SPEAKER_00: We study through books of the Bible here at the village chapel.
SPEAKER_00: And uh we have some extra copies.
SPEAKER_00: If you didn't bring one with you and you'd like one to follow along, just raise your hand up real high, and somebody will drop one off at your row, your aisle.
SPEAKER_00: We also have a network here in the building, and if you have an online Bible you'd like to use that, you feel free to jump on.
SPEAKER_00: I think maybe that information is right there at the bottom of that slide here in the room.
SPEAKER_00: We're coming off our study from last week of the miracle typically known as the feeding of the 5,000.
SPEAKER_00: And I thank our good friend, the poet Malcolm Geit from over in England, who was here last week, did such a great job walking us through that, showing us how through the heart and hands of Jesus we saw a full display of the divine generosity and provision for several thousand hungry people.
SPEAKER_00: Look with me, if you will, in Matthew 14, just as we just kind of taking a step back a little bit, verse 20, it says they all ate and were satisfied.
SPEAKER_00: And I like that word a lot.
SPEAKER_00: I wanted to look it up.
SPEAKER_00: I wanted to know what it meant.
SPEAKER_00: I've had moments like that.
SPEAKER_00: The Greek word is chortadzo, and it means to gorge oneself.
SPEAKER_00: So this was 5,000 men plus women and children, probably 10, 15, 20,000 people, who all needed to loosen their belts at the end of the meal because they were able to gorge themselves on this five loaves and a couple fish, these without tartar sauce, as far as I can tell.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, there's nothing mentioned but the loaves and the fish.
SPEAKER_00: And it's pretty interesting to me as we read in the parallel accounts, and by the way, the only miracle in all four Gospels, the feeding of the 5,000 or the 10, 15, 20, whatever it was.
SPEAKER_00: Um, and I love that.
SPEAKER_00: So see that, as Malcolm said last week.
SPEAKER_00: It's important for us to see some of this as we read it.
SPEAKER_00: Don't just let it be lifeless words on the page, but try to see some of that.
SPEAKER_00: And before I read the next section for us, uh, let us pray that the Lord will give us eyes.
SPEAKER_00: He will illuminate uh the text for us.
SPEAKER_00: Oh Lord, your word is a lamp unto our feet and a light to our path.
SPEAKER_00: Lighten our darkness.
SPEAKER_00: We beseech thee, O Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Grant us grace to hear your word in humility, to receive it, to believe it with faith.
SPEAKER_00: Then grant us the courage and the strength to rise and follow you on the path that you will now set before us.
SPEAKER_00: We pray for a clearer vision of your truth, a greater faith in your power, and a more confident assurance of your love for us in Jesus' name.
SPEAKER_00: Amen and amen.
SPEAKER_00: So our passage today, Matthew 14, 22 through 33.
SPEAKER_00: And uh, if we were going to title this uh this morning, I'll call it, Dare We Trust Jesus?
SPEAKER_00: Just a question, just to ask.
SPEAKER_00: And I think perhaps as we read this, perhaps you'll even see that there indeed is an answer.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 22.
SPEAKER_00: And immediately, there'll be three of those, by the way, in this passage alone.
SPEAKER_00: He's he's a little, he's he's borrowing a little from Mark.
SPEAKER_00: You know, Mark's gospel uses the word immediately, like 40 times.
SPEAKER_00: Mark's gospel is the short attention span person's gospel.
SPEAKER_00: Immediately, immediately, immediately, immediately everything changes.
SPEAKER_00: The scene is changing all the time.
SPEAKER_00: But here, Matthew is going to do it three times, and immediately Jesus made the disciples, this is right after feeding all these people, get into the boat and go ahead of him to the other side while he sent the multitudes away.
SPEAKER_00: And after he had sent the multitudes away, he went up to the mountain by himself to pray.
SPEAKER_00: And when it was evening, as it becomes darker and darker, he was there alone.
SPEAKER_00: And the boat, that's with the disciples, and it was already many stadia away from the land, battered by the waves, for the wind was contrary.
SPEAKER_00: And cross-reference to the other gospels, you kind of start to figure out many stadia is probably somewhere in the neighborhood of two, three miles out already.
SPEAKER_00: And so their boat is already out there, it's being battered by the waves, and the wind was contrary.
SPEAKER_00: So from below, the waves are coming up and tossing the boat about.
SPEAKER_00: From above, the wind is just howling, wailing all over them, and they're just row, row, row.
SPEAKER_00: Peter's probably yelling, stroke, stroke, stroke, and Bartholomew's doing all his best he can do, and Philip and Andrew are doing what they can.
SPEAKER_00: And I don't know if you've ever been in a canoe when somebody was paddling on the wrong side.
SPEAKER_00: You know, not that side! You know, we're going around a circle, you know, or we're headed for the falls, or whatever.
SPEAKER_00: On the Sea of Galilee, no falls, thankfully.
SPEAKER_00: But they were many stadia away, probably two, three miles.
SPEAKER_00: And he's gone up to pray and was there alone.
SPEAKER_00: In the fourth watch of the night, and this is the Roman clock, and this will be like 3 a.m.
SPEAKER_00: bleary-eyed, storm beaten.
SPEAKER_00: Um, and in the third, or the fourth watch, rather, 3 a.m.
SPEAKER_00: of the night, he, Jesus, came to them walking upon the sea.
SPEAKER_00: Now that's that's quite an amazing statement right there.
SPEAKER_00: We just talked about Jesus being fully human and fully divine.
SPEAKER_00: And I can conceptually, philosophically, theologically hold the tension in my mind a little bit and sort of understand what that means.
SPEAKER_00: But if I had been on the shore when Jesus decided to go down to the water from the mountain where he was praying, and if I'd just been over there kind of mending my nets and fixing my boat or something like that, and I see this guy come down and walk toward the water, I'm thinking, this guy is gonna walk out there and drown himself.
SPEAKER_00: This is like a suicide case.
SPEAKER_00: Everybody, you know, and then all of a sudden, though, he just walks out on the water.
SPEAKER_00: And then he keeps walking for like two miles, which is a long way to walk on water.
SPEAKER_00: Last time I checked, none of us have been doing that kind of thing.
SPEAKER_00: And he comes to them in the fourth watch of the night, walking on the sea, even though the people at the beach, if there were any, were just their mouths hanging open.
SPEAKER_00: And when the disciples saw him, remember they're stroking hard as they can on the oars, walking on the sea, they were frightened, and they said, It's a ghost.
SPEAKER_00: Phantasma in the Greek, that's where we get phantom.
SPEAKER_00: It's uh it it and what would you think?
SPEAKER_00: I would think this is a good time to pray.
SPEAKER_00: Not only for the storm and the boat going down, but now we're seeing things at 3 a.m.
SPEAKER_00: And some of the disciples probably poking at each other.
SPEAKER_00: Did you see that?
SPEAKER_00: You see, you see that?
SPEAKER_00: You see what I see?
SPEAKER_00: You know, and you're trying to just clear your eyes and double check your sanity.
SPEAKER_00: And they cried out for fear, but immediately there it is again.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus spoke to them saying, Take courage.
SPEAKER_00: It is I, do not be afraid.
SPEAKER_00: There's a three-part sermon right there.
SPEAKER_00: We could go for a long time just on that.
SPEAKER_00: Take courage, why?
SPEAKER_00: Because you need it and you don't have it yourself.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus is a great source of courage.
SPEAKER_00: It is I, Egalemi.
SPEAKER_00: This is the same thing Yahweh says to Moses in Exodus 3.14.
SPEAKER_00: When Moses says, Who do I tell him?
SPEAKER_00: Who should I tell him sent me?
SPEAKER_00: Egolemmy.
SPEAKER_00: Same kind of little combination of words, even though that would have been in Hebrew, this would have been in Greek here.
SPEAKER_00: This is fascinating.
SPEAKER_00: And do not be afraid.
SPEAKER_00: We've made this point so many times here, but I'll keep making it.
SPEAKER_00: The most often repeated command in Scripture is some form of this.
SPEAKER_00: Don't be afraid, do not fear.
SPEAKER_00: Something like that.
SPEAKER_00: And it reminds us what the God of the Bible wants for you and wants for me.
SPEAKER_00: And in this little statement that Jesus is making, he's clearly saying the antidote to your fear is my presence with you.
SPEAKER_00: Doesn't say anything about the water, the storm, the waves.
SPEAKER_00: It's just take courage.
SPEAKER_00: It's me.
SPEAKER_00: Don't be afraid.
SPEAKER_00: Peter answered him.
SPEAKER_00: And by the way, Matthew is the only one that keep that includes this little bit of the information.
SPEAKER_00: We have this uh account in Matthew, we have it in Mark, we have it in John, but not in Luke.
SPEAKER_00: But um this is interesting that Matthew includes this.
SPEAKER_00: Peter answered him and said, Lord, if it is you, command me to come out onto the water to you.
SPEAKER_00: And, you know, I don't just a moment there, the other 11 disciples might have looked at Peter, you what?
SPEAKER_00: And then Peter, what motivated him to even do that?
SPEAKER_00: I don't know if you've ever been wondering if it is the Lord or not.
SPEAKER_00: In your life, I have.
SPEAKER_00: Is this really God?
SPEAKER_00: Is he is God really allowing this to happen?
SPEAKER_00: Or is this opportunity, is this really God's plan for me?
SPEAKER_00: And how do we know if it's God or not?
SPEAKER_00: Great question.
SPEAKER_00: I think a lot of us struggle with that from time to time.
SPEAKER_00: Peter's there, but in that moment, what made him think of that?
SPEAKER_00: I don't, I, I, we're not told.
SPEAKER_00: If it's really you, is that is that say he's filled with doubt and he's gonna like raise the bar, the threshold of of proof to weigh up here?
SPEAKER_00: If it's really you, tell me to come out of the water with you.
SPEAKER_00: And therefore, then I'll believe, you know?
SPEAKER_00: What's the threshold of belief for you?
SPEAKER_00: What is it that God has to do that he isn't doing every single day that you need him to do before you'll believe?
SPEAKER_00: And I would argue, along with G.K.
SPEAKER_00: Chesterton, God never tires of doing amazing things, but he does so many of them in full view.
SPEAKER_00: We we just don't see them.
SPEAKER_00: What if every single day he gets up and says to the to the to the stars, do it again?
SPEAKER_00: You know?
SPEAKER_00: What if every day he says to the birds, fly again to the sunset, do that again.
SPEAKER_00: Put purple together with orange and yellow and blue.
SPEAKER_00: Do it again.
SPEAKER_00: And he just never grows tired of creating.
SPEAKER_00: Even though we sometimes look up in the sky and all we see is rocks and gas.
SPEAKER_00: Or we look at the sunset and all we see is just another one.
SPEAKER_00: Um, this is so amazing.
SPEAKER_00: Tell me to come out onto the water with you.
SPEAKER_00: And then Jesus says, one word, come.
SPEAKER_00: Now, if I'm one of the other 11 disciples, I'm really excited.
SPEAKER_00: What's gonna happen?
SPEAKER_00: Well, Peter, you really slipped on that banana peel, didn't you?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, you posted this thing, and now it's come to you.
SPEAKER_00: This is what you asked for.
SPEAKER_00: And Peter got out of the boat.
SPEAKER_00: What did that look like?
SPEAKER_00: What do you do when you're in a boat?
SPEAKER_00: The wind is howling, the storms are raging, you think there's a ghost out there.
SPEAKER_00: Do you, do you, what was it like to go over with just one leg and put a put put it down there like that?
SPEAKER_00: Was he still holding on with both hands?
SPEAKER_00: I would be, I'd be going like this too.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, my knees would be knocking.
SPEAKER_00: He's he gets out of the boat, is all we're told.
SPEAKER_00: And he walked on the water.
SPEAKER_00: And this is just powerful.
SPEAKER_00: But then what happened was he as he comes toward Jesus, he's he he takes his eyes off of Jesus, he sees the wind, verse 30 tells us, and he became afraid.
SPEAKER_00: And beginning to sink, he cried out, saying, Lord, save me.
SPEAKER_00: What a great prayer that is.
SPEAKER_00: Three words, Lord, save me.
SPEAKER_00: Most of our prayers can be reduced to help.
SPEAKER_00: Or maybe another one, thank you.
SPEAKER_00: I probably say the first one way more than I say the second one.
SPEAKER_00: To my shame.
SPEAKER_00: I would like to be more thankful than I am.
SPEAKER_00: But here is Peter, and he starts to walk, and then he takes his eyes off the Lord, we're told, and he begins to sink.
SPEAKER_00: And you know, when your name means stone or rock, water isn't your friend.
SPEAKER_00: You're going down, you know?
SPEAKER_00: And yet he has, for a moment, he has walked on water toward Jesus in this interaction with his Savior.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know what that must have felt like.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know what the other guys were thinking.
SPEAKER_00: They're a little more cautious.
SPEAKER_00: They remain in the boat.
SPEAKER_00: I've I've been cautious in my faith before, too.
SPEAKER_00: I've been cautious in my understanding, my trusting of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe you have as well.
SPEAKER_00: Uh Peter seems to be one of those guys that dives into things head first, full speed ahead.
SPEAKER_00: He's overconfident a lot.
SPEAKER_00: Uh he says things that he create awkward moments a lot.
SPEAKER_00: Uh it's kind of open mouth, switch feet, you know, for him, and so many times.
SPEAKER_00: But here, this is just interesting that he goes through all of this, and then Lord save me, and then then you then you're at the place where Matt Matthew's brought us now is what is Jesus' response?
SPEAKER_00: What is Jesus going to do?
SPEAKER_00: And I'm going to argue today that if if we wanted to just moralize this text, we'd focus on Peter.
SPEAKER_00: You know, if you want to walk on water, you should do X, Y, Z, whatever.
SPEAKER_00: Um, but if we if we want to actually see maybe what what this reveals about Jesus, I think we'll head in the direction of gospel.
SPEAKER_00: Good news.
SPEAKER_00: And so this is awesome.
SPEAKER_00: What is Jesus' response?
SPEAKER_00: Um, Jesus immediately, there's that immediately again, stretched out his hand and took hold of him and said to him, Oh, you of little faith, why did you doubt?
SPEAKER_00: And remember, all of Jesus' questions are rhetorical.
SPEAKER_00: There isn't something he doesn't know.
SPEAKER_00: He wants us to learn something from his questions.
SPEAKER_00: Why would you doubt?
SPEAKER_00: Oh, you have little faith.
SPEAKER_00: And in chapter 17, he's going to say, by the way, it's not the amount of your faith, it's the object of your faith essentially.
SPEAKER_00: The person with faith, just like as as tiny as a mustard seed, could move mountains, he says.
SPEAKER_00: In chapter 17.
SPEAKER_00: So this isn't about the you know, the amount, and you hear this with a lot of modern preachers.
SPEAKER_00: They'll they'll say, well, you're just your faith is too small.
SPEAKER_00: You're you you need to name it, claim it, and frame it.
SPEAKER_00: And uh, no, I don't I don't think that's it.
SPEAKER_00: I think a lot of that is in the direction of me telling God what to do.
SPEAKER_00: A lot of that is in the direction of me acting like I know what's completely the right thing and and the best thing in this particular moment.
SPEAKER_00: And the fact is, I don't.
SPEAKER_00: But if I knew everything God knew, I could I could pray like that.
SPEAKER_00: But I don't.
SPEAKER_00: And so we always leave room for the sovereignty of God.
SPEAKER_00: We always leave room for the perfect wisdom that comes down from above.
SPEAKER_00: And so he says, So, you little fifth, why did you doubt?
SPEAKER_00: And remember, I think the other disciples are hearing this as well in the boat, and they're watching Peter, and they're probably even talking about Peter.
SPEAKER_00: You know how church people can sometimes talk about the other person, whatever.
SPEAKER_00: They might be talking about can you believe that idiot?
SPEAKER_00: He got up there in the water.
SPEAKER_00: Look at him, he's sinking, he's all wet.
SPEAKER_00: He's gonna don't bring him back in here.
SPEAKER_00: He smells bad, he's stinky, whatever.
SPEAKER_00: And and just all kinds of stuff going on.
SPEAKER_00: Who knows what, right?
SPEAKER_00: But they got into the boat, verse 32 says, and the wind stopped.
SPEAKER_00: And the idea is that it went click like a light switch.
SPEAKER_00: Now, waves that are rocking in the Sea of Galilee sits 680 feet below sea level.
SPEAKER_00: Um, it's about 15 miles north to south to north, and then about seven or eight miles across the east and west uh side.
SPEAKER_00: These guys are in likely the northwest uh shoreline area uh near Coperna is my guess.
SPEAKER_00: And and and even though they're two, three miles out, Jesus was still able to see them from his prayer perch up on the mountain somehow in a stormy night.
SPEAKER_00: I can't explain that other than to say he's fully human and fully God.
SPEAKER_00: And if I had created the entire universe out of nothing, then all of what I've just read here about what Jesus does would be nothing to me.
SPEAKER_00: And so he says, Oh, you I love that and they got into and the boat, uh, it got in the boat and the wind stopped.
SPEAKER_00: And those who were in the boat worshipped him.
SPEAKER_00: Here's the response of people to Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: And they said, You are certainly God's son.
SPEAKER_00: This is the first time in the Gospel of Matthew that they have said, You are God's son.
SPEAKER_00: It's not the first time it has been said in Matthew's gospel, it's the first time these guys have said it.
SPEAKER_00: Who else has said it?
SPEAKER_00: Satan said it.
SPEAKER_00: If you are the son of God, or since you are the son of God.
SPEAKER_00: And so Satan acknowledged something about Jesus and his connection with the Father.
SPEAKER_00: And then there were two demon-possessed men on the gathering side, when Jesus came and was about to deliver them from these demons that had this legion of demons that had so beset them and cast those demons into some pigs, some swine on the side of the hillside there, those two demon-possessed guys also said, Son of God, what have you to do with us?
SPEAKER_00: And it's interesting that the devil and the demons got it before the disciples got it.
SPEAKER_00: They also got it, the disciples got it, before the religious leadership of the day got it.
SPEAKER_00: Because the religious leadership of the day are fighting it and resisting it aggressively, that Jesus is the Son of God, that he's fully human, that he's fully divine.
SPEAKER_00: I think all of that works together to show us what this really is all about.
SPEAKER_00: Let me just throw a few things up on the screen for you.
SPEAKER_00: What do we learn here?
SPEAKER_00: Well, if our question is, uh dare we trust Jesus, that's that's I think this little pericope helps us with this.
SPEAKER_00: Let me give you a little bit of geography so you can kind of see where we're at, and the map should jump up here on the screen real easily.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, this is the Sea of Galilee, Bethseda, Capernaum are up here.
SPEAKER_00: This is the Sea of Galilee right here in the northern third of Israel.
SPEAKER_00: And uh we'll be going there in March.
SPEAKER_00: I'm looking forward to that trip.
SPEAKER_00: And um, this place, Gennesaret, is right along about here, and Tiberias will be down about here, the city of Tiberius, the only, currently in our modern day and age, the only city that was allowed to remain there on the shoreline of the Sea of Galilee.
SPEAKER_00: So here it is, sits about, like I say, almost 700 feet below sea level.
SPEAKER_00: Mount Hermon is usually snow-capped, and it's to the north, somewhere up like up about in here somewhere.
SPEAKER_00: And so the cold air from Mount Hermon will sweep down onto the Sea of Galilee, which sitting as low as it does, is probably warmer.
SPEAKER_00: And so that's a great recipe for sudden storms.
SPEAKER_00: Nashville is over here, by the way, in case some of you are wondering where we are.
SPEAKER_00: That's us.
SPEAKER_00: But at least you can kind of get an idea here.
SPEAKER_00: This is the Dead Sea down here.
SPEAKER_00: And uh down here we have Jerusalem, we have Jericho.
SPEAKER_00: So this is just, again, just to give you a little bit of an idea of where it is geographically, reminding you that our Bible is actually said in space-time history in real places.
SPEAKER_00: And so we come to a text like this that has such a fantastic event in it, and a fantastic storyline.
SPEAKER_00: Dare we believe it?
SPEAKER_00: Dare we trust Jesus in this?
SPEAKER_00: Sorry, first point.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus doesn't send his disciples away, we see in verse 22, but he does send them ahead.
SPEAKER_00: He sends a multitudes away.
SPEAKER_00: But Jesus sends his disciples on ahead.
SPEAKER_00: And I think this is interesting.
SPEAKER_00: I don't think it's always the case that he's sending them ahead of him.
SPEAKER_00: I think sometimes they're following him and walking along with him.
SPEAKER_00: But the thing is, they're doing his bidding.
SPEAKER_00: Whose idea was it for them to get in the boat that night?
SPEAKER_00: It was Jesus' idea.
SPEAKER_00: Just like in the previous occasion, where we read about Jesus and the disciples.
SPEAKER_00: That time he was in the boat already with them when they set off.
SPEAKER_00: They were going to cross the Sea of Galilee, and the storm rose up, and he fell asleep in the boat.
SPEAKER_00: You remember the account?
SPEAKER_00: And they wake him up.
SPEAKER_00: Don't you care?
SPEAKER_00: We're perishing.
SPEAKER_00: And he woke up and said a single word, hush, to this to the wind and the waves, and they both became still.
SPEAKER_00: And it says there they were even more afraid.
SPEAKER_00: Who is this?
SPEAKER_00: That the wind and the waves obey him.
SPEAKER_00: And now you start to see, I think, miracle after miracle, that all of this is really telling us something more each time about who Jesus is.
SPEAKER_00: Dare we trust Jesus?
SPEAKER_00: I would say yes.
SPEAKER_00: I think this teaching miracle was designed to produce spiritual growth in the lives of his disciples.
SPEAKER_00: We read about storms in the Bible.
SPEAKER_00: There are storms of correction, like the storm that Jonah was in when he got thrown over the boat's edge.
SPEAKER_00: God had told him to go preach in Nineveh.
SPEAKER_00: He went down to the shore and got in the boat going the other way.
SPEAKER_00: Didn't like the Ninevehes.
SPEAKER_00: They had terrorized Israel.
SPEAKER_00: He hated them.
SPEAKER_00: He had racial prejudice against them.
SPEAKER_00: He had religious prejudice against them.
SPEAKER_00: He didn't want them to hear the message that God had for them.
SPEAKER_00: He resisted and he went the other way.
SPEAKER_00: Storm of correction comes up.
SPEAKER_00: He gets thrown over, swallowed by the big fish, burped up on the land near in the direction of Nineveh, goes and preaches.
SPEAKER_00: And 120,000 people repented.
SPEAKER_00: Who is it I'm holding the story back from?
SPEAKER_00: Because I don't like them.
SPEAKER_00: May God enlarge our hearts.
SPEAKER_00: But Jesus, in this case, doesn't send his disciples away, but he is sending them ahead and he's got a purpose.
SPEAKER_00: Let's throw up a slide, the purpose of Jesus' miracles, reminding you of each and every one of these.
SPEAKER_00: It's not just a bit of supernatural entertainment.
SPEAKER_00: It's not just him trying to amass crowds.
SPEAKER_00: He didn't have any problem with crowds.
SPEAKER_00: And even at the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount, he literally saw the crowds coming his way.
SPEAKER_00: He turned and went the other way.
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes he's trying to avoid the crowds.
SPEAKER_00: But the purpose of the miracles, when you read the four gospel accounts, it appears to me that he is displaying his power and authority.
SPEAKER_00: That's true.
SPEAKER_00: He is affirming his identity in doing that, though.
SPEAKER_00: It's not just spiritual entertainment.
SPEAKER_00: It's actually, if this is the Son of God, one would think he could do some things that the rest of us can't do.
SPEAKER_00: So his identity is affirmed in these.
SPEAKER_00: And they reveal his compassion.
SPEAKER_00: Why?
SPEAKER_00: Because there he is having his own quiet time, his own quiet moment, and he sees them from a distance, and he comes down, breaks his prayer, comes down, walks out on the water, goes out there to be with them.
SPEAKER_00: Because they were afraid.
SPEAKER_00: And their boat was being rocked like crazy.
SPEAKER_00: And I think it's because he actually sovereignly controls the weather.
SPEAKER_00: Why do I think that?
SPEAKER_00: Well, because when he got in the boat, the wind stopped.
SPEAKER_00: So I think he not only stopped the wind, but I think he started the wind.
SPEAKER_00: I think this whole thing was his idea.
SPEAKER_00: And it's all part of nurturing and developing them and their understanding of who he is.
SPEAKER_00: And it's all meant to inspire a response.
SPEAKER_00: Remember, some people saw the miracles of Jesus, and their response was, How dare you heal somebody on the Sabbath?
SPEAKER_00: How dare you break our religious rules?
SPEAKER_00: Other people saw Jesus heal and then went home and grabbed another sick person and brought that sick person in.
SPEAKER_00: And another, and another.
SPEAKER_00: Other people now are starting to see here in this boat, you surely are the Son of God.
SPEAKER_00: And so what he ultimately wanted to happen, I think, is actually happening.
SPEAKER_00: As to miracles, Tim Keller says, there's nothing illogical about miracles if a creator God exists, if a God exists who's big enough to create the universe in all its complexity, complexity and vastness, why should a mere miracle be such a mental stretch?
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
SPEAKER_00: I agree with him.
SPEAKER_00: That's so true.
SPEAKER_00: If you can buy, as we've said before, if you can buy Genesis 1.1, the entire rest of the Bible is a cakewalk.
SPEAKER_00: In the beginning, God created.
SPEAKER_00: If he created everything that's in the heavens and the earth, as far as I can tell, just as we saw in our catechism, in our questions and answers, that's pretty much every created thing.
SPEAKER_00: That's pretty much everything that isn't God himself.
SPEAKER_00: If he can do that, then walking on water, defying the gravity that he created, walking on water that he created, on this planet that he created, to be with these men in this boat that he created, in the middle of that storm that he created.
SPEAKER_00: Again, you see where I'm going here.
SPEAKER_00: He is sovereign over all of this.
SPEAKER_00: Number two, you may take your eyes off Jesus like Peter did, but he never takes his eyes off of you.
SPEAKER_00: You're never out of his sight, you're never out of his reach.
SPEAKER_00: And I take that from this passage as well as other passages that I think reinforce that same thing.
SPEAKER_00: You think about the omni words when we're describing God, that he's omnipresent, that he's omniscient, that he's omnipotent, that he is everywhere, omnipresent, that he knows everything, omniscient, that he can do anything that can be done, he's omnipotent.
SPEAKER_00: If God is that in reality, then he actually knows what's going on in your life, and he knows what's going on in my life, and he knows what's going on around the world with all of his people.
SPEAKER_00: I know that sounds big.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, even if you're probably some of you probably thinking, I wonder if God uses Google to track everybody.
SPEAKER_00: How does he do that?
SPEAKER_00: You know, no, he's way bigger than Google.
SPEAKER_00: He's way bigger than all of that.
SPEAKER_00: He's actually, if he's infinite, what I'm trying to communicate is that we won't be able to fully comprehend that.
SPEAKER_00: Finitum non capax infinitum is the Latin phrase.
SPEAKER_00: It says, the finite cannot fully comprehend the infinite.
SPEAKER_00: So what we're our what we're arguing is that because we are finite, we cannot fully comprehend God.
SPEAKER_00: So if you're waiting until you fully comprehend God to believe and trust Jesus, you'll be waiting forever.
SPEAKER_00: You do not have the capacity to do that.
SPEAKER_00: Neither do I.
SPEAKER_00: Which means we do a whole lot of worshiping in wonder because we're astonished.
SPEAKER_00: We're blown away.
SPEAKER_00: He's truly that amazing.
SPEAKER_00: Three, faith in Jesus is not a mere leap in the dark, but rather it's a step toward the light.
SPEAKER_00: If you want to walk on water, you'll have to get out of the boat.
SPEAKER_00: That's true.
SPEAKER_00: Um, and I'll I'll quote from uh there's a book by the same title by uh a pastor.
SPEAKER_00: But I think faith, if it must be compared to a race, is most often like a marathon, less like a sprint.
SPEAKER_00: Um fears, our doubts, our distractions may cause us to begin to sink from time to time, but they never prevent Jesus from being able to save us.
SPEAKER_00: And you know what blows me away about this text is the way Jesus responds to Peter as he begins to sink.
SPEAKER_00: While Peter was beginning to sink, Jesus didn't say, Listen, Peter, I think I want to explain to you the doctrine of fixing your eyes on me.
SPEAKER_00: If you'll just, you know, he didn't take that time to do like a three-point alliterative sermon instructing Peter as Peter's going down.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe let him go under for a few minutes and experience what drowning would be like in hopes of completely scaring heaven into him.
SPEAKER_00: Um, Jesus graciously reaches down.
SPEAKER_00: And then when he gets to the boat, does he say to the eleven, Where were you guys?
SPEAKER_00: You guys could have been out on the water.
SPEAKER_00: Look what you missed.
SPEAKER_00: It's none of that.
SPEAKER_00: Now, along the way, he corrects them and teaches.
SPEAKER_00: I'm not saying he doesn't do that, but his timing is so perfect with these guys in this moment.
SPEAKER_00: And I don't know, you can probably think back to in your own walk with Christ, a moment where you learn something through a storm of correction or a storm of perfection or a storm of just instruction.
SPEAKER_00: And you can look back and you can see, look how gracious Jesus or the Holy Spirit was to me in that particular moment.
SPEAKER_00: How kind he is, how strong he is, and how he is both.
SPEAKER_00: We need look no further.
SPEAKER_00: He really is the one.
SPEAKER_00: You know?
SPEAKER_00: Faith in Jesus is not merely a leap in the dark, it's a step toward the light.
SPEAKER_00: Pense is uh means thoughts in French.
SPEAKER_00: It's a collection of fragments written by the French, the 17th century French philosopher and mathematician Blaise Pascal.
SPEAKER_00: His intellect was so considerable and remarkable that uh Oz Guinness, a friend to some of us here at the church and a guy we've quoted often, um, who has read Pascal's work almost every year for nearly 30 years.
SPEAKER_00: I love that about Oz that he would do that.
SPEAKER_00: He describes Pascal as one who, listen, showers a thousand sparks of truth into the darkened thinking of our times.
SPEAKER_00: Showers a thousand sparks.
SPEAKER_00: You know, it's like a some kind of firework gone off, and that's Blaze Pascal's thinking.
SPEAKER_00: Here's two quotes from Ponse.
SPEAKER_00: Faith indeed tells what the senses do not tell, but not the contrary of what they see.
SPEAKER_00: It is above them and not contrary to them.
SPEAKER_00: And then reason's last step, human reasons, last step, is the recognition that there are an infinite number of things which are beyond it.
SPEAKER_00: It is merely feeble if it does not go as far as to realize that.
SPEAKER_00: So some guys will sit around and ponder and question.
SPEAKER_00: And I've seen it in the last couple decades where there's just a whole lot of people that are so fascinated, enchanted by circular questioning.
SPEAKER_00: And really, their goal is not really to ever come to any kind of an answer about who Jesus is.
SPEAKER_00: They just want to keep pushing and pushing and asking questions and showing that they're smarter than the answers that might come their way, you know?
SPEAKER_00: And in our arrogance, what happens is we end up just sitting in the boat and missing the whole point of the miracle at all.
SPEAKER_00: Fourthly, peace is found not in the absence of storms, but in the nearness of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: I would argue that storms come in many kinds, in all shapes and sizes.
SPEAKER_00: Storms can be unsettling, disorienting, even confusing.
SPEAKER_00: And if you haven't, if you look back over your own life and you haven't felt like you walked through some storm or traversed some storm, just hang around.
SPEAKER_00: It's you know I'm I'm not trying to tell you the something that's unreal here, but this world is filled with storms.
SPEAKER_00: It's you're gonna face giants, you're gonna have to endure storms.
SPEAKER_00: But what this is, this what this shows me is the kind of response Jesus has to these guys as they go through a storm, to Peter, even to Peter's sinking faith, and that makes Jesus all the more beautiful to me.
SPEAKER_00: Isn't that the kind of savior you want?
SPEAKER_00: Isn't that the kind of savior you need?
SPEAKER_00: One who can save you, one who loves you enough to do that as well.
SPEAKER_00: Um peace is not found in the absence of storms, but in the nearness of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: ASAF in Psalm 73 said, But as for me, the nearness of God is my good.
SPEAKER_00: I've made the Lord God my refuge, that I may tell of all his works, thy works.
SPEAKER_00: Beautiful.
SPEAKER_00: Some of you know the name Alistair Begg, pastor in uh Cleveland at the Parkside Church.
SPEAKER_00: He said, Sometimes the center of God's will may be for us, the very eye of the storm.
SPEAKER_00: And I think as Jesus sent these guys out there that night, I think he knew exactly what he was gonna do.
SPEAKER_00: He knew exactly what they needed, and so he sent them out there so that they could go through this lesson.
SPEAKER_00: And learn also, as Ortberg says, peace doesn't come from finding a lake with no storms.
SPEAKER_00: It comes from having Jesus in your boat.
SPEAKER_00: As we kind of bring this to a close, um, dare we trust Jesus?
SPEAKER_00: I ask you again.
SPEAKER_00: Dare we trust Jesus?
SPEAKER_00: I say yes.
SPEAKER_00: Yes and amen.
SPEAKER_00: You trust him.
SPEAKER_00: Many others here would say the same thing.
SPEAKER_00: Why?
SPEAKER_00: Because Jesus is both strong and kind.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus does love the little children.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus loves all the children of the world, no matter where they're from, no matter the color of their skin, no matter how much rebellion they've been caught up in.
SPEAKER_00: Wherever you're at right now, if you hear his voice calling through the storms that are howling around you at all, would you turn to him?
SPEAKER_00: Would you even recognize him, or would you just write him off as some kind of a ghost, some kind of apparition, some kind of a phantom?
SPEAKER_00: Or would you turn to him?
SPEAKER_00: Would you come to him if he called you to?
SPEAKER_00: Would you recognize him when he gets in your boat?
SPEAKER_00: And would you fall down and worship him?
SPEAKER_00: Dare we trust Jesus?
SPEAKER_00: Yes.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus does indeed love you.
SPEAKER_00: And uh and Jesus is indeed uniquely qualified to be your Savior and mine.
SPEAKER_00: Robert Murray McShane says this, you will never find Jesus so precious as when the world is one vast howling wilderness.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm gonna put in parentheses there, or storm.
SPEAKER_00: He really becomes quite real and precious to us during those times.
SPEAKER_00: And then McShane goes on to say, then he is like a rose blooming in the midst of the desolation, a rock rising above the storm.
SPEAKER_00: May we know Jesus, the solid rock on which we stand.
SPEAKER_00: Let's pray.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, thank you for this passage.
SPEAKER_00: Um it can teach us, all that you reveal about yourself in this passage, Lord, we're grateful to see you.
SPEAKER_00: Even though it may be through uh trembling hands and bodies that that need lots of help because we're riding out some kind of a storm right now, even though it may be that our souls feel exhausted, like too little butter spread over too much bread.
SPEAKER_00: Nonetheless, Lord, may we turn to you as you call our names, as you draw us to yourself, because you have drawn near to us.
SPEAKER_00: We pray all of this in your precious name.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: And amen.