Last week we looked at the moment when Jesus took five pieces of bread and two little fish and miraculously fed somewhere near twenty thousand people.
It’s an incredible account and it’s the only miracle besides the resurrection that was recorded in every Gospel. But I think what is missed sometimes in this story, is the hardship that Jesus was going through, right when all of these people showed up. Jesus had just been rejected by His town and His family, His cousin had just been murdered, and it’s while He is spending some time alone after these things, that all of these people show up and this miraculous meal happens.
We pick up today in Matthew 14 once again right as the meal is ending and let’s see what happens next.
Read Matthew 14:22-36
So, the miraculous had happened, all of these people had eaten and then what happens in verse 22? Let me read that again.
Read Matthew 14:22
We see here that Jesus made the disciples get into the boat and leave without Him over to the other side of the Sea. And how this is worded here, making them get into the boat seems to be stated pretty strongly. It probably wasn’t like, hey guys, why don’t you guys get in the boat and take off. It was probably more, you guys need to get into the boat, and get going, and I’ll take care of things here, and catch up later. I kind of doubt that all of the disciples would have just happily left Him there with all of these people still around, but Jesus probably made it pretty clear that it was time for them to go, for the moment, and so they went.
But there’s actually a little more to this situation and John talks about it in his Gospel, so let’s go over there for a minute.
Read John 6:12-18
These people that just ate all of this food, that witnessed this miracle happen, they came to the conclusion that you see in verse 14, that “this is truly the Prophet Who is come into the world.” And what this means is that the people there witnessing this miracle that day believed that they had now found the Messiah that was promised.
And so what happens next?
In verse 15 we see that Jesus perceives their intentions, or He knows what they are thinking and what they want to do. They actually want to come take Him by force and install Him as their King. Which seems like good intentions, seems like it might be a good idea, but this isn’t Jesus’ plan and He probably doesn’t want the disciples to get wrapped up in what’s going on either. So He tells them go.
We’ve talked about it before, that these people were expecting the Messiah to come as a political and military leader. And so now when they are seeing Jesus, they are like “we’ve found Him”, and we need put Him into that role. Like Jesus needed them to do that. But like I said, their intentions, even though they sound good, just didn’t line up with the plan, and so Jesus took control of the situation and sent the disciples out on their boat and dispersed the crowds or as Matthew said, He sent the multitudes away.
It was already nighttime when all of this was going down, but now disciples are rowing out in the sea, actually rowing out into a storm, and all of the people are heading back home. But Jesus, once again, decides on some alone time, and climbs a mountain to go and pray by Himself.
Maybe He is still hurting, maybe He just wants alone time with His Father, maybe He’s praying for the ministry that is still ahead of Him, but it’s something that we can learn from. Sometimes it is those isolated moments where it is just us and the Lord that bring the greatest healing from our struggles or bring us even closer in our relationship and reliance on the Lord. Maybe it’s in the car on the way to work, maybe it’s in a time that you have set aside, for Jesus it was up on a mountain at this moment. But let’s not take for granted the incredible truth that we, because of Jesus, can stop and come before God Almighty in prayer. Even Jesus, stopped, and went to prayer, for the hurt, for others, and for the mission.
Back in Matthew 14. Here we see the same thing in verse 23, that Jesus was alone up on that mountain for prayer. But in verse 24 the focus shifts to the boat with the disciples on it. They’re out in the middle of the sea, they’re getting hit by the waves, they’re rowing against the wind and they aren’t really making much progress. And then we see another absolutely incredible miracle in verse 25:
Read Matthew 14:25
The fourth watch of the night, in our terms, means between 3AM and 6AM. These guys are on graveyard shift, rowing straight through the night as Jesus had told them to. The wind is blowing in their face, they are getting beat up by the waves, they are probably dead tired after all of this rowing, and it’s also past three in the morning. But then they see someone, or in their mind, something walking on the water, in the middle of the sea, in the middle of the night. Let’s read verse 26.
Read Matthew 14:26
IT’S A GHOST! I mean what would you or I think if we were worn out, half asleep, and in the same situation? These guys were afraid, and we probably would be too. So, they’re over here yelling about the ghost, and Jesus is basically like, “it’s ok guys! It’s Me. Don’t be afraid.”
And then Peter speaks up in verse 28:
Read Matthew 14:28
The way that this is translated kind of makes it sound like Peter might have doubted that this was actually Jesus on the water, when it says “Lord, if it is you”. But the original words for this passage are actually more like “Lord, since it is you, command me to come to You on the water.” And then Jesus simply says “Come” in verse 29, and Peter gets out of the boat, and starts walking across the water towards Jesus.
It’s the middle of the night, the wind is blowing, there’s waves all over the place, and Peter and Jesus are out walking on the water on top of the Sea of Galilee. Another completely crazy, totally miraculous situation.
Peter heard Jesus’ command to come, Peter saw that it was Jesus out on that water, Peter had the faith to step out of that boat and start walking across the water towards Jesus. But … let’s read verse 30.
Read Matthew 14:30
Peter started in faith, eyes on Jesus, hearing His command to come, but then … Peter started looking around, started taking in His surroundings, started to realize that this was a pretty crazy situation, and started to get afraid, and as His fear builds, it seems his faith begins to shrink, and he starts sinking.
But what is FAITH?
A quick google search of “define faith” gave the following definitions:
- 1. a complete trust or confidence in someone or something.
- 2. a strong belief in God or in the doctrines of a religion, based on spiritual apprehension (or understanding) rather than proof.
Those definitions are ok, but definitely not the whole picture. That’s how the world would view faith, but let’s go look at Hebrews 11 and what it says about faith.
Read Hebrews 11:1-3
What the writer of Hebrews is essentially saying is that Faith is what gives substance to the things that we can’t see. I’ve never seen God with my own two eyes, yet I believe in Him completely. By the worlds standards that probably doesn’t make any sense. But faith is what makes it make sense even when our eyes can’t see it. And it’s important to note that faith isn’t just something that we conjure up. Check out what Ephesians 2 says:
Ephesians 2:8-9
8 For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, 9 not of works, lest anyone should boast.
The faith that allows us to truly believe is a God given gift. And that’s an interesting thing to grasp, that God gives out the faith to people that in turn opens our hearts and minds to understand what we can’t see with our eyes. Faith is the element of us given by God that looks into the spiritual instead of being limited to just the physical. It’s enables us to see God’s hand at work in this world, it allows us to comprehend Who He is, it allows us to see the truth of scripture.
Romans 1 says that we should be able to just look at the world that was created around us and see the hand of the almighty God that made it. That all of this didn’t just happen by accident. But many still don’t have the faith to see that truth. The writer of Hebrews 11 makes that same point as well.
He says that the worlds were framed or created by the very word of God. He says that everything that in this world wasn’t made by something else that we can see … it wasn’t made by some other visible thing … because it was all made by God.
But it’s faith that lets us see that truth that our eyes can’t see
So, as we jump back to Matthew, as we come back to this moment, in the middle of the night, as Jesus and Peter are standing out on the water in the middle of the storm, let’s come back with this understanding that our eyes physically see the world around us, but our faith allows us to see and understand the things of God. And that’s really important as we look back at Peter’s situation.
Read Matthew 14:29-30
In faith, Peter heard Jesus’ command to come. In faith, He knew Who Jesus was, He knew His power, He was literally looking at Him walking over water at that very moment. In faith, Peter stepped out of the boat and began to walk on the water as well.
Peter had that faith. He could see the spiritual truth of the situation and that compelled Him to join Jesus in this miracle. But there’s something really important for us to learn here from Peter’s situation.
We can learn here that it’s really easy to become overwhelmed with all of the things that our eyes are seeing in this world, and in our life, and in all of the things around us. And if we let that happen, then it’s possible to allow what we physically see to eclipse or overshadow what we should be spiritually seeing. We’re letting our physical sight overwhelm our faith. And that’s what happens to Peter at this moment.
He sees the wind, I’m sure there’s waves, it’s probably still dark or really early morning out in the middle of the water, and in seeing all of these things He becomes afraid. He stepped out of the boat spiritually seeing that Jesus could absolutely make him walk on water as well, but then his eyes drifted to all of the other things, and all of the other things, weakened His spiritual focus, on the fact that, JESUS IS ABLE TO MAKE THIS HAPPEN. And when that focus was lost, things started going bad.
Peter at the end of verse 30 cries out, “LORD SAVE ME!”
And here’s the beauty in this moment. Jesus wasn’t like, forget you Peter, you obviously don’t believe in Me enough. No. His immediate response was to reach out and catch Him in his moment of distress. Peter’s faith wasn’t perfect, it was a gift of God that he had any faith at all, but his faith was still growing, he was still growing, but he was still just a regular guy that was now learning these incredible spiritual truths. Just like we are.
God knows us. He knows we aren’t perfect; He knows our faith isn’t perfect, I mean He gave us that faith in the first place if we truly believe in Him right now, but we should be growing, and developing, and increasing in faith. I’ve seen my own faith grow through my own life as I have seen the truth of His word play out in real life, as I have seen Him answer prayer, as I have seen Him transform my own life and others. I’ve never seen God with my own two eyes, but I have no doubt that He is real, and that His words are true.
There’s a good example that I have heard before, that it’s just like the fact that I have never seen the wind, I can’t physically see wind moving around, but I can see how it effects things. I see the trees move, out here, I see the clouds of dust kicked up and the sky turn brown, I find the pool full of all the debris that is carried on the wind and so I know the wind to be real. In much the same way I see God’s creation, I see His work, I feel His presence, and in faith, I know that it’s true.
Jesus in verse 31 says to Peter, “O you of little faith, why did you doubt?” And there’s no answer recorded from Peter here, but that’s likely because this was a rhetorical question. The answer was already known. Jesus knew where Peter was in his growth, and so Jesus grabbed Peter as he was sinking and took him to the boat. As they got there all of the other guys in the boat were probably just awestruck from what they had been witnessing. Not long-ago Jesus fed like twenty thousand people from one little boy’s food and then they just watched Him come walking across the water and this whole interaction with Peter. As Jesus stepped onto that boat, these guys were seeing clearly through faith the truth of who Jesus was and so they worshipped Him saying “TRULY YOU ARE THE SON OF GOD.”
After all this, there is the last few verses in 34 through 36, which we read earlier and they made it to the other side, of the sea and Jesus continued on in His ministry to people throughout the region.
But as we close today after looking at this passage, I want us to recognize that even these guys weren’t perfect in their faith. They were still growing too, just like we need to be.
And I want us to grow, I want us to know that He is exactly Who He says that He is. I want us to trust Him enough that when God brings a step out of the boat kind of moment to our lives … that we will step out of the boat and follow Him. We learn through this moment with Peter that we need to keep our eyes fixed on Jesus, even with the wind and the waves, or all of the things of life that might be going on around us, we’ve got to keep the focus, we need to keep the faith, we need to keep trusting, we need to be abiding in Him as we have been talking about.
So, together as a church family, let’s seek to grow in the faith to follow Jesus wherever He leads, but let’s also hold onto the hope that He’s still got us even in our weakness. And that’s a wonderful thing.