WHEN DOUBT TURNS INTO DISOBEDIENCE

Please take your Bible and turn to .

Matthew 14:30–31 NASB95PARA

But seeing the wind, he became frightened, and beginning to sink, he cried out, “Lord, save me!” Immediately Jesus stretched out His hand and took hold of him, and said to him, “You of little faith, why did you doubt?”

Please take your Bible and turn to .

Do you ever find yourself being in such fear that you are seemingly paralyzed? Being a person who is timid by nature I am ashamed to say that I have been paralyzed by fear on way too many occasions! Of course there are other occasions in which I should have been more fearful than I was.

One occasion happened about 32 years ago today (give or take a day). Gail and I were married on Saturday, June 28th 1986. After spending two days at Letchworth State Park near Rochester, NY, we completed our move from Michigan to Connecticut where I took the position of Music Pastor at a small church. The day we arrived Gail and I went grocery shopping at the local supermarket, which was located in a plaza with a bunch of other retail stores. As we were loading up our groceries I noticed that two young white males were beating up on a single African American male. Wanting to impress my new bride as to how manly I was, I stuck my nose where it didn’t really belong! My memory may not be totally accurate, but I recall that I went over to this altercation, and made them stop. When I asked what going on I found out that the one individual had shop lifted something from a store, and the other individuals were store security!

Sometimes fear gets the best of us. Other times we ignore fear and do things we shouldn’t do. Like me, the Apostle Peter often found himself on either the bold side, or the timid side of the spectrum. Sometimes he was bold when he should not have been, like when he swung his sword and cut off an innocent person’s ear. Other times he did not speak up when he should have, like the situation in when he feared the men who came from James. But then there were the times when he acted in just the right way, like when he confessed that Jesus was the Christ, the Son of the living God in . Or the various accounts of his actions and sermons in the early chapters of the book of Acts.

This past week, as I was preparing for this morning’s message, I found myself in a bit of an awkward position, and not for the first time, I must say. As I started preparations for the next portion of Matthew’s Gospel, I found myself unable to move on from last week’s text. As I was bringing last weeks sermon to a close I realized that there was at least one thing in the text that I did not even deal with. And then there are some thoughts that have been on my mind to further what was said about another thing. So, for this week, I’m going to stall a bit on a couple of the verses that we looked at last week.

This will be a two-part mini-series (I think) with this morning’s focus being on Peter’s cry for salvation. As we do so we will look at the phases of salvation from an eternal perspective, Christ’s commands to the Church, and some valuable lessons from the episode of Peter’s walking on the water.

PETER’S CRY FOR SALVATION

To set the stage let’s look at .

When Peter cried out to Jesus to save him, in this text, was he asking for salvation from an eternal perspective or was he asking for salvation from a present circumstance?

While this is a fine picture of how one might cry out to Jesus for eternal salvation, in this context it is quite obvious that Peter is seeking salvation from a present, temporal, circumstance.

Salvation Phases — From an Eternal Perspective

From an eternal perspective, salvation has multiple phases.

From an eternal perspective, salvation has multiple phases.

First in order of chronology is election, which is salvation from eternity past.

Long before we ever placed our faith in the person and work of Jesus Christ for our salvation, we were chosen by God to be saved.

Justification.

Sanctification.

Glorification.

On the temporal plane there are times when we need salvation as well. One of the times in which we would desire salvation is when we go through the trials of life. But God does not promise to save us from the trials, rather He promises the strength and needed wisdom to endure the trials.

In the case of our text Peter had stepped out in faith and began walking on the water to come to Jesus. Last week we noted that Peter waited for Christ to bid him to come. He had no thought that he was able, in and of himself, to defy the laws of nature and walk on the water. But he believed that if Christ commanded it then he could accomplish it.

We should note that God does not command us to do any special fete which He does not empower us to do. In this account, Christ commanded Peter to come, and He empowered him to come. And Peter began his journey well. But then something happened that caused him to begin to sink, out in the middle of the Sea of Galilee. We will get to that in a minute.

Though there are numerous commands in the New Testament for the believer to follow and obey, there are three basic commands that Christ has given to the church.

Christ’s Commands to the Church

Love God with everything you have

Love your neighbor just as much as you love yourself

As a side-note, this does not consider that you might not love yourself. A lack of love for yourself, or a lack of self-esteem does not give you an “out” in regards to this command.

Make disciples of all people

Let’s think about these commands for a moment. Can we as individuals truthfully say that we love God with everything that is in us? Can we truthfully say that we love our neighbors as ourselves? Can we truthfully say that we are making disciples? I don’t know about you (or do I?), but I’m not sure that can truthfully say that I obey these commands.

Back to Peter for a moment. Why do you think that he wanted to walk on the water? Do you think that he was like a little kid who saw someone else doing something that looked like fun, so he wanted to try it too? I don’t think so. I don’t believe that Jesus would have empowered Peter to do something miraculous merely for his own personal pleasure. While I can’t really judge Peter’s motive, I have an idea that Christ had supernaturally placed the desire in Peter’s heart so that we who read and study this account might learn some valuable lessons.

Valuable Lessons

We need to keep our focus on Jesus

We should not let fear conquer us

2 Timothy 1:7 NKJV

For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind.

When we are fearful we should cry out to Jesus

To everyone who's lost someone they love Long before it was their time You feel like the days you had were not enough When you said goodbye

And to all of the people with burdens and pains Keeping you back from your life You believe that there's nothing and there is no one Who can make it right

There is hope for the helpless Rest for the weary And love for the broken heart And there is grace and forgiveness Mercy and healing He'll meet you wherever you are Cry out to Jesus Cry out to Jesus

Our faith is often very small, and yet it only takes a little bit of faith to move a mountain

Even If -- MercyMe

They say sometimes you win some Sometimes you lose some And right now, right now I'm losing bad I've stood on this stage night after night Reminding the broken it'll be alright But right now, oh right now I just can't

It's easy to sing When there's nothing to bring me down But what will I say When I'm held to the flame Like I am right now

I know You're able and I know You can Save through the fire with Your mighty hand But even if You don't My hope is You alone

They say it only takes a little faith To move a mountain Well good thing A little faith is all I have, right now But God, when You choose To leave mountains unmovable Oh give me the strength to be able to sing It is well with my soul

When we begin to do Christ’s bidding it is inevitable that doubts will arise

I don’t for minute think that Peter doubted Christ’s power to save him from his circumstances. The mere fact that he cried out to Jesus shows that he had faith in Jesus’ power to deliver him from the storms of life. What I do think is that Peter, after beginning well, started to think “what have I gotten myself into?” Have you ever felt that way? I have.

This morning we have seen that there are both eternal and temporal aspects regarding salvation. Not only does Jesus save us from our sins, which is the eternal perspective, but He may at times save us from our present circumstances. But, as the songwriter put it, even if He doesn’t, our hope remains in Him, and in Him alone.

Let’s pray.

Closing Song No. 705 – It is Well

Depression and doubt often go hand in hand. Charles Spurgeon wrote:

To be gloomy and depressed is not sinful at all, but there may have been in the midst of that the sin of unbelief: there may have been a doubting of God—a distrust of his providence—a questioning of his love.

One of the ways in which doubt leads to disobedience is that it can cause us to distrust God’s providence and question His love for us.

Is God sovereign in all things? Absolutely! Is God always in control? Absolutely! A more relevant question for us to ponder in regards to the trials of our lives is how does God fit into this picture.

The Greek term that is translated doubt in this passage is only used twice in the N.T.; both by Matthew. Keep a marker here and turn to . This term refers to wavering or hesitating. In Peter’s case he hesitated as he walked on the water. Once he hesitated gravity took effect. Of course hesitating in the spiritual realm has enormous consequences for the believer.

Matthew 28:16–20 NASB95PARA

But the eleven disciples proceeded to Galilee, to the mountain which Jesus had designated. When they saw Him, they worshiped Him; but some were doubtful. And Jesus came up and spoke to them, saying, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”

Did you notice that the remaining eleven disciples were worshiping Jesus. And yet some doubted. Some hesitated. Some wavered. One thing I observe about these two passages is that they both mention doubting as well as worshiping. The order of the two is reversed in the later passage. But both are present. I’m not sure I can adequately express the correlation of doubt and worship, but I find it intriguing that they are both mentioned is both passages.

In chapter 14 Peter is the one that doubted. But we need to understand that Matthew often uses Peter as representative of the whole group. So perhaps they were all thinking something like: “What did Peter get himself into this time?” Or, “Man, I’m glad I didn’t go out there with Peter. If I did I would get wet!” In chapter 28 we do not know who doubted or even what it was that they doubted. Perhaps it was a veiled reference to Doubting Thomas. Perhaps what they doubted was their ability to perform the task of making disciples of nations.

What seem apparent to me in these two texts is that a little bit of doubt does not necessarily hinder worship. But what about disobedience; does disobedience hinder worship?

I listened to a message this past week on the Great Commission. It was delivered by Dr. Burke Parsons of Ligoneer Ministries. His contention was that if individual believers, or Local churches were disobedient to the Great Commission then they could not truly worship God in spirit and in truth! My personal contention is that doubt and fear are what keep us from being actively involved in the work of the Great Commission.

As we continue on in this direction, I need to state that I am speaking to myself as much as I am speaking to you. I believe that we have all become complacent as it relates to the Great Commission. And further, I believe that we have allowed fear to keep us from obeying Christ’s command.

How Fear Causes Disobedience to the Great Commission

We fear rejection

We fear persecution

We fear that we will botch the presentation of the Gospel

How Doubt Causes Disobedience to the Great Commission

We doubt that we can make a clear presentation

We doubt that those who hear the message will receive it

We doubt that it will really make any difference

How a Lack of Love Causes Disobedience to the Great Commission

A lack of love is demonstrated in a lack of concern for salvation of the lost

Since we have the message that will bring salvation, we must actually hate those we don’t share the message with

Of course for many, these categories do not seem to fit. For some the issue is that we are so caught up with the hustle and bustle of our own lives that it is hard to find time for anything else.

A Change of Direction

How can we, as a church as well as individual believers, change our direction in regards to the Great Commission?

Pray

Acknowledge our sin

Confess our sin

Pray for the strength to reverse course

Become so familiar with the message of the Gospel that it becomes second nature to us

Ruler

Rebel

Redeemer

Response

Take the first step

We have to stop merely talking about what needs to be done — we have to start doing it

Don’t give up when the message isn’t well received

Our job is to deliver the message on behalf of Christ, whom we represent

It is the work of the Holy Spirit to cause people to respond to the message

Don’t assume that if a person does not respond to the message the first time that they will never respond

Be willing to share your experience of witnessing with others

If we share with others, then they can invest in our lives as well

I’d love to have Wednesday night Prayer Meeting become a support group for those who are willing to become obedient to the Great Commission

We could share experiences with one another

We could pray together for those we are witnessing to

Do we really believe that the message of the Gospel has the power to save those who are “the lost sheep of Israel?” Are we willing to sacrifice our own comfort and security to share the message of the gospel with those who need so desperately to hear it?

Perhaps you are hearing this message this morning and have come to recognize that you are a lost sheep who has not yet been found. If that be the case I invite you to embrace the message of the gospel, namely that you have sinned against God and that you are in need of a Savior. That Jesus died as a substitute for your sins. That He rose again from the dead. Believe the message of the gospel that states that if you believe in His person and His work on your behalf you will be saved. Then bow down in worship of your Lord and Savior.

This morning we have looked at how Christ not only offers salvation from the stand point of eternity, but He also offers salvation in terms of the circumstances of our lives. That doesn’t always mean that He will deliver us from our present circumstances, for it often means that He will supply the wisdom and strength to endure them. And then we have looked at how doubt and fear can often cause us to be disobedient to the revealed will of Christ.

I would like to close with this reminder from

Jude 24–25 NIV84

To him who is able to keep you from falling and to present you before his glorious presence without fault and with great joy— to the only God our Savior be glory, majesty, power and authority, through Jesus Christ our Lord, before all ages, now and forevermore! Amen.