SPEAKER_00: I have a lot to say today, so uh buckle up.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm gonna start with a fill in the blank.
SPEAKER_00: So, if we can get the fill in the blank up there, can you help me out with this?
SPEAKER_00: To infinity and very good.
SPEAKER_00: Did anybody not know that one?
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
SPEAKER_00: To Infinity and Beyond.
SPEAKER_00: This is, of course, the very famous catchphrase of one of the mainstays of American cinema for the past like 30 years.
SPEAKER_00: Buzz Lightyear won the hearts of audiences everywhere when he came on the scene in 1995's hit movie Toy Story.
SPEAKER_00: The franchise just added its fifth installment this past summer.
SPEAKER_00: Things have gone really well for Buzz over the years.
SPEAKER_00: But if you remember, didn't really start out that way.
SPEAKER_00: Buzz Lightyear began his glorious run as really the victim of a grand delusion.
SPEAKER_00: When he first came out of his box, he was also a bit out of his mind, believing himself to be a real Space Ranger.
SPEAKER_00: And much of the plot of that first film has to do with his disillusionment when he discovers that he's not exactly who he thinks he is.
SPEAKER_00: He can't shoot lasers, he can't fly, he's he's a toy, he's a child's plaything.
SPEAKER_00: He thought the universe revolved around him, but but he had it all wrong.
SPEAKER_00: Now, sometimes I think we read the Bible maybe a bit wrong, not completely wrong, but perhaps sometimes our understanding of certain things that the Holy Spirit has revealed to us can become a bit skewed.
SPEAKER_00: And I've increasingly been coming to the conviction that the main culprit for this is that we decide that the Bible is about us instead of about Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: We tend to make ourselves the center of attention, as if we're supposed to be the hero of the story instead of Jesus, who is the real hero.
SPEAKER_00: And our gospel reading today from Matthew is a good example of this.
SPEAKER_00: Today we've heard about how Jesus came to his disciples at night walking on the water, and then Peter gets out of the boat and walks on the water too.
SPEAKER_00: And so often, Peter has become the focus of this text.
SPEAKER_00: His boldness to get out of the boat is lifted up as heroic.
SPEAKER_00: We're taught to emulate his faith.
SPEAKER_00: One of my favorite bands from my younger years, Audio Adrenaline, had this famous song called Walk on Water.
SPEAKER_00: And the chorus repeats: if I keep my eyes on Jesus, I can walk on water.
SPEAKER_00: I can.
SPEAKER_00: If I just have enough faith, if I just keep my eyes off of the wind and the waves, I can walk on water.
SPEAKER_00: And this is a very popular take on this text.
SPEAKER_00: But I think it might be just a little bit misguided.
SPEAKER_00: I think it might suffer from a buzz light-year-esque self-focus.
SPEAKER_00: This summer, Matthew has been teaching us about discipleship, and he's been teaching us how to read the Bible with Jesus at the center, not us.
SPEAKER_00: So let's allow Matthew to guide us to Jesus today instead of to ourselves.
SPEAKER_00: And I'd like to do that first by learning all that Matthew has to teach us about ourselves and our own need by way of the disciples, and then how Jesus satisfies those needs entirely as the Son of God.
SPEAKER_00: So let's first consider what Matthew teaches us about the disciples and see how this parallels with what he has to teach us about ourselves.
SPEAKER_00: And I first think that we're supposed to notice at the beginning of this text that the disciples are absolutely exhausted.
SPEAKER_00: Now remember what happened right before this.
SPEAKER_00: We talked about it last week.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus and his disciples have been seeking out a place to rest.
SPEAKER_00: But 5,000 men, plus women and children, have followed them.
SPEAKER_00: And after a long day of teaching and healing, Jesus then, after dinner time, has his disciples distribute that miraculous meal of bread and fish to this enormous crowd.
SPEAKER_00: And then after that, well into the night by now, Jesus makes the disciples get into a boat and go to the other side of the lake.
SPEAKER_00: After an exhausting day, they now face a red-eye voyage across the Sea of Galilee.
SPEAKER_00: They must have been absolutely spent.
SPEAKER_00: And then we learn the boat is being beaten by the waves and the wind is against them.
SPEAKER_00: They're not particularly in danger this time around, but it's really rough going.
SPEAKER_00: They are exhausted and they are helpless, especially considering the hour.
SPEAKER_00: It must have been torture.
SPEAKER_00: They must have felt hopeless.
SPEAKER_00: Have you ever felt exhausted and helpless?
SPEAKER_00: Me too.
SPEAKER_00: But then it gets worse.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus comes to them walking on the sea, but they don't know that it's him.
SPEAKER_00: They don't know what's going on.
SPEAKER_00: And when they see Jesus walking on the sea, they are terrified.
SPEAKER_00: They think he's a ghost.
SPEAKER_00: They cry out in fear.
SPEAKER_00: And you'd probably do the same thing.
SPEAKER_00: What terrifies you?
SPEAKER_00: The lesion they discovered on that recent scan, the procedure you have coming up, the precarious state of your marriage, the way your kids have been drifting away from the faith lately.
SPEAKER_00: We can identify with the disciples' fear because it can tend to take over our hearts as well.
SPEAKER_00: And the fear that they feel in the boat will soon be amplified in Peter.
SPEAKER_00: As is so often the case, Peter serves as kind of the spokesman, the representative of the other disciples.
SPEAKER_00: By the way, I think he serves kind of the same role for you and for me.
SPEAKER_00: And so when Jesus claims that it is him and not a ghost, Peter responds, Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water.
SPEAKER_00: And this is where we can tend to make Peter the focus and by extension ourselves.
SPEAKER_00: We can see this as Peter's to infinity and beyond moment, a moment of heroic boldness.
SPEAKER_00: We write songs about getting out of the boat like Peter did, walking on the water with courageous faith.
SPEAKER_00: But I'm going to suggest to you this morning that I think that really misses Matthew's point.
SPEAKER_00: I had a really proud pastor moment in the van on the way to Idaho last week.
SPEAKER_00: I was discussing this text with Lucy, one of our awesome high school or high school youth, and without giving her any context or any preamble or anything like that, I asked her what she thought the point of all of this was.
SPEAKER_00: And rather than going the to infinity and beyond route, as so many people do, she immediately said to me, Peter is like all of us.
SPEAKER_00: No matter how many times Jesus has shown himself to us or proven himself to us, we still demand a sign.
SPEAKER_00: We still doubt.
SPEAKER_00: And I almost cried for joy.
SPEAKER_00: What incredible discernment.
SPEAKER_00: How spiritually insightful to see that Peter is not the hero.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus is.
SPEAKER_00: And when Jesus speaks to Peter, when all is said and done, he doesn't commend him for his boldness and his faith.
SPEAKER_00: He asks him, Why did you doubt?
SPEAKER_00: Dr.
SPEAKER_00: Jeff Gibbs writes this.
SPEAKER_00: Was there ever a man who was less deserving of rescue than Peter?
SPEAKER_00: There is nothing admirable in his example, nothing bold about his desire to get out of the boat.
SPEAKER_00: The one thing we can be certain of is this.
SPEAKER_00: He should have believed Jesus the first time.
SPEAKER_00: And he should have believed Jesus the second time as well.
SPEAKER_00: Because Peter almost immediately discovers that he is in dire need of rescue, because he begins to sink and sink fast.
SPEAKER_00: And the Greek that Matthew uses suggests not that Peter began to sink on the way to Jesus, but that he had practically arrived at his side.
SPEAKER_00: And it's there that he begins to plummet.
SPEAKER_00: A number of years ago now, uh Emily and I were invited to stay with some friends at their house on the Lake of the Ozarks in Missouri.
SPEAKER_00: And one of the things we got to do there was go out on their jet ski.
SPEAKER_00: I did not have prior to this moment really any experience jet skiing, but that didn't stop me from taking Emily out on the heart of the lake and immediately, you know, kicking it up full throttle.
SPEAKER_00: I felt pretty awesome.
SPEAKER_00: We were flying around everywhere.
SPEAKER_00: I didn't run into anybody or anything.
SPEAKER_00: It was pretty cool.
SPEAKER_00: And uh after doing that for a while, you know, we finally decided it's probably time that we should go back.
SPEAKER_00: And so I steered us toward the little inlet where their dock was and started to slow down.
SPEAKER_00: And they were all standing on the dock, you know, wondering how this went.
SPEAKER_00: And um, I learned in that moment that jet skis can be a little bit like bicycles.
SPEAKER_00: It's easy to stay on when you're going fast.
SPEAKER_00: But as we came toward the dock, our speed dropped.
SPEAKER_00: And so did we.
SPEAKER_00: To quote Kevin James, we wiped out going zero.
SPEAKER_00: Right on our way back, practically there in full view of everybody.
SPEAKER_00: It's a very embarrassing failure.
SPEAKER_00: That's Peter.
SPEAKER_00: This is not to infinity and beyond, unless we mean the infinite depths of the sea dragging him down to destruction.
SPEAKER_00: Peter's fear reaches new heights, or we might better say, new depths, as his doubt-driven experiment fails miserably.
SPEAKER_00: It's like that moment in Sid's house and Toy Story where Buzz tries to fly.
SPEAKER_00: And he goes out there and has this look on his face, and all of a sudden it changes because he begins to plummet to the ground and he loses one of his arms.
SPEAKER_00: Again, Jeff Gibbs, Peter's faith is not being held up as an example to emulate.
SPEAKER_00: His weakness is being showcased in order that, in direct contrast, Jesus' identity and power and grace might be seen more fully.
SPEAKER_00: And what Jesus says highlights this all the more.
SPEAKER_00: Little faith.
SPEAKER_00: And it's not just Peter's problem.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus applies this phrase to his disciples on a few other occasions in Matthew's gospel.
SPEAKER_00: This is our problem.
SPEAKER_00: But here's the key little faith is not a problem we solve, but the condition from which the Son of God rescues us.
SPEAKER_00: And I think the disciples understood that very clearly that night.
SPEAKER_00: Because what happens when Jesus steps into the boat, hauling in the sea-soaked Peter with him?
SPEAKER_00: Those in the boat worshiped him, saying, Truly you are the Son of God.
SPEAKER_00: Through exhaustion and helplessness, terror and doubt, their need for rescue and the smallness of their faith, the disciples are led to worship.
SPEAKER_00: And so are we.
SPEAKER_00: We are here today to worship Jesus as the Son of God, not just despite our exhaustion and helplessness and all of that, but because of it.
SPEAKER_00: Because we recognize that he is the one who can make all those wrong things right.
SPEAKER_00: That's the lesson that Peter has to teach us.
SPEAKER_00: And that's why our eyes should be fixed, not on Peter, but on Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: So I'd say by now it's past time to rewind the story and take a look at the main character of it all.
SPEAKER_00: What does Matthew tell us about Jesus?
SPEAKER_00: First of all, I think we can safely say that he is just as exhausted as the disciples are, and probably much more so.
SPEAKER_00: After all, it was him who has been teaching and healing all day long.
SPEAKER_00: He's the one who broke and multiplied the bread.
SPEAKER_00: And then he's the one who dismisses the crowds himself as he sends the disciples away.
SPEAKER_00: How spent he must have been.
SPEAKER_00: And then Matthew tells us he's alone.
SPEAKER_00: He climbs a mountain.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus hikes up Black Butte after dismissing the crowds, after feeding them, after serving them all day, after he had gone there in the first place to try to find some peace and quiet.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus finds himself alone praying.
SPEAKER_00: What an example this is for us.
SPEAKER_00: That solitude with our Heavenly Father is not something we should reserve for when we're feeling up to it and well rested, but that it is the very source of our rest.
SPEAKER_00: Of course, it must have been quite rejuvenating for Jesus, because the next thing we know, he's coming to his disciples, walking on the sea, and Matthew tells us it's in the fourth watch of the night, which was 3 to 6 a.m.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus is hindered neither by the late, or I guess we could say at this point, incredibly early hour, nor by the wind and the waves, because he is their master.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus is revealing to his disciples who he is.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus is showing them his divine identity.
SPEAKER_00: Remember in our Job reading today how Yahweh told Job that he shut in the sea with doors, that he prescribed its limits and stayed its proud waves, that he walks in the recesses of the deep.
SPEAKER_00: What is Jesus doing here on the Sea of Galilee?
SPEAKER_00: All of that.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus is demonstrating that he is Yahweh, ruler of wind and wave, master and commander of the sea and of all things.
SPEAKER_00: We see this also when he gets into the boat and immediately the wind stops.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus chooses when the wind and the waves can and can't go.
SPEAKER_00: And so because of this, because of who he is, his presence takes away fear.
SPEAKER_00: And this is a bit ironic at first glance because the disciples were terrified when they first saw him.
SPEAKER_00: But what does Jesus do for them?
SPEAKER_00: Immediately he speaks to them and he says, Take heart.
SPEAKER_00: It is I.
SPEAKER_00: Do not be afraid.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm guessing that you maybe need to hear those words today, just as much as the disciples did that night.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus is here.
SPEAKER_00: He's with you.
SPEAKER_00: No matter what you face, take heart.
SPEAKER_00: It is Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Do not be afraid.
SPEAKER_00: Now the angels at Bethlehem proclaim that the presence of the Christ would take away fear.
SPEAKER_00: And here on the sea, the presence of Christ takes away fear.
SPEAKER_00: Here and now, today and every day, the presence of Christ takes away fear.
SPEAKER_00: But even when we do fear, Jesus is patient with us.
SPEAKER_00: He was with Peter.
SPEAKER_00: When Peter doubted and demanded proof, Jesus didn't reprimand him, but simply said, Come.
SPEAKER_00: He knew how it would end, but in his patient mercy, he let Peter learn.
SPEAKER_00: And he never left him.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus doesn't wait for us to get our act together before he invites us to come to him.
SPEAKER_00: And this willing invitation to Peter here in chapter 14 echoes his invitation to all of us in chapter 11 that you might remember, where Jesus invites all of us who are weary and heavy laden to come to him.
SPEAKER_00: Because Jesus is, for Peter and for us, Savior.
SPEAKER_00: When Peter inevitably begins to sink, begins to plummet to his doom, Jesus immediately reaches out his hand and takes hold of him.
SPEAKER_00: And the Greek verb that Matthew uses here describes catching something, taking firm grasp of it, even making it your own.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus was not letting go of Peter.
SPEAKER_00: He was holding tightly to him.
SPEAKER_00: He was making him his own.
SPEAKER_00: And that's just what he's done for you.
SPEAKER_00: On the cross, Jesus reached out his hands for you.
SPEAKER_00: And as the nails were driven through him, he took hold of you.
SPEAKER_00: He held tightly to you.
SPEAKER_00: He made you his very own.
SPEAKER_00: Peter was not saved because he was brave enough to step out of the boat.
SPEAKER_00: Peter was not saved because he was bold or strong.
SPEAKER_00: Peter was saved because in the midst of utter helplessness and fear, he cried out to Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Today we heard Paul proclaim that if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.
SPEAKER_00: We heard him say that with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved.
SPEAKER_00: We heard him quote the prophet Joel, who said that everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.
SPEAKER_00: By faith, which is itself given as a gift to hopeless sinners like us.
SPEAKER_00: We have called upon the name of the Lord Jesus, the master of the wind and the wave, and the savior of the world.
SPEAKER_00: And he has saved you.
SPEAKER_00: Know this that whenever and wherever you may be sinking, his nail-pierced hand will pierce the surface of the chaotic seas, take hold of you, and bring you up to eternal safety with him.
SPEAKER_00: Praise God that we have a Savior who saves even those of little faith.
SPEAKER_00: People like you and me.
SPEAKER_00: So what is left but to worship him?
SPEAKER_00: What is left but to say, along with the disciples that night, truly you are the Son of God.
SPEAKER_00: Truly He is.
SPEAKER_00: He is the same God Job encountered.
SPEAKER_00: He's the same God the disciples saw walking on the sea.
SPEAKER_00: He's the same God who rescued Peter and who has rescued you.
SPEAKER_00: He is the God who has revealed himself to you by faith, who's taken hold of you in baptism and has rescued you from sin, death, and the devil.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus is the hero.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus is the savior.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus is Yahweh.
SPEAKER_00: So let's fix our eyes on him and not ourselves.
SPEAKER_00: Let's let him take center stage in our thoughts and our meditations and our hearts and in our lives.
SPEAKER_00: He is with us.
SPEAKER_00: He is savior.
SPEAKER_00: And truly he is the Son of God.
SPEAKER_00: In his name.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.