9th Sun. after Pent. Matthew 14:22-34; Salvation in the storm
Glory to Jesus Christ! Today we pick up immediately where we left off last week. The 5000 have been filled, and having had their physical hunger satisfied they conclude that Christ is the Messiah. They are correct of course, in all that Christ is doing He is always fulfilling the signs of the Messiah. In today’s gospel Christ comes walking across the water and stilling the storm. We hear David prophesying in the Psalms, (Ps. 77:19), “Your way was in the sea, Your path in the great waters, And Your footsteps were not known” and (Ps. 89:9), “Thou rule the raging of the sea; When its waves rise, You still them.”
But though the hungry crowd of 5000 men plus women and children correctly determined that Jesus was the Messiah, how did they understand the Messiah? In John we hear (John 6:14, 15) “Then those men when they had seen the sign that Jesus did, said ‘This is truly the prophet who is to come into the world.’ Therefore when Jesus perceived that they were about to come and take Him by force to make Him king, He departed again to the mountain by himself alone.” Their understanding of why and what the coming Messiah will do when He comes, (especially as it relates to them) is distorted and limited to having the Messiah improve their personal present earthly situation. How many times is this not also our main focus as we turn to God in prayer? They didn’t know that they were witnessing the redemption of the human race and were living at the center point of all of human history. We however, living on this side of the resurrection should know.
Thinking we understand, when we really don’t have a clue is a common human failing. We too usually run everything through our own very limited personal perspective, and have no idea what God is really up to, or at best we get a small glimpse of a small part of what is occurring. How can we know fully? (Isiah 55:8) “My thoughts are not as your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways says the Lord.” Yet, we often look for opportunities to tell anyone who will listen what God is doing and thinking, and love to demonstrate what clever little monkey’s we are, having figured it all out. Intellectual knowledge of God leading to faith in our presumptive certainty will usually only lead us into the most dangerous arena of pride and striving. When we really think we understand God and what He is doing in our lives, or even worse in the lives of others, we will often try to control the circumstances and twist the story to fit our vision. “Look what I’m doing for God!” Often God, in His love and mercy, will allow this idolatrous enterprise to crumble, and in the rubble pile we can then find Him waiting to gather us up into His ever-loving arms, where we can finally simply rest in His love. Everything starts with humility and grateful acceptance for whatever it is that God has allowed into our lives. Being thankful for our cross, which He faithfully gives us for our salvation. We really don’t have to figure it all out, but rather just accept in faith that He loves us, and is always with us. As the apostle Paul says in Romans (Rom. 8:28) “And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God…” Faith comes from believing in the loving benevolence of God; and this faith lets us trust God. We may not understand, but we are instructed to, (Matt. 16:24) “deny ourselves and take up our cross and follow Christ.”
Having fed the 5000, Jesus sends His disciples away by themselves in the boat, while He retreats from the crowd and goes up the mountain alone to pray. He knows of course that He is sending them into a great storm. Our life is lived in a great storm. The essential lesson of today’s gospel is that the only way to survive the great storms of life is to keep our focus upon Jesus Christ, and to know that He is always with us in the middle of the most troubling and destructive storms. Christ tells His disciples (John 16:33) “These things I have spoken to you that in Me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.”
The last time Jesus sent His disciples into a great storm He was sleeping in the boat with them, demonstrating by His physical presence that He would be with them and protect them from all storms. When the storm threatened to capsize the boat, the disciples woke Him saying (Matt.8:25) “Lord save us, we are perishing!” giving us one of the most effective prayers we can use. These disciples were seasoned fishermen, so this must have been a doozy of a storm. Jesus says then the same thing which He says to Peter in today’s gospel “Why are you fearful O you of little faith.” He then rebukes the winds and the sea and there was a great calm and they marvelled greatly asking the essential question we must all ask “Who can this be?” This is the most important question we can ask ourselves, and our eternal destiny awaits our answer and our response.
In today’s gospel, Jesus is sending His disciples into the storm without Him being physically on board. He wishes to deepen their understanding that even when He is not physically present, He will in fact Matt.28:20) “be with them (and us) always and unto the end of the age.” He is beginning to show them He is and will be even more present with them when He is not with them physically. He waits long enough to see they are in distress. John says (John 6:19) that the disciples were 3 or 4 miles out and a great wind was blowing and the sea arose. Mark says (Mark 6:47, 48) that Jesus could see that they were in the middle of the sea straining at rowing for the wind was against them. Christ is seeing them at night when they are out in the middle of the sea, demonstrating that He sees all and is ever present with us, even when we are blinded with terrible visibility and have a hard time seeing Him.
Christ walks upon the water to come to them in the fourth watch of the night, between 3 and 6 am. Remember, Christ had sent his disciples off in the boat immediately after feeding the 5000. It would seem that the disciples took this rather spectacular miracle of the multiplication of the loaves for granted, somehow missing the glory of God. In Mark’s gospel we hear, (Mark 6:51, 52) “Then He went up into the boat with them, and the wind ceased. And they were greatly amazed in themselves beyond measure and marvelled. For they had not understood about the loaves, because their heart was hardened.” Familiarity can make us miss the miraculous and we often fail to see the presence of God which is always all around us in all of life. This walking on the water is a rather in your face demonstration of Christ’s divinity which is hard to miss. It sometimes takes this type of eye opening experience to penetrate through our hard and crusty hearts. When we awaken to God’s reality which is ever present and filling all of creation and only hidden by our great blindness, our reaction is the same as that of those in the boat and we are “amazed beyond measure and marvel greatly.”
All of creation is held together with the energy of God. Once in a while, we get a glimpse of this as God’s presence in His creation breaks through and makes an electric impression on us. But everything is sacred, all of creation is infused with God. As we grow up, we lose our sense of awe that we had as children, seeing God’s creation in every new discovery. Christ tells us we must regain this and (Matt. 18.3) “…become as little children to enter the kingdom of heaven,” for unless we do we will not even see the kingdom of heaven is everywhere present “On earth as it is in heaven”. The pulsating presence of God that fills all things is dimmed by everyday familiarity and begins to elude our conscious awareness. We become blinded to the sacredness of the ordinary, and perceive only the material “stuff” of creation, missing the Creator who gives life and form to all creation.
Seeing Jesus walking on the water allows Peter to have one of these breakthrough moments and recognize Christ. Peter is inspired crying out (Matt.14:28) “Lord, if it is You, command me to come to You on the water.” Peter is filled with the certainty that anything is possible, an entirely different view of reality fills his heart, and with this new faith he steps out and begins walking upon the water towards Jesus, keeping his gaze riveted upon Him. His present danger and circumstances are irrelevant, Jesus is with him in the middle of them and that is all that matters. But then Peter’s focus wavers. The reality of the present storm with the wind and the waves raging around him break through. Peter loses his new-found faith as he once again considers the obvious reality of the danger he is in. Fear strikes his heart, destroying his burst of faith and as he changes his focus from single mindedly coming to Christ, he sinks, crying out in desperation “Lord save me.” This is the essential prayer of us all. Distilled down to its core this is the Jesus prayer. “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy upon me a sinner” or when we need to connect desperately with God right now “Lord save me.” Christ responds immediately, reaching out and catching Peter and admonishing him “O you of little faith, why did you doubt?” They get into the boat, the wind stops and in the gospel John (John 6:21) we are told that the boat was immediately transported to the shore where they were going. When we are with Christ, we are always at our true destination.
When we hear this gospel, something in our hearts stirs. Our common-sense view of how reality works is challenged. The spark of divinity laying largely undeveloped within us leaps to our consciousness awareness. We identify with the impulsive apostle Peter who reaches out in faith and yet is clobbered by doubt and fear. This is our story as children of God. Slowly testing our fledgling muscles of faith, we progress into becoming more and more captured by the new reality of the kingdom of God. A completely different understanding of life than what we are conditioned to accept as proper reality through our culture and upbringing begins to take hold of us. The rules are very different, the opposite of the culture around us. Orthodoxy is Paradoxy.
– Many who are first will be last, and the last first. (Matt. 19:30)
– Whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My Names sake will find it. (Matt. 16:25).
– Whoever desires to be great among you, let him be your servant, and whoever wants to be first among you let him be your slave. (Matt. 19:26, 27)
– Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you. (Luke 6:27, 28)
In today’s gospel we see the great Apostle Peter, struggling to keep his eyes on Christ in the middle of the storm and failing. We see that Christ would prefer that we just ignore the storm and keep our eyes and heart focused on Him in the middle of it. However, we also see that when our faith falters and it is too much to bear the trial set upon us for our growth and salvation, and we call out in desperation “Lord save me!” that He will reach out His hand and pull us safely into His protection and end the storm. He will safely bring us to our blessed destination. For the apostles in today’s Gospel they were immediately transported to the other shore – they still had work to do. For thousands of Martyrs in their greatest hour of trial they were welcomed directly to their final destination, their true home and given crowns of victory. In death is the ultimate victory achieved.
A little later we find St. Peter boldly and with no hesitation saying to Jesus (Matt. 26: 35) “Even if I have to die with You, I will not deny You!” Then later that same evening, when Peter is asked if he was a friend of Jesus the scriptures say (Matt. 26: 74) “Then he began to curse and swear saying, ‘I do not know the Man!” You know the rest of the story, Peter goes on to be filled with the Holy Spirit, heal the sick, raise the dead and become one of our most loved saints.
We can identify with Peter and his flawed and broken humanity and we relate well to his struggles, and we love this lesson because it shows us so well that Christ our God is always with us. He loves us and continuously saves us, protects us and forgives us, blessing our many stumbling attempts to come to Him in our own power. He lovingly watches over us, even as we watch over our children as they take their first few stumbling steps. We stumble and fall and cry out to Daddy and learn to call upon Him at all times, as we learn to walk upright in balance. But through it all, He is always with us unto the end of the ages! Glory to Jesus Christ!