Sermon manuscript:
“Seek first the kingdom of God and
his righteousness, and all these things will be added unto you.”
Let’s begin by setting the scene. Our Gospel reading today
picks up where last week’s reading left off. Last week Jesus fed the 5,000 with
five loaves and two fish. Immediately after that, as we heard in today’s
reading, Jesus sent the disciples off in a boat on the sea of Galilee. Jesus
went up on a mountain by himself to pray. He was praying by himself well into
the night.
While Jesus was praying, the disciples were in the boat, but
the wind was giving them trouble. The wind was making big waves. The wind was
blowing against the boat. The wind was whistling in their ears. They were out
there all night long, battling that wind. The fourth watch of the night finally
came, which in our time would be somewhere between 3 AM and 6 AM.
It was at this time that Jesus came towards the disciples in
the boat walking on the water. The disciples must have been very tired, given
what time it was. They had to have been frustrated that their journey was not
going well. When they see Jesus they don’t recognize him. They thought he was a
ghost. And that’s understandable. People can’t walk on water.
So try to put yourselves in the disciples’ shoes. This was a
very unpleasant, even dangerous situation. It’s dark. The wind’s howling. The
waves are crashing. They’re probably trying to keep the bow of the boat into
the wind so that the bow can cut through the oncoming waves instead of being
swamped by them. Then, to top it all off, there’s a stinking ghost. What else
can go wrong?
Jesus’s words then break into the darkness, the wind, the
confusion. He says, “Take heart, it is I, do not be
afraid.” It is good to spend a little time here on Jesus’s words. The
first thing that Jesus says is, “Take heart.” That
means, “Be courageous.” The disciples were in
trouble. Jesus tells them to have courage.
Why should they have courage? Jesus says, “It is I.” With the words, “It
is I,” certainly Jesus is telling the disciples that he is no ghost. But
Jesus might also be saying something more here too. What it says in Greek is: “Ego eimi.” Maybe some of you have heard that
before. “Ego” is Greek for “I.” “Eimi” is Greek for “am.” So “ego
eimi” means “I am.”
What is the significance of Jesus saying, “I am”? Perhaps you recall God identifying himself to
Moses at the burning bush. Moses wanted to know what name he should give to the
Israelites when they ask him who sent him. God responds, “I am who I am. Tell them that ‘I am’ has sent you.” “I
am” is a name for God. Here Jesus says, “I am.”
So although Jesus doesn’t say many words, the few words he does
say are powerful: “Be courageous. I am. Do not be
afraid.” “Be courageous because I am who I am. I am God. Do not be
afraid.”
It appears that Jesus’s message hit home with Peter by his
reaction, which you might say is unusual. He says to Jesus, “If it is you, Lord, then command me to come to you on the
water.” Remember all the stuff that is going on around them. The wind
and the waves have not stopped. The wind is howling. They were shouting just to
hear one another.
Peter’s mind, however, has been taken away from what was
happening around him. The cares and concerns that have kept them up all night
long recede into the background of his mind. He has an audacious idea. Peter
believes in the “I am.” So he has the courage to
step out of that rocking and swirling boat onto the tempestuous sea.
I’d like to point out that there is an obvious alternative to
Peter’s plan. The alternative would be to focus on what was going on around
him. He could have said to Jesus, “Can’t you make this wind stop that’s been
tormenting us all night long? Can’t you see we’re suffering!? Make it stop! We
loathe this worthless sea voyage, which, by the way, you put us on.” The
sensible thing would be to get the wind and the waves to stop. That’s what a
responsible person would do.
The responsible person seems to be proven right, also, by
what ends up happening. You know how the story goes. He ends up sinking! So a
responsible person might say, “See, first things first. Get rid of the waves.” But
there’s more to the story than that. Peter did end up sinking. He had to cry
out: “Lord, save me!” But before that he was
walking on the water and was making his way towards Jesus. Maybe if Peter had
sunk like a stone the second he stepped out of the boat those responsible
people would have a point, but for a time Peter believed, and it was glorious.
Now when it comes to applying what we hear in this Gospel
reading to ourselves, the applications are almost innumerable. This is a very
rich text and could teach us many things. But I’d like to focus just on Peter’s
reaction and how we might imitate him so that something glorious might take
place in our lives too.
We all, like Peter had with the wind and the waves, we all have
our troubles and frustrations. If we thought hard enough we could all come up
with a good long list of stuff that we’d like to have different. All of us
would have minor stuff. Maybe we would have some terribly, terribly big stuff
too. Maybe your life is in danger of being lost—not by wind and waves, but by disease.
Perhaps more important than merely surviving, though, are all the relationships
in our lives. Maybe you are estranged from someone. There’s a cold war
happening in your family or in your house. We all have our cares and worries of
every kind, and perhaps they are so bad we haven’t been able to make headway no
matter how hard we try. It’s the fourth watch of the night. When is it ever
going to end?
Then, to top it all off, Jesus can show up in a sense, similar
to how he did with the disciples. What I mean is that Jesus can make himself
and his will known to us, and what Jesus says is not always welcome. His
thoughts on life are usually not our thoughts. How he says we should live our
lives can seem impractical, impossible, otherworldly—ghostly. He tells us, for
example, that we should forgive those who trespass against us. What should we
do with those who have hurt us? We should do good to them and love them. Love,
in general, would be Jesus’s way. Can’t go wrong with love.
To which we might sensibly respond, “Don’t you know what’s been
going on with me? Don’t you know the hell I’ve been through? I’m just trying to
survive. How dare you ask anything more of me?” Away with you, you ghost!
You’re not here to help us. You’re just making it worse!
But Jesus doesn’t remain a ghost to the disciples, nor does
he wish to remain a ghost to us. He tells us who he is so that we may believe
in him. He says, “Be courageous. I am God. Do not be
afraid.” Faith comes first. The life of love, especially to our enemies
and to those who have hurt us, would be as impossible as walking on water if
faith did not come first.
And faith in Jesus is always good and gracious. All the
disciples were probably relieved to hear Jesus’s voice, but Peter did something
more. He also gave up worrying about himself. You will never be harmed by
believing in Jesus. But believing in Jesus will mean that the other things that
are going on with you will need to be pushed to the background.
Imagine if Peter didn’t react the way he did, but responded
differently. Imagine if he faintly, distantly heard Jesus say what he said, but
instead of taking it to heart he would have been too busy with the boat. Look!
See there. The bow is turning against the wind! The wind is going to push us
sideways! Look at the wave that’s coming. It’s going to sink us! Everybody on
the left row forward! Everybody on the right row backwards! Row for your lives!
Can’t you see how something like that could happen? Not only
could it happen, it’s what comes
naturally to us. We believe that we must solve all our own problems. How are we
going to solve them? How about we start by obsessing over them? That’s what
responsible people do. It’s irresponsible, in a sense, to move all thoughts to
the background and focus on Jesus and his words to us. But that’s what faith
does.
Faith in Christ requires us to push all kinds of important
and seemingly relevant thoughts to the background. You must, for example, set
aside the sins that you’ve committed. Either your sins are supreme and you
should worry yourself to death about them, or Jesus is supreme.
Or how about your failures? If you’ve failed at love, failed
at business, failed at life, either this is going to be the supreme thing in
your life or Jesus. But maybe you’re more of an upbeat sort of person. You’ve
succeeded at life. You’ve take those waves head on and sailed right through!
There’s no stopping the wind though. Death must relentlessly
and ruthlessly take its prey. There’s no stopping that no matter how many waves
you’ve made it through. Let’s turn that on its head, though, and say, “I’ve
only got one life to live so I’m going to be glorious!” All that is still just
playing around with the oars and the rigging.
By nature, with our unbelief, we can’t do anything different.
We can’t help but mess around with all the things in our life. We want to
decrease that long list of stuff we’d like to have different. So we pull on
this and move that. Patch and mend and reinvent ourselves. Motivate, educate,
reinvigorate.
Or, on the other hand—and this makes up no small number—we’re
tired of all that. We sit hunched on the bench, staring at the hapless rudder
and the flapping of sails.
These two ways of being seem so different from one another,
but really they’re not. Whether we’re busy or whether we’ve given up—it makes
no difference ultimately—the boat is doomed if Jesus is not there. “Moth and rust destroy; thieves break in and steal.” But
what if there were something more important, more life-giving, outside the
boat?
And there is! Jesus does not come from inside the boat, from
inside this life. Jesus comes from heaven. And here’s the amazing thing: We’re
safer with Jesus. Peter held on to that strange thought for quite some time as
he was making his way towards Jesus. All the disciples would have been safer
with Jesus than they ever were in the boat. But, boy!, is it ever hard for us
to believe that. It was hard for Peter too. He looked at the wind and the
waves. We’re not told this by the text, but maybe there was a huge wave coming
towards him, towering way above him. He shouldn’t have doubted, but can any of
us blame him? We are cut from the same cloth. “Lord,
save us!”
The truth remains, though, despite how we feel: You are
safer with faith in Jesus than you are in any other possible place. Jesus is
the great “I am.”
“Seek first the kingdom of God and
his righteousness, and all these things will be added unto you.”
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