Peter Walks on Water

Peter Walks on the Water

Matthew 14:22-33

I. The Focus of these passage is Jesus, not Peter.

A. The climax of this section is found in verse 33.

1. The disciples recognize Jesus for who He is. They do waver back and forth after this, but nevertheless their actions are important. They confess that Jesus is truly the Son of God and they worship Him. This causes a problem for those that do not believe in the Divinity of Christ. After Christ was born the wise men worshipped Him (2:11), Hebrews says the angels worshipped Him (Heb. 1:6), Revelation says that all of heaven worships Him (Rev. 5:14). Someone may ask “is it wrong to worship Christ?” The answer to that is that it is a sin not to worship Him.

2. The confession the disciples made was a little late. God the Father had already told everyone that Jesus is the Son of God (3:17), the demons had confessed that Jesus is the Son of God as well (8:29). People are the only ones that doubt Jesus. Everyone in the spiritual realm is convinced of who He is.

3. It took a near death experience to shake these disciples into reality. This wasn’t the first time Jesus had saved them from a storm (8:23-27). But this seems to be the most drastic situation in which they were saved from. As well, in the first storm Jesus didn’t come to them walking on the water. I have no problem with people being scared into confessing Christ, as long as they are sincere when they do it. There are some things in life that ought to scare us, namely perishing in our sins.

B. Jesus forces everyone to leave.

1. The crowd attempted to forcefully take Jesus after the miraculous feeding. John tells us this in John 6:14-15. They wanted to make Him their King. They did not want to submit to His Lordship in their lives. Jesus told the crowd “Ye seek me because ye did eat of the loaves and were filled!” He then warned them “labor not for the meat which perisheth”. The crowd wanted Jesus as their King for purely physical reasons.

2. Jesus made the crowd leave. Here we see the power of Jesus. Tens of thousands of people could not take Jesus by force if He was not willing to go. By the word of His power He sent them away. The word “constrained” means “to compel by force”. Note that before Jesus was not willing to send the crowd away (15-16). Now it was time to send them away. It is important that we know not only what to do but when to do it.

3. Jesus made the disciples go away. They must not have wanted to go. Perhaps they didn’t want to leave Jesus, especially with that rowdy crowd. Maybe they saw the storm clouds gathering and were afraid to go. The disciples are to be commended for obeying. At least they did what Jesus told them to do.

C. Jesus wanted to be alone.

1. He wanted to pray by Himself. He wanted to experience some intimacy with the Father. Did He need this? No. He is the Son of God. He doesn’t need anything. But he wanted it. The relationship that exists in the Godhead is so deep that we could never comprehend it. Christ wanted to be alone with the Father.

2. We ought to desire time alone with God. There is a temptation to love the church more than we love the Lord-but Christ wanted to be with the Father more than He wanted to be with the twelve. There is a temptation to love ministry more than time with the Lord-but Christ wanted to be with the Father more than he wanted to be with the lost. The desire reveals the heart-do we love God or ministry, God or church?

3. Without time alone with God we will not be effective. We will be no good to those that need us if we don’t spend time with the One that we need. In reality, people don’t need us at all. They need the Lord. And if we are not overflowing with the wisdom, power and presence of the Lord we have nothing to offer the crowds or the church.

II. Jesus Comes to the Disciples.

A. A storm engulfs the disciples.

1. By the time the storm hit the disciples were 3-4 miles out to sea (John 6:19). They were too far to turn around. I don’t know what was going through the disciples mind but I’m sure at least a couple of them were upset with Jesus. He had made them leave! You can do everything the Lord says and still end up in a storm. Too often we think the storm is the result of disobedience. It could be the result of obedience. More important than the source of the storm is our reaction to it.

2. This was no small storm. Mark 6:48 tells us the disciples were rowing hard to try and steer the boat, Matthew tells us the boat was tossed with waves. It was dipping up and down at the mercy of the sea. No doubt it was filling with water. The disciples battled this storm for some time. They had been at sea before evening and now it was the fourth watch of the night (3-6 AM).

3. Our sinful nature causes us to think that if God does allow storms they should be small and brief. You know small, like we lose our car keys, and brief, we find the 5 minutes later. The truth is that storms come into the most dedicated of believer’s lives. They come raging and they come to stay sometimes for quite a while.

B. Jesus comes to the disciples walking on the water.

1. We know that Jesus could have done a number of things differently to help the disciples. He could have performed the miracle w/o being present, He could have prevented the storm, He could have sent them on another route or at another time. But He didn’t. Because none of those things were right.

2. Jesus seemed to be passing them by. Mark 6:48 says “He would have passed the by”. Isn’t that interesting? What if He did? And Why did he stop? Mark seems to imply that it was because they began to cry out in fear. Now think about this. The first time the disciples were in a storm, Jesus was asleep and He rebuked them for waking Him up. This time He is about to pass them by. I think I know. It’s because Jesus wants us to endure the storm. He wants us to make it all the way through it with great faith rather than in fear. As they saw Him walk on the water they should have been reminded that God was in control and just rode the storm out. I think He was going to pass by to encourage them to press on!

3. Why did Jesus walk on the water? As a reminder that he has power over the forces of nature. The ocean, the wind, the waves were no match for Him. They were beneath His feet. The ocean was a source of great fear in Jesus day. It caused the death of many a man. Today when we think about death we ought to remember the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Jesus resurrection is a great reminder to us. When we are faced with death we ought to see Jesus come passing by us with death beneath his feet and be encouraged to press on knowing that our faith is in the One that has conquered death and the grave!

C. The disciples fear had overwhelmed them.

1. The disciples didn’t recognize Jesus. Trials have a way of clouding our vision. All we can see is our fears and the worst possible outcome. The disciples should have been quoting Psalm 139:8-10 “If I ascend up into heaven thou art there; if I make my bed in hell, behold thou are there; if I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea; even there shall thy hand lead me and thy right hand shall hold me”.

2. They thought Jesus was a ghost. They thought He was some creature of darkness, the source of their turmoil and an enemy of their soul. They were afraid! Despite the fact they had witnessed the fear of the demonic when in Jesus presence, they are not afraid of the demonic.

3. The priority of Jesus was to calm the disciples before He calmed their storm. He tells them ‘it is I, do not be afraid”. Did you now that’s what He wants to do with us. If we are afraid of the dark we just figure God will just let us sleep with the lights on. That doesn’t help us. God wants us to be calm in our storms because we know Who He is and Where He is. Fear is the result of doubt. God wants His children full of faith and trust in Who he is!

III. Peter Walks on the water.

A. Something unexpected happens in the story now.

1. Peter asks the Lord if he can come to Him. On the water that is. Why? Not because Peter said I’ve always wanted to walk on water!” in John 21 Peter sees Jesus on the shore and rather than ask Jesus if he could walk in the water he just jumps in and swims to shore! Peter wants to come to Jesus because he figures “better to be on a raging sea with Jesus than in a sinking boat without him!”

2. Peter just wanted to be with Jesus. He wanted to be near him. And he wasn’t about to allow anything to come between him and the Lord, not even the ocean. What small excuses do we use to justify the space between us and the Lord? A spouse, a job, an illness, debt, a church, inability?

3. Peter was not being a show off. He never mentions this event in his letters. Peter was overwhelmed with two things: fear and a desire to be with Jesus. We need to be sure that if we do have fear it urges us to Christ.

B. Peter walks on the water.

1. For a brief time he does what no other person has ever done, except Jesus. He walks on water. You know, you never see those faith healers do anything like that do you? Imagine the faith it took to step out of the safety of that boat and onto the surface of the water. I don’t think he hesitated. He knew he had to get to Jesus. He just believed and took off. And he walked on water.

2. But then he realizes what he has done. I don’t know how long of a walk it was. But at some point Peter lost faith. He saw the waves and felt the wind and came down from his spiritual high. I think this was actually funny to Jesus. It’s funny to me. I can almost hear the disciples “yeah, look at you now Peter!” Peter begins to sink.

3. Jesus saves Peter. God doesn’t say “Come” and then let you go! As Peter sinks Jesus grabs him ad asks “Why did you doubt”. So now you have Jesus standing on the water and holding peter at the same time! What a sight that must have been! They step into the boat and Jesus calms the storm.

C. God wants us to do amazing things for long periods of time.

1. He wants us to stand boldly when life comes at us hard.

2. He wants us to do whatever it takes to stay near Him.

3. He wants us to ignore the storm and stay the course.