, there are some of those who are standing here who will not taste death until they see the kingdom of God after it has come with power.”
Therefore, the kingdom is the church, the body of Christ.
How where the keys used?
Since Peter was given the keys to be used, he had to have used them in his lifetime. The keys he was given, were the keys to the kingdom of Christ, the keys to the church. And since keys are used to lock and unlock, to open or close, he must have used them to either open the church, or to close the church.
Since the church is now open, and Peter long dead, he must have used them to open the church. How did he do this? Continuing the passage from Acts,
“’Therefore let all the house of Israel know assuredly that God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ.’
Now when they heard this, they were cut to the heart, and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, ‘Men and brethren, what shall we do?’
Then Peter said to them, ‘Repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For the promise is to you and to your children, and to all who are afar off, as many as the Lord our God will call,’” Acts 2:36-39.
Prior to Peter saying this, the baptism of Christ for the remission of sins had never be revealed to the world. This is the means by which Christ adds someone to the church, Acts 2:47, and this is the door that Peter used the keys on to unlock the church. There is but one baptism now, Ephesians 4:5, and this baptism was never preached to the world before Peter’s sermon on Pentecost.
But at this point, only the Jews have been shown the way. Therefore it was necessary for the way to be shown to the Gentiles as well. This was accomplished in Acts chapter 10, when Cornelius sent for Peter at God’s word, and Peter then came and preached the gospel to him, being shown by God that the Gentiles were also to be His people, as he recounts in Acts 15:7-9, “And when there had been much dispute, Peter rose up and said to them: ‘Men and brethren, you know that a good while ago God chose among us, that by my mouth the Gentiles should hear the word of the gospel and believe. So God, who knows the heart, acknowledged them by giving them the Holy Spirit, just as He did to us, and made no distinction between us and them, purifying their hearts by faith.’”
The purpose for the keys to the kingdom were to open the way into the church, the kingdom. These were given to Peter, and he used them on Pentecost to reveal the way into the church to the Jews, and then later to show the way to the Gentiles.