God’s grace, peace and
mercy be with you. … My sermon is entitled Parallels, Peter and Prayer. My
focus is on Matthew (14:22-33). Let us pray. Heavenly Father, the psalmist
wrote, “I rejoiced when they said to me, ‘Let us go to the house of the Lord.’”
Now that our feet are within your gates, we rejoice to hear your Word. As we
listen, may your Spirit enlighten our minds and move our hearts to love deeply
as Jesus loved. This we pray to you, Most Holy Trinity. Amen.
As I started thinking
about this passage, it dawned on me that there are quite a few movies, songs
and books about people’s experience on the sea. Many people have seen Avatar:
The Way of Water, and I am sure you have seen at least one version of Titanic.
Many still laugh at episodes of Gilligan’s Island. A few of you might
sing along with Gordon Lightfoot when you hear The Edmund Fitzgerald.
And if you haven’t read a good book lately, I suggest Boys in the Boat,
a true story of the 1936 US Olympic crew team.
Moving from popular
culture to personal experience, my time at sea has never put me at peril. Mine
is limited to cruising. Cindy and I love cruising. We cruised Alaska for our
honeymoon, and five later, Hawaii. We also cruised the Caribbean, the Danube
and the Rhine. We love being on the water.
Cruising is difficult
work for the crew, as it also was for the seasoned sailors in the Gospel. So,
as we examine our passage, let’s have all hands on-deck to check two other
parallel passages; the insertion of Peter into Matthew; and Jesus at prayer.
First, parallels.
Everyone knows that parallel lines are equidistant from each other and never
meet. Gymnasts swing and balance on parallel bars and cartographers plot points
according to latitudinal parallels. However, how many of you have ever read
Gospel parallels?
Gospel parallels
compare and contrast Matthew, Mark, Luke and John by aligning them side by side
to show where they agree, complement or differ from each other. One of the
easiest passages to examine found in Matthew, Mark and Luke is the Parable
of the Mustard Seed. Gospel parallels allow us to plunge deeply into a
study of The Last Supper, The Passion of Christ and The Resurrection.
In the parallels for
Matthew’s version of Jesus Walking on Water, both Mark and John preceded
it with the Return of the Twelve and the Feeding of the Five Thousand.
All three Evangelists tell us that after the feeding, the disciples got into
the boat. Mark and Matthew wrote that Jesus made them do so, but John does not.
Mark says that they sailed towards Bethsaida; John says they sailed towards
Capernaum; and Matthew says the other side, but reports later that they landed
in Gennesaret.
Jesus then dismissed
the crowds before going into the mountain to pray alone. John does not include
this. At night, all three report that Jesus then walked on the Sea of Galilee
during rough waves for quite a distance, perhaps several miles, in the middle
of the night and caught up to his disciples in the boat. Mark adds a comical
line that Jesus intended to pass them. Seeing Jesus walk on the sea frightened
(John) or terrorized (Mark and Matthew) the disciples who cried out not because
of the rough water, but because they thought they were seeing a ghost (Mark and
Matthew). Jesus calmed his disciples by saying, “Take heart; it is I. Do
not be afraid.”
Now, Mark and John
tell us that Jesus got into the boat. Whereas John wrote that the disciples “were
glad to take him into the boat, and immediately the boat was at the land to
which they were going;” Mark wrote that Jesus “got into the boat
with them, and the wind ceased. And they were utterly astounded, for they did
not understand about the loaves, but their hearts were hardened.” I am
going to return to those last words of Mark, but for now, I would like to move
on to my second point, Peter, because up until verse 28, Matthew sticks to
earlier script of Mark, which, in case you were not aware, Mark was the first
written gospel. Matthew, however, inserts Peter into the action.
By adding four verses
to the story, Matthew does not contradict Mark or John, nor can we say that he
fabricated a story. Matthew changed the ending of his version and added Peter
for a reason. Remember, all the Evangelists wrote for a particular church in a
distinct culture at different times. So, let’s examine why Matthew inserted
Peter into the action.
Starting with verse
28, Matthew stresses his own concerns about church. This theophany, this
glimpse of Jesus’ divinity – walking on water and his words of self-revelation
(“it is I”) is reminiscent of Job saying that God “trampled
the waves of the sea” (Job 9:8). In Isaiah we read, “Thus says the Lord who makes a way in the
sea, a path in the mighty waters.” (43:16). In Exodus God revealed himself to
Moses, saying “I AM WHO I AM” (Ex 3:14). Again, in Isaiah we
read, “I, the Lord, the first, and with the last; I am he.”
(41:4).
So, his revelation to the
boys in the boat so encourages them that Peter, the leader of the disciples, is
emboldened to ask the Lord for the power to walk on the water to meet Jesus.
Peter’s address to Jesus as Lord expresses the most solemn form of reverence.
His words, “if it is you,”
express not doubt but rather confidence that Jesus has the power to make such a
thing possible simply by his presence and his command.[1]
Jesus gives his disciple a share in his own
power, and Peter is able to act on that grant of power until his fear in the
face of such a great peril weakens his faith. As he begins to sink, he repeats
the prayer for aid spoken by all the disciples. Recall that earlier the
disciples were at sea during a storm and Jesus was sleeping as they were
swamped by waves. They were all afraid that they were going to perish and
cried, “Save us, Lord!” (Mt 8:25).
Continuing the role of
Yahweh in the Old Testament, Jesus stretched out his hand to save Peter from
the waters of death. It reminds the reader of Psalm 144: “Stretch out
your hand from on high; rescue me and deliver me from the many waters.”
(v. 7).
Jesus then rebuked
Peter neither for his rashness in stepping out of the boat nor for his total
lack of faith. Rather, he asked a rhetorical question, “O you of little
faith, why did you doubt?” (Mt 14:31). Peter is a man of little faith,
but for Matthew, the disciples do have faith and understanding, something that
is not the case in Mark. Recall, Mark ends with “their hearts were
hardened.”
In Matthew, the
problem of the disciples is that, when a crisis comes, when danger looms and
everything appears to be about to collapse, the disciples panic and act as
though they had no faith. This is what we call ‘littleness of faith,’ which
expresses itself in wavering, oscillating and doubting. Doubt is not a denial
of faith. In Matthew doubting refers to that personal vacillation in the
presence of danger or confusion which can seize even the believing disciple.
Even at the final commission (28:17), some of the eleven disciples doubted when
confronted with the risen Jesus. This littleness of faith can cause the
disciple or church leader to lose his share in the power of Jesus. Yet, Jesus
hears the prayer spoken out of imperfect faith, and saves Peter from the waters
of death, and the same goes for all those with him.
When we look at the
parallels of Jesus entering the boat in Mark and Matthew, we see in the latter
that the whole church – those in the boat – bowed down in worship and made a
formal profession of faith, “Truly you are the Son of God.”
The believing
community professed what God revealed, what Satan tested, and what the demons
proclaimed – that Jesus is the Son of God (2:15; 3:17; 4:3,6; 8:29). As opposed
to the secrecy of Jesus’ identification in Mark, the profession of faith in
Matthew is public – Jesus truly is the Son of God – and He is the guardian and
savior of his imperiled church, especially its weak leaders. Folks, if there is
anything you should want from your church and for your church, it is a deeper
faith in Jesus whenever we waver.[2]
Whenever any of us
waver, whenever any of us doubt, we should only say what the sinking Peter
shouted, “Lord, save me!” or better yet, “Lord, save us!” In that prayer spoken
out of imperfect faith, Jesus will save you and me from the waters of death,
from loss of faith and eternal damnation.
Now that we have
covered parallels and Peter, let me turn to prayer. In between the scenes of
Jesus dismissing the crowds and walking on the water, “he went up on the
mountain by himself to pray. When evening came, he was there alone.”
(Mt 14:23). He went up on the mountain by himself to pray. … Have you ever
wondered and researched how Jesus prayed? There are many verses in the Gospels
and other writings about Jesus praying.
Often, he withdrew to
lonely places to pray (Luke 5:1), and sometimes, very early in the morning
(Mark 1:35). At times, he praised the Father, Lord of heaven and earth,
(Matthew 11:25-26), blessed his holy name (Matthew 6:9) and at other times, he
petitioned him, as when he raised Lazarus from the dead: “Jesus lifted up
his eyes and said, ‘Father, I thank you that you have heard me. I knew that you
always hear me, but I said this on account of the people standing around, that
they may believe that you sent me’” (John 11:41-42). There were times
when he prayed to his Father on his knees or flat on his face (Luke 22:41;
Matthew 26:39), and even while hanging from the cross (Matthew 27:46). Hebrews
reminds us that during the days of Jesus' life on earth, “he offered up
prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to him who was able to
save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverence.” (Hebrews
5:7).
The Evangelists
recorded Jesus praying with others during the Transfiguration (Luke 9:28 par)
and Last Supper when he gave us the Words of Institution (Mark 14:22 par). He
prayed for Peter that his faith would not fail, and that he would be able to
turn back and strengthen his brothers (Luke 22:32). He prayed for his disciples
(John 17:9), those who did not believe (John 17:20f.) and those who crucified
him (Luke 23:34).
The disciples prayed
together as Church. We read in Acts, “All these with one accord were
devoting themselves to prayer, together with the women and Mary the mother of
Jesus, and his brothers.” (1:14). Jesus’ night prayer is a model for
all Christians who besides common prayer need periods of silent personal
prayer. [3] Hence, it is important to
pray in solitude and in community. That said, let me close with a story about
our experience of prayer.
When Cindy and I lived
in Tinley Park, IL, a southwest suburb of Chicago, we often walked our dogs,
Travis and Pepper, past Faith Christian Reformed Church, where the pastor often
changed the phrase on the marquee. Once it read: Prayer is a conversation
with your best friend. Quite true. Prayer is an intimate conversation with
a best friend. Prayer can be likened to me looking at God and God looking at
me. Only those who are intimate with one another will feel comfortable with
such mutual gazing. I would feel uncomfortable if a stranger, coworker or
acquaintance looked at me this way. It would be a stare or a gawk accompanied
by an uncomfortable feeling. Not so with God. With Him, I am most intimate.
Cindy and I share this
intimacy with God as we begin each morning with a few pages from our common
prayer books, now available as apps. Because we usually recite our morning prayer
in the office or family room, Maggie often chooses her wrestling with Travis to
coincide with our prayer time. There have been moments when Cindy and I
interrupted our prayer and ended this canine commotion, but then we learned to
continue praying amidst their canine activity.
What I mean is that we
must pray amidst activity. Experience teaches us that we cannot control all the
activity around us, and must trust that in God’s time, the commotion of this
world will stop.
Decades ago, I learned
that an infant crying during my sermon would soon stop or that one of the
parents would take the child out of earshot. If not, I tuned out the
distraction and refocused on my message. Whenever we take time for private or communal
prayer, there will always be distractions around us that we cannot stop. People
will engage in vice and violence – gossip, infidelity, abortion and an array of
abusive behavior towards others and themselves. Parents and caregivers will
neglect their children and the elderly. Nations will war on other nations and
oppress their own people. Nature will produce hailstorms and heatwaves,
blizzards and earthquakes. We must continue to pray through distractions – dog-fights
and cosmic disasters.
Friends, because we
are like those disciples together in one boat, let me assure you that as you
pray in solitude or in common, you will experience an array of feelings and a
barrage of activities. I remind you that Jesus gave his peace to his disciples
and encouraged them with these words: “Let not your hearts be troubled,
neither let them be afraid.” (John 14:27). In God’s time,
all distractions will end. At the appropriate time, God will direct us to deal
with people’s vices and violence, abuse and oppression. Until then, we must pray
amidst activity, and as we do, I pray that the peace of God that surpasses all
understanding will keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.
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