Matthew 16:18 and a Plea to Reconsider
The Gates of Hades will never overtake my church. — Matthew 16:18
I am convinced that one of the most misunderstood verses in the Bible is Matthew 16:18. And interestingly enough it stems from a very simple source. It seems that when we come to this verse people often forget the way in which the Bible lays out its own cosmology.
We start with this idea that Satan’s kingdom is Hell. We imagine him sitting on a throne, surrounded by fire, deep in the bowels of the earth. Tortured souls around. Yet this is a pagan concept, not a biblical one. This is Hades of Greek mythology, Hel of Norse mythology, et al.
Satan’s kingdom is the earth (John 12:31; 14:30; 2 Cor. 4:4; Eph. 2:2; 1 Jo. 5:19). Remember Job, Satan is walking to and fro on the earth (Job 1:7). Secondly, remember Satan’s fate; he, along with the unrighteous are thrown into the lake of fire (Gehenna, or Hell) to be ‘tormented’ or punished forever (Rev. 20:10).
So we can now begin to come to a conclusion. Jesus speaking of the Gates of Hades, then is not speaking about Satan’s kingdom. What is Jesus speaking of then? Well it is a bit beyond the scope of this article, but note in the very next verse that the keys of heaven are given to the church (Matt. 16:19). Jesus, in Revelation, is the one standing who has the keys of Death and Hades (Rev. 1:18). Note as well that this is Christ, the Risen conquering King, who now has the keys of death and hades — having conquered them! Therefore, in the New Covenant, we no longer fear death, we are no longer slaves to death (Heb. 2:14-15), because we know how God defeats sin, death, and the devil.
The picture being drawn is that Christ through his death and resurrection now flings open the gates of heaven and shuts the gates of hades to his people. In my estimation that doesn’t resolve all the difficulties in this verse but it does help put us on a trajectory to understand it in a way that is much more consonant with the Biblical worldview.
