Behave Like Christ

Believe, Behave Become

Matthew 14:23–33 (NIV)

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

Behavior Modification VS Being a Disciple

Behavior Modification is easier!

I understand why this becomes a focus. It is easy! I have kids, when I am trying to help them learn and grow, the easiest thing for me to do is to focus on their OUTPUT. Their behavior.

So I give them a list of behaviors that are good, and a list of behaviors that our bad, and I focus on stopping the bad behaviors and promoting the good behaviors. Because I am dad, and they are just kids, I have the power to reinforce this behavior, I can reward the good behavior and punish the bad behavior. Part of my responsibility as a parent is to teach my kids how to behave, how to function properly in society, I understand that. How my kids behave absolutely matters. How we behave as followers of Jesus absolutely matters.

So we as a church, have often done the same thing, especially when it comes to how we teach and minister to our kids and teenagers.

I grew up attending youth group in the late 90s and started working in youth ministry in the early 2000s. This was the height of the “Purity Culture” focus. There was this HUGE focus on sexual purity with massive campaigns like the True love waits program? Any of you remember this? There was also books that came out called I kissed dating goodbye, and this massive focus on how everyone dressed and avoiding lust, and waiting until marriage. The huge focus of the church, especially in regards to youth ministry was on specific behavioral outcomes in this area.

I think this all by itself wasn’t a bad thing. After-all I do think the Bible is pretty clear about the importance of purity. I think the heart was in the right place, but a lot can and in many cases did go wrong when our primary focus is on specific behavioral outcomes.

I think there are 2 big ways we as a church get things wrong when we focus specifically on behavioral outcomes.

Fence Laws and the failure to provide the WHY!

We know people have a bad habit of wanting to walk right up to the line, or even test the line and so drawing hard and fast lines serves as a temptation, and so we build artificial barriers, which become increasingly silly.

Here is a super simplified, long-term view of some of the things that happened in the old testament that help set up this example.

God wants the Israelites to be his people and his representatives in the world. Part of that was establishing how this nation was supposed to operate, and part of helping them know how to do that was by giving them some rules to follow. I think it came up in Last weeks After service Sunday school class that there were 613 rules in the old testament. Which sounds like a lot, but were really 3 categories of laws - Moral, Civil and Ceremonial.

Well you know the story, the Israelites stop taking these rules seriously, and start trying to manipulate the rules, or outright break them and so God sends his prophets to warn the Israelites to start following the rules. The nation refuses and so eventually God sends in another nation to punish them and they are scattered and many are driven from Israel.

After time, the Israelites get to return to Israel and start to rebuild life and part of that rebuild is an awareness that they need to take these rules a bit more seriously. They don’t want to repeat the mistakes of their ancestors and face total destruction again and so some of them (though certainly not all) start to be better about following the rules.

But a funny thing happens, Some of them are so afraid of breaking the rules again, that they start to build what comes to be known as Fence Laws. These are not actually God’s laws but they are manmade laws that seek to keep people from getting anywhere close to breaking the original law. A common example of this is the command to honor the Sabbath and keep it Holy.

Exodus 20:8–11 NIV

“Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your male or female servant, nor your animals, nor any foreigner residing in your towns. For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.

That is the law, but then the question becomes what is work, and so rather then just saying don’t do your job for the day, every little detail was regulated, like how many total steps you could take, or how heavy an object you could lift, and much more. It got to the point where it was Burdensome to try and follow all of these rules. Not the original law, but the complicated interpretation of the rules….these Fence laws.

Instead of teaching or training people to think and understand the heart behind the rules, and instead focusing on specific behavior modification we so often miss the point. This is after-all, one of the big things Jesus pushed back against when it came to the Pharisees. He made it clear he was not interested in changing any of the original 613 OT laws, instead, he was confronting all of these Fence laws that had crept up and made things super difficult for everyone. He says the’ve totally missed the point and so he confronts their view of the Sabbath and heals someone (work) on the sabbath. He says, Sabbath was made for Man, not man made for the Sabbaath. He said you totally missed the point and instead of the sabath being refreshing and life giving it became burdensome and just another complication for life.

It is easy to point at the people of the OT and to say they were overzealous but this is essentially what happened with the Purity culture focus of the late 90s We took a really good Biblical concept and then made a bunch of increasingly strict fence laws around them, and the focused shifted from the original Biblical concept to a bunch of burdensome man made lines that missed the whole point.

Here is a simpler example. Like probably most of you, I grew up in a house where I wasn't allows to swear. Specific words were “bad” words and we couldn't say them. In fact one time as a little kid I did use one of those “bad” words and my parents made me wash my mouth out with soap. Anyone relate? In my wifes family, she had to put hot sauce on her tongue as a consequence. But beyond just don’t say the bad words, it was don’t say anything that was even “close” to the bad words. No just changing a letter, or using something similiar sounding, that was bad too. For the longest time I didnt realize fudge was an actual dessert, I just thought it was a naughty word you couldnt say because it was too close to a different word. But where does it end? My wife and I have had many conversations about what our kids should or should not be allowed to say based on our upbringing and I am often suprised at how far those “fence laws” extended. It can easily get to the point where the original law is nowwhere to be found and instead it is all of these made up lines that aren’t in the Bible. After-all, the Bibles doesn't say don’t say these 6 words, or anything that rhymes with them. The Bible says things like don’t let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouth

Ephesians 4:29 NIV

Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen.

Which is a really great rule, but is a far cry from don’t say the name of a food because it sounds somewhat familiar to another word.

And this matters because eventually, the question will arise in some way shape or form that essentially asks this big question…. WHY? WHY DOES THIS MATTER? Why can’t I say this word? Why can’t I wear a shirt with a 2 inch strap instead of a 4 inch strap, why can’t I take a hike on a beautiful sabbath day to enjoy the beauty of God’s creation while still observing rest and a break from the routine of my weekly job?

When we fail to provide the WHY - then people tend to feel manipulated, and taken advantage of, and they also are quick to throw the whole thing out and not follow any of the rules, including the original rule, which may be really good for them!

It is the totally wrong focus. YES OUR BEHAVIOR MATTERS and we DO want to behave like Christ, but instead of focusing on behavioral modification, and specific behavioral outcomes, we should be focused in a totally different direction. We should be focused on being a Disciple of Jesus.

It is at this time, that it is good to remind ourself what a Disciple is. it is a lot easier for us to think of the term apprentice. If you want to learn how to be a welder, or an electrician, the best thing to do is to go spend a couple years, helping a seasoned welder or electrician and assisting them and learning from them to that eventually you have learned all of their tips and tricks and can do everything they can do and then you start working on your own. I looked into the difference between a Disciple and an Apprentice and the super simple distinction that I thought was helpful is that a Disciple is a follower of someone else's IDEAS whereas an apprentice is focused on learning a trade, but both are similar in that you are learning directly from someone who is already deemed to be an expert in a given area.

Being a Disciple of a Rabbi was a very big deal! It was typically and historically difficult and rare to be choses as a Disciple. In order to be a Disciple of a Rabbi, they would need to think that you could do everything that they did. That you would be able to literally walk in their footsteps and follow them everywhere they went.

In fact, There is this great Jewish blessing that essentially says “May you be covered in the dust of your Rabbi”

Which sounds kind of funny, but is essentially saying, may you walk so closely behind your Rabbi, your leader, that the dust that kicks up from his sandals as you walk lands on you. In other words, let there be very little gap between what your leader does and what you do.

Now we will unpack this even further next week as we talk about Becoming like Christ, but the real heart behind this idea of Behaving like Christ is essentially Discipleship, not behavioral modification.

We want to be following Jesus so closely, that everywhere he goes, we follow. If Jesus teaches us to pray the Lords Prayer, we say the Lords Prayer. If Jesus tells us to celebrate communion by taking the bread and the cup in remembrance of him, we do as he instructed. We want to be so in tuned with Jesus, so focused on being like him, that we are willing to follow him wherever he leads us.

Which brings us all the way back around to our passage of Scripture for this morning.

Matthew 14:28–29 NIV

“Lord, if it’s you,” Peter replied, “tell me to come to you on the water.” “Come,” he said. Then Peter got down out of the boat, walked on the water and came toward Jesus.

Peter is a good Disciple. He wants to follow Jesus everywhere, he wants to join Jesus in everything. Which makes this scene of Peter joining Jesus walking on the water more understandable and less crazy.

The story is not about Peter seeing Jesus walking on the water and thinking, wow that looks like fun. Or Peter not believing it is really Jesus and trying to test Jesus by seeing how he will respond if he asks to join him on the water.

The real focus for Peter is his desire to literally follow in the footsteps of Jesus and do everything Jesus is doing just as a good Disciple would do. So he says, Jesus, I want to walk where you walk, I want to follow you everywhere, even if it is scary and crazy and even if it means stepping out of this boat and walking on water. I am fully committed to being your disciple and following you everywhere.

I love that first Peter ASKS the question to Jesus. Jesus, if you invite me out onto the water, if YOU say its OK I will come join you. He doesnt just jump out of the boat and start running towards Jesus, that would be crazy, he waits for the invitation from Jesus, and as soon as he gets that invitation THEN he jumps out of the boat and starts walking on water. I think sometimes we can get ahead of Jesus and think Jesus is leading us somewhere and so we just jump out of the boat without first checking with Jesus and this is a huge mistake. This can lead to awful consequences when we thought we were following Jesus, but in reality we were not really listening to Jesus and we didn’t wait for his invitiation to follow. So word of caution before just jumping out of the boat, but thats not what happens here.

Peter sees Jesus doing this crazy thing, asks to follow and waits for an answer and then joins Jesus in walking on the water

Peter truly wants to Behave Like Christ, no matter the cost, no matter the situation, no matter how scary it might be. So without hesitation when Jesus invites him to follow him out on the water Peter jumps out of the boat and starts walking on water! I want to have this level of faith, this level of commitment to Jesus, I want this to be the focus when I say we are called to Behave like Christ!

Eventually Peter takes his eyes off of Jesus and starts to look around and realize how crazy this all is, and that is when he starts to doubt and sink. When his eyes were on Jesus, when his focus was on following Jesus wherever Jesus was going, he was able to do the miraculous and walk on water, but as soon as he took his eyes off of Jesus and started to think about all the ways this thing could go wrong, thats when he started to sink. It is absolutely critical that we keep our eyes on Jesus, especially when taking bold steps in following him and learning to Behave like Christ, otherwise we get so easily distracted and blown off course and can find ourselves in Trouble. But even then Jesus steps in to save the day and help us out.

Matthew 14:31 NIV

Immediately Jesus reached out his hand and caught him. “You of little faith,” he said, “why did you doubt?”

This verse is a perfect example of why I wish the Bible was an audio book and not just the written word. Because so often I think we read this verse in a negative context, as if Jesus is mad or disappointed in Peter, Like he let Jesus down. But without changing any of the words but simply changing the TONE in which we read the words, it changes how we feel about it. Instead of it being disapproving dad voice, it could be super encouraging positive voice. You of little faith… why did you doubt! As in, oh man you had it, you were doing this awesome thing, why did you doubt yourself, that was awesome. Peter is the only one willing to follow Jesus out onto the water, none of the other disciples were even willing to try, I think it was just as likely if not more likely that Jesus was super excited for Peter as he was mad at Peter. Like a parent who watched their kid ALMOST score a spectacular goal, or make a diving catch, or be so close to achieving something they have been working on. OH MAN YOU ALMOST HAD IT! you were so CLOSE! That was awesome to see!

I think when our heart is in the right place, and our desire is to BEHAVE LIKE CHRIST, then even if we fall short, or don’t quite get it right every time, but we are clearly trying God is much more like an excited parent knowing we will get there soon and encouraging us to keep trying to live like him, than he is the yelling angry figure too many people view God as. But thats another sermon for another time.

I want us to end this morning with a few final thoughts as we wrap up this message on Behaving like Christ.

1.) Our behavior absolutely matters, but Jesus is far more interested in teaching us to think and act like him then he is in specific behavioral modification.

In fact it is in the book of Isaiah right around chapter 58 I think is where God even says - don’t try to manipulate me with your behavior, as if the behavior is the most important thing. God sees our hearts and that matters so much more. He in fact gets angry at those who think merely be a specific act, or gesture can they trick God into doing whatever they want, or hide the fact that their behavior is just empty gestures rather then genuine love of God.

2.) Behaving like Christ, means being a Disciple of Jesus! It means following in his footsteps, and being willing to step outside of our comfort zone even when it seems risky to do so.

3.) The big question I keep asking myself, is where is Jesus leading me now? I believe he lead my family and I here to Join you and this church. I am excited to journey along side you. But I know just getting here, wasn’t the end result, it was just the beginning of a whole new adventure. I want to follow Jesus wherever he is leading me right now in this next phase of life. I hope you spend some time today reflecting on this question as well. Where is Jesus leading you now? What does it mean for you, in your current context, to step out of the boat and follow Jesus? To Behave Like Christ and to live as he is inviting you to live?

4.) Where is Jesus leading our church? My prayer is that we will all feel called to follow Jesus by walking together in the path he invites us all to take. That collectively we can step out of the boat, do what might seem risky or bold, but in reality is just being willing to walk in the footsteps of Jesus as he invites us to follow him and to Behave like Christ. To be clear, I don’t have the answer, I don’t have an agenda, because it is not MY agenda that matters, but I want us to be thinking about and praying about where the Lord is leading this church next, and listening carefully for Jesus to invite us to step outside of the boat and follow him. Where is Jesus inviting us to step out of the boat and follow him?