08.13.2023 - Provision and Protection

Scripture: Matthew 14:22-33

Matthew 14:22–33 NIV

22 Immediately Jesus made the disciples get into the boat and go on ahead of him to the other side, while he dismissed the crowd. 23 After he had dismissed them, he went up on a mountainside by himself to pray. Later that night, he was there alone, 24 and the boat was already a considerable distance from land, buffeted by the waves because the wind was against it. 25 Shortly before dawn Jesus went out to them, walking on the lake. 26 When the disciples saw him walking on the lake, they were terrified. “It’s a ghost,” they said, and cried out in fear. 27 But Jesus immediately said to them: “Take courage! It is I. Don’t be afraid.” 28 “Lord, if it’s you,” Peter replied, “tell me to come to you on the water.” 29 “Come,” he said. Then Peter got down out of the boat, walked on the water and came toward Jesus. 30 But when he saw the wind, he was afraid and, beginning to sink, cried out, “Lord, save me!” 31 Immediately Jesus reached out his hand and caught him. “You of little faith,” he said, “why did you doubt?” 32 And when they climbed into the boat, the wind died down. 33 Then those who were in the boat worshiped him, saying, “Truly you are the Son of God.”

Children’s Moment:

Peter Sinks on the Water

Theme

On the sea of life, there are floaters and sinkers -- which are you?

Object

A tub of water and a variety of objects, some that will float in water and some that will sink.

Scripture

Peter answered him, "Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water. "He said, "Come." So Peter got out of the boat, started walking on the water, and came toward Jesus. But when he noticed the strong wind, he became frightened, and beginning to sink, he cried out, "Lord, save me!" Jesus immediately reached out his hand and caught him, saying to him, "You of little faith, why did you doubt?" Matthew 14:28-31 [NASB]

As you can see, I have a tub of water and several other things with me this morning. Some of the items that I have with me will float in water and some of them will sink. I am going to show you an item and ask you to vote as to whether you think it will float or sink. Then we will put it in the water to see if you were right or not. Are you ready?

Here is a wooden building block. How many of you think it will float in the water? How many think it will sink? Let's try it and see. Great! Most of you were right. The block is floating in the water.

Here is the second item. A metal spoon. How many of you think it will float? How many think it will sink? Well, let's try it and see. You were right again! It sank!

Here is the another item. A piece of heavy duty foil. How many of you think it will float? How many think it will sink? Okay, let's see. You were right again! It floats!

Here is another piece of foil. It is exactly the same as the other one. (Wad it up into a ball.) Now how many of you think it will still float? How many think it will sink? Right again! It still floats.

Are you a floater or a sinker? Don't worry, I'm not going to throw you into a tub of water to find out, but I think we can find the answer in the Bible. Do you remember the story in the Bible when Jesus fed five thousand people with just five loaves of bread and two fish? After he had finished feeding the five thousand, Jesus told his disciples to get into their boat and go to the other side of the lake while he went up into the mountains to be alone and to pray.

While the disciples were going to the other side of the lake in their boat, the wind came up and the water began to get rough. The disciples became afraid that their boat would sink and they would be drowned. Then they looked, and they saw Jesus coming toward them and he was walking on the water. When Peter saw Jesus, he became excited and he said to him, "Lord, if that's really you, let me walk to you on the water. Jesus answered Peter and said, "Come."

Well Peter climbed over the side of the boat and started walking on the water to Jesus. Then he began to look around, he felt the strong winds and saw the waves and he became afraid and started to sink. He cried out to Jesus, "Help, save me!" Jesus reached out his hand and saved Peter and he said to him, "Oh, you of little faith, why did you doubt?"

As long as Peter kept his eyes on Jesus, he was walking on the water, but when he took his eyes off of Jesus, he began to sink. As we go through life, there will be some storms. We will encounter some pretty rough water. As long as we keep our eyes upon Jesus and put our trust in him, we will be okay. But when we take our eyes off of Jesus and put our confidence in our own ability, we will surely sink!

Dear Jesus, when the storms of life come against us, help us to keep our eyes on you and to put our trust in you. Amen.

Provision and Protection

What happens when get it wrong?

What happens if we get it wrong?

We face many decisions every day. Thankfully most of them are easy decisions. Some of these are easy because we know the correct answers or responses. Whether it is daily chores, following the rules of the road, or following a family tradition. These decisions are easy because we have practiced them many times, and they have proven themselves to be the right decisions. That is... until they are not.

Some of the most frustrating decisions we have to make happen when our lives change, and the things that used to be easy decisions no longer work, and we have to make different choices. My dad worked at the post office his entire adult life, so whenever I wanted something mailed, I could put it in an envelope with an address and leave it on the kitchen table. The following day, it always made it into the mail. When I left home for college, I discovered a process involving buying stamps and putting letters in boxes, which sometimes meant getting to the post office while it was open.

Becoming an adult made other easy choices more complicated. Dinner had to be bought and made. It no longer appeared on the kitchen table. The bathrooms did not clean themselves. I began to discover that as much as I did not like doing certain chores, the consequence of them going undone for too long was often worse. So I had to learn to schedule the things I was not particularly eager to do so that all the things I did not want to do could get done in the correct order without causing additional conflicts.

Some of us are blessed and do not need daily medicine to function. Others of us have a set of medications we take every day, and scheduling them feels like planning a wedding reception where we try to keep certain people who do not get along from sitting next to one another. It is frustrating when easy decisions change and become complicated.

Then some decisions are always difficult, and we wish we could avoid them altogether. These kinds of decisions may change the course of our lives. They are the decisions we often bring to God and ask what He wants us to do. That doesn’t always mean we follow His direction, but we try our best to follow Him on our good days. But there, in the back of our minds, we wonder:

“What happens if we get it wrong?”

“What happens when we get it wrong?”

Our scripture today shows us that the disciples struggled just as we do today, and the grace Jesus showed them teaches us that Jesus provides for and protects us when we focus on and follow Him.

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Jesus Provides for and Protects Us

Long before boats with engines, those who traveled by water were at the mercy of the wind and waves. The wind was against them. The waves were rocking against the small boat. It was dark and hard to see.

There were four fishermen in the boat who probably thought this was not the best time to try to cross the lake and were rowing against the wind and waves. The others were wondering if they should have left earlier that evening. They all quickly forgot the multitude's miraculous feeding in the wilderness. They were exhausted from the work and the excitement, ready for bed, and had miles to go before they could sleep. Perhaps one of the twelve thought of Jesus as they rowed against the waves, wondering if He was finally able to get the rest He needed. Rowing with their backs to the wind, each of them would have seen the sun start to rise up on the eastern horizon and a strange shadowy figure in front of it.

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Jesus came to them with the Sun rising at his back, a silhouette on those rough waters, but they could not recognize Him. Walking on the top of deep water, they were certain it was a ghost or worse. Suddenly they were wide awake, and In a panic, they could not manage to row away fast enough. Seeing their fear, Jesus called out and told them not to be afraid.

“It is I,” He said.

Peter recognized the voice but was struggling to make sense of what he saw with his eyes. Then, in that brash, impetuous spirit he has become known for, Peter shouted out to Jesus,

“Lord, if it’s you, tell me to come to you on the water.”

Testing Jesus

Matthew wanted us to know this story as evidence that Jesus was the Son of God. He wanted us to know that Jesus had the authority to command the wind and the waves when trained fishermen were helpless against them. And surely Peter caught some of that. But He was caught up in the moment and was not sure. This was not his moment to confess Jesus as the Christ. This was his moment to step up and out and follow Jesus beyond what he could do himself.

Peter calls Jesus Lord, and then he says the word “if.” This one moment is a strange mishmash of faith and doubt. It doesn’t make much sense to call Jesus your Lord and test to see if it is Him by putting your life in danger. Surely there was a safer way to test if it was Jesus out there on the water.

I suspect we have all opened our mouths and said we would do something before thinking it through. God gave Peter the opportunity and perhaps even the words to help him get out of the boat and experience what it meant to follow Jesus. But Peter had to take the step to trust those words that came out of his mouth. Peter did not make a difficult choice there. He made a ridiculous choice. He was testing God. Once he stepped out of that boat, he was committed. There was no going back.

I can stand here and tell you that you should not test God. I can point out scriptures telling us we should not test God. However, I know I have moments when I test God, and you do too. Part of being in a growing relationship with God is going through our times of testing so that we grow to trust God quicker.

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Trust is not measured by size or weight but by speed. As we grow in faith, we face challenges and grow faster in trusting God's protection and provision. Can you recall the last time you were blindfolded? How quickly did you walk when you could not see? Do you walk slowly? Do you run? Do you take tiny steps and feel ahead of you with your feet?

I remember playing “Pin the Tail on the Donkey” at a birthday party in college. One of my taller friends, about 6 foot 7, spun himself around and decided he had a lot of trust in his sense of direction rather than following our voices. He did not hesitate but nearly ran to where he thought the target was. Instead of making it to the paper donkey on the wall, he crashed into a table with the birthday cake, sending it flying all over the room and injuring himself. Sometimes misplaced trust is worse than no trust at all.

Peter couldn’t trust his eyes, so he asked Jesus to call out to Him. When He heard Jesus again, he stepped right out of the boat.

When you hear Jesus calling you, how fast do you move to Him?

Following Jesus

Peter was a beautiful, awkward example of what it looks like to learn to trust Jesus enough to serve Him well. It is so much easier to trust ourselves and expect that we know what to do based on our training and experiences. We sometimes tell ourselves we can tolerate a few injuries and broken tables, and our smashed birthday cakes will wash off with some work. But that is not God’s will for us. Jesus wants us to trust and follow Him, not ourselves.

And we, just like Peter, will lose our focus, misplace our trust, and fall sometimes. And Jesus will pick us back up again, remove us from the situation, and start us following Him again. He does not intend to let us drown or take anyone down with us. He will work with us. He will provide for and protect us.

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God may not call you to walk on water, but He does call you to carry your cross. The Bible never tells us about Peter walking on water again, but Jesus's ministry with him was far greater than that simple miracle. Carrying your cross is hard, humbling work. You won’t win points with the world for it. You might not even be noticed. Throughout history, disciples of Jesus have been called fools for carrying their crosses for Jesus.

These crosses we carry are usually not literal. They are the burdens we bear in our minds, hearts, bodies, and possessions because Jesus asks us to. Many of you carry your cross in your workplace, serving with humble love because Jesus calls you to do so. Others of you serve your family humbly because Jesus asks you to. Some of you serve in our church or the community with humble love, carrying your cross there because Jesus has led you there.

Wherever you carry your cross, there will be days that you will fall, fail, and feel like you are drowning in the waves around you. When that happens, there is only one thing you need to do. Look to Jesus. Refocus on Him instead of the work or people around you. Sometimes it's ok to drop your cross and ask for help because you don’t get heavenly credit for carrying it around if you aren’t following Jesus. You won’t have the power to carry it if you do not have Jesus in your sight.

Once you see Jesus leading you, you will discover that the impossible becomes possible, heavy burdens become light, and the work will become a joy, not because of what you are doing, but because Jesus is there with you. You know that when you get in over your head, Jesus will provide for and protect you. When we serve Jesus, we keep our eyes fixed on Him, and He can lead us anywhere to do anything.

Brothers and sisters, will you pick up your cross and follow Jesus where He leads you, be it up the mountain, through the valley, or over the rough waters you face?