Jesus Treads Upon The Water

When Jesus walks across the stormy Sea of Galilee, he is doing more than displaying his power over nature—he is giving his disciples a glimpse of his victory over death. Like Peter sinking beneath the waves, we cannot rescue ourselves; our hope is found in the Lord who reaches down and lifts us up. Through the death and resurrection of Jesus, the grave that once threatened to swallow us has been trampled beneath his feet, and we are given new life in him.

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SPEAKER_00 0:01

Let us pray. Heavenly Father, we gather around your word this morning asking you to help us see and hear and believe the gospel and trust in your Son Jesus Christ for everything. We ask this in Christ's name. Amen. Do you think that Peter was a man of great faith? I think Peter has so many of those big mouth kind of moments, open mouth insert foot kind of moments, that he gets a bad reputation. And we can think back over the Gospels and remember him taking Jesus aside and telling him that he is in no way ever going to die, you know, and Jesus tells him, get behind me, Satan. Not really a shining moment. Peter was the one who was the one who didn't know what to say on the mountain of transfiguration. And so he, in his sort of desperation for something to do with his hands, you know, he's like, I don't know what to do with my hands. He says, Can I build you a tent, you know, to Jesus and Moses and Elijah? We can recall in the upper room Jesus talking about what's going to happen to him and Peter saying that he would never abandon Jesus. Though everyone else were to fall away, he would never abandon Jesus, even if it meant that he would have to die with Christ. Of course, he followed up those words by slicing a man's ear off and then denying Jesus three times. In Matthew 14, in our passage this morning, Peter seems to have a tremendous amount of faith at one moment, but then quickly sinks when he notices the ferocity of the wind and the waves. And I think often sermons on this passage of Scripture revolve around Peter's experience of the wind and the waves, how Peter is looking at this the ferocity of the wind, and he begins to sink, and then he puts his eyes on Jesus, and everything is okay. I think most of the time we think about that because we want to see ourselves in sacred scripture. And when we look at Jesus, we know we can't be him walking on the water because he's Jesus and we're not. We pray to God that we're not the crowds that are dismissed at the beginning of the story and just told to go home. You know, we don't want to be those folks. And so the only ones that we find a parallel with are those disciples rowing themselves across the Sea of Galilee all night long, and in Peter.

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Right?

SPEAKER_00 2:34

So when Peter stands up and asks Jesus to join him on the water, we feel like, you know what, we're right there. That's me too. I'm right there with Peter, standing up, asking the Lord to invite me to join him in what he's doing. And as the disciples of Jesus, as with our, as with the disciples of Jesus, our experiences seem to parallel Peter and those other disciples. So the imagery in this story is not hard for us to kind of relate to sort of experientially. But I think we should strive in this passage of scripture, as in every passage of scripture, to keep our focus on Christ and not on the disciples. On this day that we find this walking on the water occurrence to have occurred, Jesus had taught all morning long to a large crowd of people. And then he, at the end of the sort of teaching, they realized they needed to go home, but they didn't have anything to eat, and so Jesus fed them. He had miraculously multiplied five loaves of bread and two fish, so that it fed five thousand men, plus women and children. And the disciples not only witnessed this miracle. You can imagine what it'd be like to be on the sidelines seeing all of this happen, but the disciples didn't just witness the miracle, they participated in the miracle. It was their hands that distributed piece after piece of bread that was not getting any smaller. After the meal, the fragments of bread that were picked up were picked up, and twelve baskets full of bread fragments were there. Jesus hadn't just fed those people, he overfed them. And the disciples must have been astonished. Jesus had in front of them, in front of their eyes, healed the sick, cast out demons, he had taught with authority, he had already calmed the storm at sea, and he was now multiplying food, doing something that no one could do. Only God could do the things that Jesus was doing. And then, in echoes of Jonah's prayer in Jonah chapter 2, and of God being enthroned on the water, Jesus comes to them, walking on the water in the fourth watch of the night. You see, the disciples had the boat, and Jesus needed to catch up to him. Practically speaking, Jesus was just following that old simple logic. The shortest distance between two points is a straight line. And so Jesus comes to them walking on the water, and yet there's more to Jesus' actions than simply needing to reunite with his disciples. Jesus is doing more than walking on the Sea of Galilee. He's triumphing over death itself. The Bible's use of water varies. In various places, you'll see different kinds of illusions that water creates. But generally, water, especially deep water, the sea itself, is kind of an implied chaotic and uncontrollable place. It's power and evil kind of viscerally right in front of you. You can't do anything about the waves pounding you and the depths of those waters. However, so I've already kind of, yeah. So the the the more fundamental meaning for water, though, is not just chaos and uncontrollable power, but it is death itself. To be covered by water means that a person is dead. The floodwaters rose at the time of Noah and wiped out human life on the earth. The water of the Red Sea crushed and drowned Pharaoh's army and Pharaoh and his army. Jonah himself found himself, Jonah himself found was in the belly of the fish. I'll read the sentence. Found himself in the belly of the fish at the bottom of the ocean. And while we can't live without water, we know we have to have water to live. Water that covers us all the way up, you know, a little bit of water inside of you is no big deal, but when the water gets over your head, you're in trouble. When the water covers us up, it means death. That's why we see God as the one who triumphs over it and has a throne that sits above it in Psalm 29. And so when Peter began to sink into the water, what did he know was going to happen to him? He knew he was going to his grave. The thing that strikes me about all of this water talk and Jesus walking on the water is that he is visually and literally, as it were, treading on death itself. He seems to be doing it with ease too. And not only does he tread on death when walking on this water, he lifts Peter up with no problem at all. He just lifts him right out of the water and they walk back to the boat. And so it's no wonder why the other disciples rejoice when Jesus and Peter get back in the boat. They rejoice because Jesus is with them again. When he's with them, the one who can walk on the water, the one who can triumph over death, he will be the one to lift them out of their graves and carry them all the way home. In Mark's account of the walking on the water, Mark says as soon as they get in the boat, they're at land. It's like that whole wind that they were striving against all night long when they were fighting against it. Jesus gets in the boat and they are there. Like the disciples, we are faced with difficulties and stresses in life. I don't know if you feel that today. We must make decisions about what we want to do and how we want to live our lives. We grapple with warring priorities and desires, and even the joys of life, which are almost always coupled with heartache, don't satisfy us the way we hoped that they would. And to make matters worse, death awaits us at the end of our lives. But then Jesus comes to us. He treads upon the grave, lifts us up to life through the power of his resurrection. This truth has been on our minds, as all saints, church, this truth, the resurrection transforming everything and lifting us out of the grave has been on our minds a lot this year, and yet we must guard this truth and not allow its importance to just walk right past us. The strength and the joy that we're seeking in life is kept right here in this resurrection. At the beginning of the gospel reading, Jesus is sending all these people away. Did you catch that? He's dismissing the crowds and telling the disciples to go ahead of him. And we don't know Jesus' motivation for sending the disciples ahead of him. It's not explained in the text. Jesus spent that day teaching the crowds, but the thing that he really wanted to do from the beginning of that day was to get away from everybody and to spend time praying and grieving over the death of John the Baptist. It's safe to assume that the disciples would have wanted to keep on talking about that miracle that they had just witnessed, that five, the 5,000 people being fed with five loaves of bread. And so maybe Jesus was sending them away because he didn't want to keep on talking about this stuff over and over again. You can imagine him being sort of, I have another plan here. I want something else. But it's also likely that the group of people who were called disciples was a lot bigger than just those twelve. I mean, maybe Jesus would have been fine with the twelve being around him, so he's quietly praying, and he can just tell them to be quiet, go on the other side of the hill and pray. But in John chapter 6, sort of the parallel of this, we know at the end of the discussion that follows, being on the other side of the Sea of Galilee, there's a whole group of people who are called disciples. And when Jesus tells them to eat my body and drink my blood, at the end of that discussion, a bunch of them depart. So there's probably a pretty big group of people. All whatever may be the case, Jesus sends all of those people away from him, and he sets up a scenario where he's going to need to rejoin them in some way. Unfortunately, for the disciples, the journey across the Sea of Galilee was not easy. A strong contrary wind arose, and they were rowing for hours. And there must have been a large group of people, or they couldn't have kept up all that rowing against the wind for hour upon hour upon hour. We don't know exactly where they started from or their intended goal, so we don't know how to draw the line across the Sea of Galilee, but the Sea of Galilee is about eight miles across at its widest part, and so they didn't really have that far to go, and yet there they were rowing from early afternoon through the early evening, into the late evening, and into the wee hours of the morning. Exhausted and seemingly too far to turn around, the disciples press on. And in the final hours of the dark before sunrise, Jesus comes to them walking on the water. Like in most places around the world, there are lots of superstitions about the water. You know, don't tell the sailors about mermaids or they'll fall in love. You know, people look over into the water and they see all kinds of things. Maybe there were stories about the Sea of Galilee, and these disciples, who many of them were fishermen, all of them had strong ties to the life around the Sea of Galilee, being from that area, they would have had all of those stories in their minds when they see walking on the water a human figure coming to them in the middle of the night. And so their immediate response was to crowd in fear. An apparition was gaining on them, and their fear lasted until they heard a voice. A voice call out to them, saying, Do not be afraid, it is I. And they knew Jesus' voice, and because they knew Jesus' voice, they rejoiced at that hearing. Their fears were quelled, but Peter responded to Jesus' voice by saying, If it's you, let me join you on the water. Jesus called him out onto the water, and Peter is triumphantly, you could see him sort of proudly walking toward Jesus, but the wind was still blowing, the waves were still rolling, and the sea was still storm-tossed. So Peter gets out of that boat and he walks to Jesus, but when he gets there, he looks around and he sees the sea raging around him, and he grows afraid. He sank down into the water, crying out to Jesus to save him. And our Lord reached out his hand and pulled him out of the water. It's always at this point in relating the story that we have the kind of sense that we should pause and apply all of this to ourselves. What is Jesus doing here? He comes to us in the midst of life storms, and that when we're in the hardest moments of our lives, the only thing we really have to do is keep our eyes focused on Jesus. And you know what? In the middle of life storms, when things are really raging, keeping your eyes focused on Jesus, set on Jesus, is absolutely the right thing to do. We do need to keep our eyes fixed on Christ, especially when we are forced to face our doubts and our fears. Hearing the voice of Jesus saying to you, Do not fear, it is I, is a balm that soothes our heartaches and motivates us to press on in life. Jesus is capable of not only calming literal storms on literal seas, he's also the one who draws near to us and brings mercy and healing when we need it most. But it would also be appropriate for us to say, and it's also appropriate for us to say, there are times when we need to be willing to walk boldly with Jesus into the world as a testimony of his power, just like Peter did. But, as I said earlier, the point of this passage of the gospel is not about what the disciples did and what we can do as Jesus' disciples. The point of this passage is to say that this is who our Savior really is. The response of the disciples at the end of the passage, truly you are the Son of God, is the point. Jesus is the eternal Son of God who was promised to come as that Messiah. That's one of the focal points of the gospel of Matthew, is that Matthew is trying to get the readers who were originally received this gospel to know who Jesus really is. And so the disciples worship Jesus when he rejoins them in the boat as proof that they were witnesses to his divinity. No one gets worship in the Bible except God. They know who he is, they worship, they fall down and worship him. Jesus is making a declaration as much as he is establishing for us a picture of his presence in our life amid life's storms. Jesus was showing the disciples and is telling us that he is triumphant over more than nature. His walking on the water shows that he's triumphant over death itself. In one of Jesus' many confrontations with the Pharisees, they ask him for a sign in Matthew chapter 12. This is before this, a couple chapters ahead or behind from our passage this morning. And Jesus had already done miracle after miracle after miracle in front of these Pharisees. He had already shown them who he was over and over again. And yet they ask him for one more sign. They were testing Jesus. But he responds to them by telling them the only sign that they were going to get is the sign of Jonah. That after being dead for three days, he would rise again. And if the Pharisees had known their Bibles a bit better, which ironically we often think of the Pharisees knowing the scriptures very well, but they clearly misunderstood the Bible at this point. Because they didn't understand what Jesus was talking about, being the sign of Jonah and being gone for three days and so forth. So if the Pharisees had known their Bibles a bit better, they would have remembered Jonah's prayer. And in that prayer, Jonah talks about going down into the water. And he says the waters are coming up to him and over him, they wash over him, and he is taken down to the depths. He goes down to a place where you are kept in bars forever. And Jonah 2. He is in a deep pit and he should be trapped there. But Jonah, for no apparent reason that anyone can tell from the book of Jonah itself. If you read in sort of homework for the day, if you want, read through the book of Jonah. If you read Jonah chapter 1 and Jonah chapter 3, you're not going to find any reason why Jonah's going to be super confident that while he's in the belly of this fish, that he's ever going to get out of it again. But there he is in the belly of this fish, saying that he believed and knew that he would come back from the dead. His salvation had not yet arrived, and yet he was confident in his redemption. In Matthew 14, Jesus is triumphantly walking on the water, even though he had not yet defeated death. Just like in a few other symbolic acts in the Bible, God tips his hand a bit early. He shows his people what he is going to do for them. The first Passover meal was eaten before the Passover event took place. The institution of the Lord's Supper took place before Jesus' body was broken and his blood spilled out. Jesus is preaching a gospel message to the disciples that they could not yet fully understand. He was standing on death itself. They saw his power, but they didn't see his grace. And the eyes of the disciples, walking on the water was another sign that nothing can touch them if Jesus is around. And Jesus walks on the waves as the one who defeated death itself, and he is the one who lifts us out of the grave and gives us life. The life that we receive at his hand is not like our old life. This life is fragile. But the new life that we receive in Christ is as enduring as his life is. And like him, our new life is a foretaste of the new heavens and the new earth. But what are we supposed to do with the life that we have received from Jesus? What are you supposed to do with the life that you have received from Christ? And I think to answer that question, we look at Jonah and Peter and St. Paul. Both Jonah and Peter are helpful examples of what to do. They both do the same thing. They receive life from Jesus. That's it. They receive. They don't strive or contend with God. They don't offer their own little contributions. And if it's not, it's not, and so if you want to test me on this, read Jonah chapter 1 and see kind of the conclusion of Jonah after he's run away from God, he's given a mission to go and serve, serve the Lord, and preach a warning message, a gospel, as it were, of repentance. Come and repent, and God would spare all of the people of Nineveh. And Jonah doesn't want to do it. So he runs from God, and then he's on this ship, and the ship is storm-tossed. It's very similar to our passage from this morning. And the the sailors cast lots, and they find out that Jonah is the one that God is mad at. And Jonah says, What? Chuck me into the sea, and everything's going to be okay for you guys. God's mad at me, not you. And what do they do? They chuck him in the ocean. And for all the all of the sense that you get from Jonah chapter 1, there's no coming back from that. He goes down into that water and he dies. From Jonah's perspective, if God is willing to send a storm that would sink a boat full of people, then going into that water meant death for him. And then a fish came along to sort of double down on that death and ate him. On the other hand, we might be tempted to put a lot of emphasis on Peter's faith. Think about Peter for a moment. His faith, his boldness. He hears the voice of Jesus and he says, If it's you, call me onto that water. So maybe we look at Peter and we think, all right, we know what Peter's got this, he's got some credit. He's got an example for us. We're going to be bold in our faith. We're going to be strong in our faith. That's what God wants from us. That's what we need to do. We need to be strong. But that would be the wrong part of the story to look at. All of that strong faith melted away when what? When he was faced with his own death. When he was faced with the depth of his sin and the pulling down power of death itself, he knew he had no strength whatsoever. It melted away from under him, just like it would be if you tried to walk on water this morning. You would be pulled down to the depths. His only hope was Jesus. The belly of that fish and sinking into a stormy sea are not positions of power. You wouldn't want to be in one of those two places. And yet Jonah and Peter are at the mercy of God, and that's the best place to be. Paul's example is a little bit different. In Romans 9, he is saying that he would be willing to be cut off from Christ for the sake of his kindred, according to the flesh, for his kinsmen, for the Jews. And Paul is here depicting what it looks like to have your eyes so set on Christ that you begin to imitate the compassion of Christ. He was willing to stand in the place for all of Israel. Now, if you read all of Romans, you know that Paul knows that he can't stand in anybody's place, that he's not a sacrifice that can redeem anybody, but his desire to stand in the place of his people was driven as much by his love and his imitation of Jesus as it was for a love for his own people. If you read Romans 9 again, especially verse 5, you can see very clearly that he wants Jesus to be glorified in saving the people who had received so many of the gifts of God and so much of the mercy of God throughout the long centuries. We can imitate Jesus by desiring the salvation of the people around us, and we, like St. Paul, entrust the people that we love into the gracious hands of the same Lord who saved us out of the deep waters. Our lives serve as living examples of God's grace. We sometimes say here, quoting St. Martin Luther, that God does not need your good deeds, but your neighbor does. And as recipients of the resurrection life of Jesus, we are set free from the bondage of sin. The Lord has called us to live as pilgrims, though. We are heading to a promised land where justice and righteousness are perfect and everyone is at peace with God and with one another. That means that we are pilgrims of peace and of good news of a gospel. We declare to a sin-ravaged world that in Jesus Christ they can be made partakers of a righteousness that brings life rather than judgment. So Jesus comes to us treading on the water. He is triumphant over death. That is the good news for us. The thing that would surely have swallowed us up is now powerless over us through the resurrected Jesus Christ. He reaches down and lifts us up, and through him we receive grace through the love of God for sinners like us. And as we walk through life, we look to Jesus, who calls us to be his ambassadors, to represent him to people like ourselves all around the world, people who are sinners, sinners who need the grace of God. And the new life that we have received calls us to follow Christ and shapes us into his image. Let the good work let the good work of the Word of God have its way in you. Repent of your sin, both outward and obvious sins, as well as the inward and hidden sins. Live with an eye on the coming kingdom, so you're not caught off guard when it comes, even in the fourth watch of the night. Let's pray. Father, we come to you asking for your help as we live in a world full of sin, a world full of turmoil, a world full of heartache and broken expectations and missed dreams and so many other things that hurt us. Lord, we we come to you asking for your help, for your mercy, for our eyes to be focused on your Son Jesus Christ and all of those good things that we've been reminded of over and over again. But Lord, more than anything else, touch us with the life of your Son Jesus Christ. Resurrect us, give us the power of the Holy Spirit to walk in a way that gives glory to your name and shows forth the power of your great gospel. We ask this in the name of your Son Jesus Christ. Amen.