Unraveled by Uncertainty
Matthew 14:22-33
September 19, 2021
Emmanuel Baptist Church; Rev. Kathy Donley
Note: A recording of the worship service in which this sermon was preached may be found here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rLPtmCBVa08
It had been an exhausting day for the disciples. They learned that John the Baptist had been executed by Herod Antipas. That was an emotional shock. They had tried to go off with Jesus to grieve and talk and process, but the crowds had followed as usual. So, they had spent most of the day listening to Jesus with the crowd, but then, he had told them to feed everyone. That was a different kind of shock, finding out that he expected them to be able to do that. As we know, Jesus did the hard part of getting the food together, but still, they had to do set-up and clean-up involved in serving a few thousand people. So they were already tired when Jesus made them go away. He made them get in the boat and leave him alone to pray.
They were weary. They just wanted the day to be over so they could go rest. But first, they had to get home and apparently, on this day, their way home was across the water. Having to fight with the rough seas and the wind in their face only added to their fatigue.
In Biblical stories like this one, the water functions almost like one of the characters with its own tension and plot development. One scholar says “Water is the necessity that humans must have for life and we must drink it, even though it can swallow us and all that we have built, in an instant. . . .Water was pushed up and back when God made a safe place for human life in Genesis 1, but water waits, just on the other side of the sky, waits to gush out and wash everything away. Water waits . . . to return God’s creation to the formless void, the dangerous watery chaos that existed before God began to create.” [1]
A friend is traveling the coast of Ireland right now. From several different locations, he has shared pictures of sculptures and memorials remembering those who went to sea and never returned. Many of them were fisherman. The people know the danger. Every town has its own memories of those lost, but they still go out on the water because they must.
Several of the disciples are fishermen. They are familiar with sudden storms like this one. The Sea of Galilee is really a lake. It covers about 64 square miles. For reference, Lake George covers about 45 square miles. The disciples are never very far from land, but the storm has them in a holding pattern. For hours, they have been straining at the oars and rowing against the wind. They are drenched by the waves, miserable and tired.
They respect the power of the storm, but they are not afraid of it. Not this time. They only become frightened when Jesus shows up. He is difficult to recognize. His presence is not comforting They think he is one of the demons who live on the sea or a ghost. Jesus calls out “Get a hold of yourselves. It’s me.”
Peter answers. Of course, it’s Peter. I am so grateful for all the stories we have about Peter. Peter says, “If it really is you, Jesus, then command me to walk on the water.” As a way for Jesus to verify his identity, this doesn’t make a lot of sense. He could have said, “If it’s you, Jesus, what’s my mother-in-law’s name?” Or “If it’s really you, tell me what we had for lunch today.”
But Peter says, “If it’s really you, Jesus, then empower me to do something spectacular.” This sounds something like what Satan at that beginning of Jesus’ ministry “If you are the Son of God, turn these stones into bread.” Peter wants Jesus to make him impervious to the storm. He doesn’t want to have to use the oars and row against the wind any more, but to rise above it all.
I can relate to that, can’t you? It feels like we’ve been in this storm forever. I keep thinking that the shore is in sight. If we would just all row together, we would land and then we could get off the boat and rest. But some people are tired of trying so they quit. And others aren’t taking the storm seriously, they’re content to ride it out while others do the hard work. Some feel like God put them in the boat and then abandoned them in the storm. They are frightened or sad or angry. A few people think that they’re exceptional. They don’t need to stay in the boat, they don’t need to keep rowing, because they are not subject to the same rules of physics and biology that the rest of us mere mortals are.
I am grateful for Peter. I am grateful that we know so much of the range of his experience with Jesus – the time he dropped his nets without notice to follow, the time he declared “You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God.” The time he jumped in to answer Jesus’ question and put his foot in his mouth. Not that time, the other one. The time Jesus asked him to pray with him in the Garden of Gethsemane and Peter fell asleep. The time he went running to the empty tomb to check out the women’s story. The time he baptized Cornelius. The time Jesus called him a rock.
Jesus says, “OK then. Come out and walk on the water with me.” And Peter does. For a minute. Until he loses his focus and feels the wind on his face and the waves splashing over him. Until he remembers that people can’t do this. And then he starts to sink. Peter is “not a skeptic who habitually doubts but a faithful follower who becomes overwhelmed by the circumstances surrounding him and begins to lose his nerve.”[2]
Peter did not learn to walk on water on this occasion. He did learn, again, to trust the presence of Jesus that came to him in the boat. Even when he didn’t recognize it at first, even when it wasn’t initially comforting.
Most of us are a lot of like Peter. One minute, we feel like we can walk on water. The next, the wind and waves are too much. As Barbara Brown Taylor says, “The truth about us is that we obey and fear, we walk and sink, we believe and doubt. But it is not like we do only one or the other. We do both. Our faith and our doubts are not mutually exclusive; they both exist in us at the same time, buoying us up and bearing us down, giving us courage and feeding our fears, supporting our weight on the wild seas of our lives and sinking us like stones.”[3]
There is no point in beating ourselves up about this. No point in dwelling on our feelings of inadequacy and failure. Our doubts are part of our humanity, a reminder that our strength comes from God. But even a little bit of faith, Jesus said, is enough to move a mountain.
“Take courage,” Jesus says to Peter and to us. Live with heart. We got in this boat with all our doubts, because we believe and we want to follow. Live with heart. Let yourself trust, even just a little bit, that God is in the boat, in the storm with us. Take courage. It will be enough. Amen.
[1] Richard Swanson, Provoking the Gospel of Matthew: A Storytellers’ Commentary, Year A (Cleveland: The Pilgrim Press, 2007) p. 194
[2] Walter Brueggemann, Charles B. Cousar, Beverly R. Gaventa, James D. Newsome. Texts for Preaching: A Lectionary Commentary Based on the NRSV—Year A. (Louisville: John Knox Press, 1995), p 441-2.
[3] Barbara Brown Taylor, “Saved by Doubt” in The Seeds of Heaven: Sermons o the Gospel of Matthew (Louisville: Westminster/John Knox Press, 2004), p. 60