Sermon
Pentecost XIII
3/8/08
TL
Readings:
OT: Genesis 37:1-4, 12-28
Psalm: Psalm 105:1-6, 16-22, 45b
NT: Romans 10:5-15
Gospel: Matthew 14:22-33
+INFSHS
What is this story about? We’re well-trained to see this as a parable about faith and keeping our eyes on Jesus. We look at Peter’s falling into the wild sea, and say to ourselves, “God, help me not to be like that. Help me to trust that you will calm the wind and the rain and the storm that’s howling around me.” Or even, cry out with Peter, “Lord, save me!” None of that’s wrong. We DO need to cultivate the habit of keeping our eyes on Jesus, allowing the knowledge of his presence with us to calm the wind and waves that buffet us from time to time. It’s laudable to aspire to the kind of faith which would have *us* leaping out of the boat to walk or run to Jesus on the water. Certainly, these are the interpretations I have been used to and preached on before. But one of the beautiful things about scripture is that it’s always new. For the first time last night I realized that Jesus’ exhortation to Peter, “You of little faith, why did you doubt?” was not so much about Peter’s sinking into the waves from a lack of trust, but was about Peter’s doubt that the figure walking towards the disciples huddled in the boat was Jesus.
He’s just come down from the mountain, the place of encounter with God. Moses came down from the mountain with the burning bush with the command to go to the chaos presided over by Pharaoh and demand “let my people go”. Moses came down from another mountain and found the people of God carousing around a golden calf, lost in chaos and confusion. In a clear echo of the Mosaic story, God himself comes down from the mountain and walks on the water amidst chaos and confusion as if it were smooth glass. Note: on the water, not through it on dry ground. It is the property of the I AM to control the forces of chaos which in other religions of the peoples around Israel gave birth to their gods. This is a demonstration of Jesus’ identity: he walks on water.
Unlike the story earlier in Matthew, in which the disciples were also in a boat being buffeted by waves and storm, Jesus isn’t sleeping on a cushion in the stern. He’s not with them at all. Then, he calmed the wind and storm by standing in the boat and commanding the maelstrom to stop. This time, in the middle of the night he walks calmly through it.
Why did they think he was a ghost? The time of the morning may account for it; we all know weird stuff happens in the wee hours, and things we logically know are lost to fantasy and shadow. So we can empathise with the hapless disciples in their failure to recognize Jesus. Was Jesus shining after having spent time with God on the mountain? Was it like Moses’ shining face when he came down the mountain? Yet here he is, the one who compelled them to get in the boat in the first place, whom they left behind, and here he is, walking on water. Who even does that? God does – in the psalms. Here, it’s not enough that Jesus should reflect God’s light, like Moses. But better still, Jesus surpasses Moses because in him the fullness of God dwells bodily… and so he walks on the water, not threatened by chaos, but commanding it to cease, as God does.
But the disciples doubt who Jesus is. “If it’s you, command me to come to you on the water.” The challenge Peter puts down is about Jesus’ identity – is it really him? Jesus says: “I am”, the Name of God. What did Peter hope to achieve in actually getting out of the boat and walking to Jesus on the waves? Was he thinking they’d walk back together? What was he going to do, even if he did walk on the water, once he got to Jesus? Like the transfiguration, when he opened his mouth and promptly deposited his foot in it, Peter rushes in without thinking about what he’s saying… And Jesus calls his bluff. “So come, then.” You gonna challenge who I am because you think I’m a ghost, ok, fine. Maybe it’s Peter’s impulsive belief that lets him go some way, keeping his eyes on Jesus in determination. Until he looks down and sees the waves, and marvels at the wind… The moment he loses sight of Jesus’ identity, he falls into the water and looks all set to drown. Then he calls out to Jesus for salvation. Another echo from the Psalms: Out of the depths have I called to you; you raised me up out of the miry clay and set me on so firm a rock that I can never be moved. Jesus lives up to his name as Saviour, and reaches down to pull Peter out of the chaos and dripping into the boat with him. I wonder whether Jesus himself had a droplet of water on him.
Jesus’ “Oh you of little faith, why did you doubt?” It’s singular, addressed to Peter. But it applies to all: did you really not believe that it was me? Jesus is not rebuking Peter for falling into the water. He’s gently chiding them, poking them fondly and saying, “Really? You couldn’t see it was me, even after everything you’ve experienced? After the 5000+ were fed? After healings and teaching? After the previous incident with storms and boats on this same sea? Do you still not understand? Bunch of loveable doofuses. Of course it was me. How could you not know that?”
Echo in the next chapter: “Who do people say that I am?” the affirmation of the disciples “Truly you are the Son of God.” It’s hard not to read this without some sense of wonder, and maybe even awe and reverence. Who is this? Who is this that commands wind and wave and they obey him? All of this puts into context Peter’s declaration when Jesus does ask his disciples who people say he is: “You are the Messiah, the Christ, the Son of the living God.” It makes sense because by that time Peter *finally* is able to articulate what in this story manifests only as a cry for help: Lord, save me. That cry is still a statement of faith: he trusts Jesus enough not to let him drown; no good mate would let another die like that if they could help it. But it’s not of the same level as recognizing who Jesus is.
What do we do with this? How do we recognize Jesus? Who is he to us?
He appears in the ordinary and the extraordinary, and in unexpected ways and places, through unexpected people and experiences. Do we recognize the countless ways he comes to us each day?
His presence has been trusted by millions, and found to calm disquiet in the midst of life’s storms. He can be trusted.
He is not just your run of the mill buddy, but in him God’s own presence shines, and when he steps into the boat smiling at us after his extraordinary walk across a midnight, tossing lake, we find ourselves in the presence of God in human form, with an impish look on his face, as though wind and wave hadn’t just immediately quieted at his command.
When he says, “I am”, he can be trusted that he is who he says he is, and not a ghost, a figment of the imagination, or other delusion. He is real. And he is our friend, as well as being the Lord of wave and wind and storm, the Son of God.
There is a sense in which Jesus entrusts his identity to the disciples. He’s not the Lord of wind and wave and storm for the sake of being lauded and applauded, set up like a golden calf. He shares that experience with his closest friends, and invites them to share in the power to command wind and wave. God has come down from the mountain, and is with us, among us, within us. He goes before us into the world, and beckons us to continue his work in the power of the same Spirit he was given. May we have faith enough to recognize Jesus when we see him, and grace to know him in word, prayer, and sacrament.
The Lord be with you.
And also with you.