Fear deepens our faith

Opening:

Have we ever

Good morning Cornerstone family, I am very excited to be here with you this morning to share what God has for us.

I will be having the pleasure to wrap up our sermon series on Miracles.

For those of you that don’t know who this red headed fellow is, my name is Thomas Woolsey and I am the campus pastor for our up coming campus in macon county.

I will be having the pleasure to wrap up our sermon series on Miracles.

Share a little about myself (family, and little history)

When I was 15 I went thru one of the most difficult times in my life. My mother passed away, I was left homeless, tried to take my own life, I was completely alone from any family members that would take care of me. This lasted about 2-3 weeks.

I don’t tell you any of these for you to feel sorry for me. I tell you this because there are times in our lives where we seem to go thru some impossible odds.

When we go thru such odds that seem impossible, reminds us that going thru trials is a normal thing for a christian to experience, that the testing of our faith produces endurance.

Have you ever been thru something that seemed to be the most difficult situation that you have ever been thru?

Main text this morning

I am going to read thru the scripture and then come back thru and touch on a few things.

If you would open your bibles and join with me as we read God’s word.

Mark 6:45–52 HCSB

Immediately He made His disciples get into the boat and go ahead of Him to the other side, to Bethsaida, while He dismissed the crowd. After He said good-bye to them, He went away to the mountain to pray. When evening came, the boat was in the middle of the sea, and He was alone on the land. He saw them being battered as they rowed, because the wind was against them. Around three in the morning He came toward them walking on the sea and wanted to pass by them. When they saw Him walking on the sea, they thought it was a ghost and cried out; for they all saw Him and were terrified. Immediately He spoke with them and said, “Have courage! It is I. Don’t be afraid.” Then He got into the boat with them, and the wind ceased. They were completely astounded, because they had not understood about the loaves. Instead, their hearts were hardened.

Have you ever been up against something that seemed impossible?

mark 6:45-52

Matthew 14:22–33 HCSB

Immediately He made the disciples get into the boat and go ahead of Him to the other side, while He dismissed the crowds. After dismissing the crowds, He went up on the mountain by Himself to pray. When evening came, He was there alone. But the boat was already over a mile from land, battered by the waves, because the wind was against them. Around three in the morning, He came toward them walking on the sea. When the disciples saw Him walking on the sea, they were terrified. “It’s a ghost!” they said, and cried out in fear. Immediately Jesus spoke to them. “Have courage! It is I. Don’t be afraid.” “Lord, if it’s You,” Peter answered Him, “command me to come to You on the water.” “Come!” He said. And climbing out of the boat, Peter started walking on the water and came toward Jesus. But when he saw the strength of the wind, he was afraid. And beginning to sink he cried out, “Lord, save me!” Immediately Jesus reached out His hand, caught hold of him, and said to him, “You of little faith, why did you doubt?” When they got into the boat, the wind ceased. Then those in the boat worshiped Him and said, “Truly You are the Son of God!”

Matthew 14:26-

Picture of Sea of Galilee

Jesus sends

Fear Deepens Our Faith

Fear of the unknown

Matthew 14:24 HCSB

But the boat was already over a mile from land, battered by the waves, because the wind was against them.

Exodus 34:30 HCSB

When Aaron and all the Israelites saw Moses, the skin of his face shone! They were afraid to come near him.

The radiance of Moses face reflected God’s glory and made the Israelites afraid.

Matthew 17:6 HCSB

When the disciples heard it, they fell facedown and were terrified.

We see here that a storm was on the disciples.

h

There are times when God sends us on mission and then storms will arise and we are not careful we will miss what God has for us.

Picture of Mount of Transfiguration

There are time in our lives when Jesus will ask us to do something that will seem impossible.

Jesus protects

We look back at verses 27-29

Matthew 14:27–29 HCSB

Immediately Jesus spoke to them. “Have courage! It is I. Don’t be afraid.” “Lord, if it’s You,” Peter answered Him, “command me to come to You on the water.” “Come!” He said. And climbing out of the boat, Peter started walking on the water and came toward Jesus.

mt 14:27-28

There are times in our life that Jesus will seem not there but He reminds us that he is standing right there.

In verse 27 Jesus reminds them who he is.

In verse 28 Peter asks Jesus to “Command him to come to You on the water”

In verse 29 Jesus simply says Come.

This is a super natural moment!!!! Not only is Jesus walking on water but Peter is as well.

You know everyone wants to give Peter a lot of bad flack about all he has done in failing Jesus but the one thing I see in these 3 passages, is that Peter had what the others didn’t have. That he was willing to step out of the boat in a raging storm.

One thing about what peter is doing is he is walking on God’s word “come”.

Peter is relying on the word that Jesus spoke to him,

One thing that my wife is great about doing is putting sticky notes on the mirror in the bathroom of different bible verses.

Do we rely on the words that Jesus speaks into us?

We forget that there is power in Gods word.

Gods word gives us direction in the darkest times in our faith walk with Him.

Gods word gives us comfort

Gods word points us on a path of freedom.

Are you coming up on something right now in you life and you don’t know where to turn? I would say for most of us, we are looking for a miracle to happen. I encourage you to read the word of God and He will show how to step out of the Boat.

Fear of trails

James 1:2–3 HCSB

Consider it a great joy, my brothers, whenever you experience various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance.

James 1:2-4

We can forget sometimes that some of the greatest miracles ever worked in our lives is when we where going thru a trial. James reminds us that its a natural part of life to go thru times of trials.

Jesus

Trails don’t always mean that they happen when your at low in life. They can happen in some of the greatest parts of life. (cloud nine times of life).

In Verse 3 James says “ that the testing of our faith produces endurance”.

Turn with me to the book of John

Nothing is impossible with the Holy Spirit walking with you.

John 14:15–18 HCSB

“If you love Me, you will keep My commands. And I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Counselor to be with you forever. He is the Spirit of truth. The world is unable to receive Him because it doesn’t see Him or know Him. But you do know Him, because He remains with you and will be in you. I will not leave you as orphans; I am coming to you.

john 14:

Matthew 14:22 HCSB

Immediately He made the disciples get into the boat and go ahead of Him to the other side, while He dismissed the crowds.

Matthew

We see in these verse that we are not left alone on this journey.

We here in verse 16 that the Holy Spirit is with us forever

We look in the past chapters in Matthew, Jesus had sent the 12 out to do the work. They healed the blind, the sick, cased out demons, and so on.

So we see in our main passage this morning that it shouldn’t of been a probable for all of the to get out of the boat and walk on the water.

Don’t get me wrong this was not the perfect time to go for a stroll on the lake, there was a storm on them.

What we see here is that there are 11 of them that are missing out on the miracle.

There are time in our life when the Holy Spirit prompts us to do something but we are to embarrassed or ashamed or just not sure if it was words from God telling you to do a miracle for someone or if it was just words in your head.

Back pain (now Healed

While I was there He did some xrays and he told me that he couldnt touch my back, he said I had a kinds of issues and popping my back would make it worse.

I couldnt take the pain much more so I went to see Ms. Linda hagen and she schedule to have an mri on my back. After getting the results back I had 3 pages of issues and I needed to go to the spinal insulte in Columbus to have them look at.

I had a few weeks before my appointment with the doctor in columbus and i was pumping gas at lowes and me and jessica saw vickie crew and we where talking to her and vickie had aske about my back. Jessica was talking to her while i was pumping gas and Tyler Grantham was pumping gas on the other side.

He said hey did i hear your have some issues with you back, can i pray for you. I said sure i can us all the prayer i can get.

He lays his hands on me and begins to pray for me in front of everyone.

We see in this mornings passage that Jesus and Peter walked on water.

Don’t be afaird to ask God how He can us you today to Glorify Him today.

Its easy to get caught up in our own short coming and think that God cant us me. But the truth of the matter is He can us you.

When you ask to step out of the boat of security and you begin to sink Jesus is standing right there to help you get thru it.

Boxing

God alone is to be feared, and moments of human fear can be opportunities of deepening our faith in Him. As our faith deepens in Him, we will better see the miracles that he is performing in our lives, and even using us to perform some of those miracles for others