Matthew 14:22-33
When I was a boy, there was a newspaper feature entitled “Ripley’s Believe It or Not.” I looked on the net, and sure enough, there it was again: a repository of the odd and the unusual. It came to mind when I ran across another odd story recorded in a book published a few years ago, entitled Bizarre World by Bill Bryson. It, too, is a collection of weird stories, mostly collected from the newspaper accounts. And, it included the following story which is a kind of archtypal example of a bad day.
It seems a man identified as Viktor was seated in a crowded train headed for Budapest. He was one of the leading bee experts in Hungary and he was transporting a box of bees, which he had placed under his seat. As he was talking to the passenger seated next to him, he felt something crawling up his leg. and, then he felt two and then three somethings crawling up his leg. As he pulled up his pant leg and looked down, he discovered that his bees had escaped from the box and were beginning to crawl up his legs.
Well, he was a bee expert, so he was not panicked, but he was afraid of the possible danger to his fellow passengers. So, he calmly suggested that the other passengers leave the car while he recaptured the bees. And, of course, he was going to have to take off his clothes, for the bees were crawling underneath his pants and shirt by this time.
After the other passengers cleared the car, Viktor began taking his pants off. Just as he had pulled them free of his legs, an express train passed, and the sudden draft from the open window blew his pants back into the corridor where they wrapped around the head of a conductor. A startled onlooker pulled the emergency brake. As the train lurched to a halt, somehow a fire started.
When other train officials rushed to the scene they discovered Viktor, minus his pants. So, they assumed he must deranged , and they bundled him off to a nearby mental hospital, where it took Viktor 3 days to convince the doctors he was sane. Now Viktor certainly had a bad day, but I don’t think it can compared to the bad night that we read about in today’s gospel lesson from Matthew 14.
When I have consulted what other Bible preachers and teachers have said about this episode, I find that most of them focus on the miraculous elements of it. And, that is understandable. Jesus’ miracles – and this is one of many that are clustered together in this section of Matthew’s gospel – are powerful testimonies to Jesus divinity. And Peter’s example of leaving the boat because of his confidence in Jesus, and then turning loose of that confidence in the face of the powerful storm and wind – all these are fruitful lessons for us, lessons to which we will return briefly after we step back and look at what a lot of Bible teachers do not dwell on very much. And, what they do not dwell on is the very often is – I think – one of the chiefest points of what happened out there on the Sea of Galilee.
To recognize what we are supposed to take from this portion of Matthew’s gospel, I think we notice several things about this miracle. First of all, it is a private miracle – and by “private” I mean that unlike most of Jesus’ miracles, this one was NOT performed before the crowds. There were a handful of miracles which almost no one saw, and this is one of them. And, when such miracles occur – miracles that only the very few saw, it helps us to notice who those people are.
In this case, it is Jesus’ own disciples, and so we may assume he was trying to teach THEM something which was particularly important for Jesus close disciples to understand. The day before, he had performed the miracle of feeding the 5,000 – which was actually feeding 10 or 15 thousand people – and the next day he was going to perform many miracles of healing. But, here – in the middle of the Sea of Galilee, where no one except his disciples can see – he performs this miracle. This one is for the inner circle; it is not for the crowds. And, if we suppose we are among those who are rightfully called Jesus’ disciples, we would do well to pay extra special attention to this miracle.
When we pay special attention to this miracle, the very first thing we must notice is how Jesus has set it all up from the beginning. Matthew tells us something very important when he relates that Jesus “made” them get into the boat. Why does Jesus have to “make” them get into the boat? This little word points to the fact that the disciples didn’t think getting into the boat to go across the sea was a very good idea. Remember, many of them were fishermen. Here it is sundown, and no doubt the storm that they found themselves in was no surprise – they very likely saw it developing off on the horizon. But, Jesus insists – he sends them off in the boat to row to the other side of the sea, while he goes off to a nearby mountain to pray.
What do you suppose he was praying about? Do you suppose it might have been praying for the disciples? And, what would he have been praying about, do we suppose? Well, he was probably praying about many things, but certainly one of those things he no doubt prayed about was for his disciples spiritual growth in the midst of the testing that they were undergoing at that very moment.
Mark and Matthew both note that by the time evening had come – in other words, after it was completely dark – Jesus was on the land, and the boat with the disciples in it was in the middle of the Sea of Galilee. At the place where they were rowing, the lake is about 8 miles wide, and so they were about four miles from either shore. It had taken them anywhere from three to six hours to get that far, and Matthew tells us why – the wind was against them. Not only were they rowing into the wind, the waves were beginning to get higher and higher.
Now, how long did this go on? Well, both Matthew and Mark note that Jesus came walking on the water sometime during the fourth watch. The fourth watch of the night corresponds to the our hours of 3:00 A.M. to 6:00 A.M. So, the disciples had been out there in that boat for about six hours, maybe as long as eight hours, rowing against the wind. And, what do you suppose they were doing besides rowing?
Well, I’ll bet they were praying. I’ll bet
they were worrying, too. After all, eight hours of strenuous rowing is taxing, and with the waves and the wind, I suspect that they had begun to despair. The waves were tossing them, Matthew says. And when Jesus finally comes to them, walking on the water, they are terrified, thinking that they were seeing a ghost.
I’ve often wondered why they tought it was a ghost. I don’t know that ghosts and storms are always linked. Of course, someone walking on the surface of the water – well, that’s pretty unusual. Ordinary people don’t do that kind of thing, you see, but I suppose a ghost might be able to do that kind of thing. But, even then, that would indicate that the disciples had enough experience of ghosts to know that they walk around on water, and that sounds a tad unusual too. Perhaps I got a clue to what they were thinking from the hospice care folks who assisted my family during the death of my daughter Francesca, and a few years later in the death of my mother. Both died at home, and the hospice workers were very helpful not only to my dying family members, they were extremely helpful and encouraging to the other family members who were going through this trial.
One manual for family members went into some detail about the experience of those who are at the point of death. This manual explained that for the person who was about to die it was very common for them to see other people who they knew were already deceased, to not only see them, but to seemingly interact with them – to speak to them, to watch them move about the room. I didn’t observe this at my daughter’s death, but I definitely observed it in my mother’s behavior a couple of hours before my mother died. And later, as I reflected on all this, I remembered this episode on the sea of Galilee.
You see, unlike us, I expect that the disciples – like most of the people in that day – were far, far more experienced with people dying. In those days, excepting for soldiers in battle, most everyone died at home, surrounded by family and friends. And, the mortality rates were far higher in those days. So, if “seeing ghosts” is something that is an ordinary occurance near death, the disciples would certainly have been experienced with that.
And, here they are, in the middle of a stormy, windy, wave-tossed sea, exhausted from rowing for hours and hours and making little or no headway, and they see a ghost. I don’t think Jesus walking on the water was so terrifying a sight. He wasn’t a ghoul, covered in seaweed or rotting flesh. I think the disciples freaked out because they supposed they were about to depart this world completely – that they were about to die, and here was someone from the other side to come and collect them.
Well, it wasn’t that at all, of course. Jesus called out to them not to be afraid. And the chief disciple – Peter – was eager to believe that Jesus had come to the rescue. And, because he does believe, he participates in the miracle by walking on the water himself. Even when he falls into the water when his fears overtake him, Peter calls out “Lord save me!” and the Lord does just that.
When Jesus asks Peter, “Why did you doubt?” do you suppose Jesus asking for information? No, I don’t think so. He was prompting Peter to examine himself to find the answer, but it is already given in the text of Matthew’s gospel. His fears, though pushed back by Jesus’ appearance and encouragement, were still there, and Peter succumbed to them again.
And after all was over with, when Jesus and Peter were back in the boat, and the wind had stopped, the disciples’ faith was increased. They worshiped him, saying, “Truly You are the Son of God.”
Now, why did Matthew put this in his gospel? What are we supposed to take from this? I suggest that it is here in our Bibles so that we can recognize similar things as we grow to be Christ’s disciples.
Please notice that Jesus had done a mighty miracle in feeding the 5,000 the day before; and he was going to do many more miracles of healing the following day on the other side of the Sea. And, he did this miracle in the midst of the sea. But, there is a difference in this watery miracle – it is not merely a “private” miracle – done for the disciples alone – it involved a test, a trial, a dangerous situation if you will, into which the Lord deliberately sent his disciples, so that their faith in him could be strengthened.
And, it was successful. Perhaps not immediately; but eventually, the memory of what had happened returned to them, and they drew the proper responses. That’s the chief reason Matthew and Mark include this miracle in their gospels.
But, the lessons they learned in that boat returned in other ways, seen most dramatically in the way the Apostles lived their lives in the days following Jesus resurrection. For those days were far more dangerous, far more fraught with trial and threats of death, than they had faced on that stormy sea. And in these cases, Jesus did not come walking on the water to pull them out. He didn’t need to, for they had learned he was there, that nothing could overcome them, not even death, for Jesus had conquered that too. And, so they lived their lives fearlessly, as those whose confidence is in the one who sits at the right hand of God the Father, interceding for them, and strengthening them by his spirit in the midst of the trials they face for his sake.
The Apostle James is not mentioned in either account of Mark or Mathew, but I want you to think about the gospel lesson as you listen again to what James wrote many years later to believers: “2 My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials, 3 knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience. 4 But let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing. 5 If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him. 6 But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for he who doubts is like a wave of the sea driven and tossed by the wind.”
Why do you suppose James offered us the picture of a wind-tossed wave on the sea as a picture of doubt? Do you suppose that as he penned those words he was remembering what Matthew and Mark put into their gospels about Jesus walking on those very waves, in the midst of that storm? Do you suppose James was remembering the time when his own faith in Jesus was strengthened by a great test of his own faith? I believe that’s exactly what he was thinking when he wrote those words.
And, that is what we need to be thinking about when we look the difficulties we ourselves face from time to time. For, if we are truly Christ’s disciples, he will set up trials and tests for us, just as surely as he set them up for the twelve Apostles. And, when he does so, they will be trials and tests that will push us to the limits of our faith in Christ, and that is good – for in so doing, Jesus will be stretching the limits of our faith, so that we are more and more confident in him.
In whatever trial or test you individually face today, line it up with what the disciples faced out there in the middle of a dark, stormy night. Jesus was with them, and Jesus saved them, and their faith in him grew greater because of that trial. May God grant that we will remember this as we face our own trials and tests. May Christ find us faithful as Peter was faithful – we we may be encouraged and emboldened as Peter was. And, may we also mimick the behavior of those same fearful Apostles, who later lived lives of fearless obedience to the mission Christ gave them.
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy spirit. Amen.
