I.N.I.
a sermon
to be preached on the 9th Sunday after Pentecost, 10 August 2014 at
Our Savior Lutheran Church, Arlington, VA, and based on the Holy
Gospel for the day: St. Matthew 14:22-33
Grace,
mercy, and peace be yours in Christ Jesus our Lord,
Dear
Friends in Christ,
What is
this story in the middle of Matthew's Gospel all about? It might
depend on just where you focus.
For example, imagine yourself as one
of the disciples. You've just participated in the miraculous feeding
of the 5,000 -- passed out that never-ending bread and fish with your
own hands -- and eaten of it yourself. You and your buddies were
still marveling over just how that happened and then how each of you
had picked up a basket full of leftovers. You were still in the glow
of all that when Jesus, your Master, hurried you all off in the boat,
shoved you all out on the Sea of Galilee himself, and as evening
deepened turned his back on you in order to talk more with the
crowds. So you start rowing. And rowing and rowing. You probably take
turns at the oars because you are working basically all night, trying
to make progress against a strong headwind, muscles aching, sweat
dripping. So if you're one of the 11 (we will leave Peter, the 12th,
out for a minute) this story might one about being on a spiritual
high and being brought down to a physical low, wrapped up with this
stunning concluding act of walking on the water.
The
crowds, the common people and their leaders, were bookends to this
narrative. The 5,000 were fed and nourished by Jesus in last week's
Gospel, and as we pick up the storyline this morning they're being
dismissed by Jesus. Not much going on there except that by now
evening had pretty fully come and they were all still out in the
deserted place, away from the surrounding villages. And who knows but
maybe Jesus miraculously provided oil lamps for each family group, or
sent along angels (the crowds would have thought they were some of
the disciples) to guide them safely back to town for the night, back
home to their own beds. Then just past the end of the story crowds
on the other side of the lake recognized Jesus and brought their sick
and needy from all over the region for healing that they knew, that
they believed, Jesus could (and did) provide. Maybe some of the
people in the morning heard the disciples tell in wide-eyed amazement
"You won't believe what just happened out on the lake last
night!". But mostly the crowds thought of this as a story of
comfort and contentment and fulfillment and peace; a story of full
bellies and full hearts; a story of restored vigor and restored
health.
And
Peter, what about Peter? Ah, he was there during the feeding miracle,
of course, though he isn't specifically named. He was there when they
were sent away by Jesus. As one of the fishermen among the troupe he
would have been comfortable and 'at home' on the boat among the oars
and ropes, in the smell of the open water, feeling the rise and fall
of the boat on the waves. Even the contrary wind all night would have
been familiar to Peter, as sudden storms are common on the Sea of
Galilee. Peter was certainly more at home on the water than, say,
Matthew the tax collector, or the farmers and scholars among the
Twelve. He knew what to expect out in the middle of the large lake
and how to deal with it. And then he finds all that comfort and
familiarity shaken through and through as surely as if they had
struck an iceberg. Some one of them glanced off to the side, or maybe
looked up over the stern when the boat was at the top of one of the
waves. Somebody saw something out there on the water and called out
about it. They all looked, certain it was some kind of ghost, some
kind of phantom.
I mean,
whatever it was, it actually looked like Jesus out there walking on
the surface of the water. I imagine the first couple of them said
"Man, I must be working too hard here; I'm seeing things!"
But then they all agreed that clearly this was a ghost, an apparition
of some kind. Except that the figure spoke to them: "It's me,
don't be afraid." Peter, who had apparently not gotten the memo
that said 'don't tempt the Lord, your God', tosses out a challenge,
which is immediately accepted, and next thing you know he's
clambering down the side of the boat to the water, stepping out, and
walking. This likely seems to us to be Peter's high point in the
story, the thing he'd remember most. Though it seems to me that over
time he would have remembered more what happened next: when he
started to sink, and called out to the Lord, Jesus immediately shot
out his hand and grabbed Peter to save him. To Peter, then, I think
this story could have been about being saved by Jesus, and not about
walking on water.
What do
you suppose the story was about for Jesus? It was part of a very
long period of work for him. Hearing about John the Baptist's
execution, trying to get away to pray about it, but being followed by
the crowds that sought healing miracles, crowds that then found
themselves hungry and not near a village, crowds that had to be fed
miraculously, then there were the disciples to send on their way, and
the crowd to dismiss, and THEN Jesus was finally able to get up the
mountain in the dark by himself to pray uninterruptedly. "But by
this time the boat [of disciples], battered by the waves, was far
from the land" and in order to give his friends a hand, Jesus
had to walk out there, into the wind, up and down waves, through the
dark, until - somewhere between 3 and 6 in the morning - he caught up
with them.
So I'm
wondering whether maybe for Jesus this story wasn't so much about
walking on water as it was about prayer. Hearing about John' death
and wanting to pray about it; prayer interrupted by the crowd praying
to him for healing; disciples praying about feeding the people;
praying over the bread and fish; wrapping up with the crowd that was
surely expressing either final needs or thanks or both; and then
finally getting away by himself to pray; except that he was
interrupted by the disciples' fearful prayers out on the water, and
then Peter's specific prayers. Yes, it seems to me that from Jesus's
point of view, this story might be one about prayer.
Well,
that's the crowds, and the disciples, and Peter, and Jesus. What
about you? What is this story about for you? If you haven't come to a
conclusion on that yet, perhaps you can follow me along a little
longer to this point: the story is about how we should
and how we can have
faithful trust or confidence that we're going where Jesus wants us to
go, doing what he wants us to do.
If
we focus in on Jesus and Peter in this passage we can see this most
clearly. At the beginning, Peter and the other disciples did not see
Jesus at all. It was night. They were out to sea. They were headed
away from Jesus. Sounds a lot like us on our bad days, doesn't it?
Then when they finally did see Jesus, they didn't really see him.
They thought he was a ghost, not the real thing, something come to
frighten them. They saw him but did not see him as their loving,
comforting, powerful friend who made things come out right. I would
suggest, again, that we're like that a lot. We might often be going
along on our merry way and, glancing to the side, see Jesus, but
think of him as a threat. Maybe we know that we're headed the wrong
way and that Jesus is going to call us up short and point us in a
different direction. We usually don't like it when our sinfulness is
pointed out to us. So sometimes we're headed into the dark, and away
from Jesus. Sometimes we see him but don't really see him, and try
to ignore his calls to us.
And
sometimes we are even in his presence and still manage to fall away.
Here, think of Peter on the water. He had asked for a sign, Jesus
said "Come" and Peter had stepped out toward Jesus and
everything was fine. Except that Peter then, as the text says, "saw
the wind". Strange phrase, that: "Saw the wind." We
don't actually see the wind itself, do we? We see the effects of the
wind. We see clouds moving along the sky; leaves dancing ahead of it;
snow being driven horizontally; sails on a boat puffed out. But the
wind itself? We don't see that. Peter, however, saw the wind. He
looked away from Jesus, he focused instead on something we cannot
really see, something that has power in it, but is itself
insubstantial. The wind has no weight, no heft, no mass. It isn't
something you can put in a box for later. But it distracted St.
Peter, the same way that insubstantial things distract us from Jesus.
He took his eyes off of Jesus as do we.
Then
we come to what I think is the most curious verse in this passage "he
was afraid, and beginning to sink he cried out". I've been
trying to picture how one "begins to sink." As Peter lost
focus on Jesus did the water slowly creep past his ankles, rising bit
by bit toward his knees? If it were me, I'm sure I'd have gone
straight to the bottom. It would have read "he was afraid and
sank like a stone before he could cry out." But Peter was only
"beginning to
sink" and had a chance to cry out.
Which
brings us to the central point of all this: that the story is about
how we should and how
we can have faithful
trust or confidence that we're going where Jesus wants us to go,
doing what he wants us to do. In today's Epistle St Paul writes that
"Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved".
It's a very New Testament thought, right? Except that Paul is quoting
from the prophet Joel in the Old Testament at this point. Calling on
the name of the Lord in times of trouble and when we sin is something
encouraged throughout the Bible, and ever since. Peter began to sink
and called out "Lord, save me." You're faced with some dire
temptation and call out "Lord, save me!" We're faced with
some danger -- wild Beltway traffic, a house fire, an eviction
notice, loss of a job -- and call out "Lord, save me!"
Prayer, in other words, prayer to the Lord is one of the ways to
express our faithful trust and confidence that he will help.
The
other way we can consider this morning is the action Peter took as he
began to sink. He could have flailed around. He could have grabbed
for the boat behind him. He could have tried to dive in the direction
of his friends and their helping hands. But Peter did none of that.
What happened in that instant was that "Jesus immediately
reached out his hand and took hold of" Peter. Peter didn't grab
or lunge or dive, he was taken hold of by Jesus.
When
we are looking for direction in our confusing, storm-tossed world, it
seems to me that we could take guidance from this passage. Act like
Peter. Find out whether Jesus is really there in the direction you
propose to go. Maybe your options aren't as stark and scary as a
choice between staying in the wind-driven boat, or going over the
side onto the waves; but we're often as uncertain as Peter was. So,
pray "Lord, is it you?" Is it you standing there where I
propose to go? If it's truly you there, Lord, then invite me out of
the boat, invite me into this new project, this different direction.
Then listen for the Lord's response, because if he is in the new
venture, he will invite you to step out. Now, very key to this whole
thing, keep your eyes fixed on Jesus. Don't be distracted by the
wind. Don't worry about the waves. Focus on Jesus, think about how he
is in the new thing and invited you into it, how he is always
concerned about your safety and well-being.
Engage
in prayer. Let Jesus reach out and take hold of you. You could, in
other words, just say "be a Christian," because Christians
pray and they let Jesus reach out to them through his Word and
through the Sacraments. He takes hold of us through them, and holds
us safe. Our Savior did an immense thing by taking our sin to the
cross when he died in our places. So he can do a little thing like
individually taking hold of each of us to make sure we get safely
back to shore.
Pray.
Let him take hold of you. Then be at peace.
Amen
And
may the peace of God that passes all understanding keep your hearts
and minds in Christ Jesus, our Lord.
S.D.G.
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