Matthew 14:22-33
August 7, 2005
Sermon preached by Rev. Donald Ng at the First Chinese Baptist Church in San Francisco.
If you met Jesus on the street, would you recognize him? What does he look like? When we share Communion with each other, we affirm that “Christ has died, Christ has risen, Christ will come again.” But when Christ returns as he promised, would you be able to pass him on the street and say, “That’s Jesus!”
We don’t have any photographs of Jesus; no portraits. But we do have artists’ renditions of Jesus like Sallman’s Head of Christ or our stained glass window of Jesus the Good Shepherd or outside in our vestibule, the other depiction of Jesus which we believe is Leonardo da Vinci’s Jesus and the Young Rich Ruler. These are all representation of Jesus by painters and artists. But how does he really look like? Given the fact that Jesus is from the Middle East, he probably looks more like people in that part of the world than the images we have grown up with.
Knowing Jesus
In today’s Scripture, Jesus’ own disciples had difficulty recognizing him. After Jesus and the disciples fed the 5000 with an abundance of food with as much as twelve baskets full of leftovers, Jesus instructed the disciples to go ahead to the other side of the sea while he retreats up the mountain to pray. He must have told them that, he’ll catch up with them later.
By evening, a storm stirred up and the wind caused waves to batter the boat the disciples were in. Then early in the morning, Jesus came walking on the sea toward them. He was catching up with them. The disciples were terrified and said, “It’s a ghost!” Now if we saw a ghost, we too would scream out in fear! Then Jesus spoke to them and said, “Take heart, it is I, do not be afraid.” The disciples had difficulty recognizing Jesus.
If Jesus walked down Waverly Place this morning, would you be able to recognize him? A few years ago, there was quite a controversy over whether or not the words; “In God we trust” should be stamped on our money. Was this an unfair or illegal imposition of religion into our society?
Many people defended the phrase, “In God we trust,” by arguing that the phrase does not refer to a Christian God, or a Jewish God, or an Islamic God or maybe even a Buddhist God. It’s a generic God. They would say that you can make this God to mean whatever you want it to mean. It’s the recognition of a higher power—however you want to think of that power.
But doesn’t that pretty much sums up what’s wrong with much of the church today—it’s generic. We make it mean whatever we want. For too many of us “God” denotes a vague, nondescript, completely undemanding but always at your disposal “higher power.”
Today’s gospel tells us that Jesus the Christ is that higher power with a specific name, a particular face even though we may not know exactly what he looked like, and he has a claim upon us as his disciples!
He comes up to the disciples and reassures them to not be afraid. A generic God wouldn’t do that. He talks to his disciples like you and I talk about meaningful things. A generic God wouldn’t do that. At this point, Peter says something pretty strange, “Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water.” A generic God wouldn’t have the time or the personality to talk with people like Peter. But Jesus Christ did.
Stepping Out of the Boat
The God that we trust is found in Jesus Christ when Peter was willing to test his faith in Christ by stepping out of the boat. For some strange reason, Peter was willing to risk his life, tempting death by walking across fathoms of the dark, threatening sea. Peter was almost saying, “Lord, if it is you, command me to stick my hand into the fire.” “Lord, if it is you, order me to jump off the skyscraper.”
Even before Peter was definitely sure if it is Jesus, he was willing to endanger his life and risk drowning to see if this man walking on the water was truly Jesus. How many of us would do that?
So Peter got out of the boat and started walking on the water coming toward Jesus. He was actually doing this! But when he noticed the strong wind picking up, he got scared and began to sink. Peter cried out, “Lord, save me.” Jesus reaches down with his hand and caught him before he sank. Jesus told him that he had little faith which caused him to doubt his ability to walk on water.
We don’t know God from a generic definition like “in God we trust.” We know God through Jesus Christ who extravagantly and recklessly commands us to leave the safety of the boat, to step into the sea and test the waters. That’s the Jesus we know.
Jesus’ disciples were once a group of ordinary people who dropped their nets, left their families, and ventured forth with him on a perilous journey called discipleship. We shouldn’t find it strange for one of the disciples to say, “Lord, if it is you, call me to get out of the boat and walk on the water?” They have been testing their faith already—leaving their homes, their families, their jobs and trusting their lives in Jesus’ hands.
There’s an old gospel hymn that says, “Jesus calls us over the tumult of life’s wild, restless sea, in our joys and in our sorrows, Christians come and follow me.” But in today’s gospel, Jesus doesn’t simply call us over the tumult. Jesus doesn’t call us out of the tumult. Jesus calls Peter into the tumult. Jesus calls Peter out of the boat and on to the waves. And Peter, on the basis of his experience with Jesus, trusts Jesus to risk his life for his faith.
I know that most people here don’t have a boat. We are more city folks and maybe haven’t been on a boat for a long time. Some of us might take one of the ferries to cross the bay for work. Others have taken the ferries to Angel Island or to Alcatraz for sightseeing. Some of you might get in a boat for fishing. People have told us that we should have a boat living in Sausalito but the only boat ride I get once a year is with the Men’s Fellowship as we boat up to Suisun Bay in Steve Lessler’s friend’s boat. We may never get a chance to step out of the boat like Peter did to see if this ghost-like man was truly Jesus. But what we can do is to “step off the curb.”
One of the early church symbols of the church is a boat. Our boat is this church and every time we have an opportunity to see if our faith is strong enough to recognize Jesus, are we willing to step off the safety of the sidewalk and into the street?
We know that when a boat is moored in safe harbor, it’s nothing more than all of the other boats tied up and going no where. But when a boat is willing to go out into uncharted and perhaps rough waters when the wind may pick up and toss you to and fro is when a boat is a boat! We must venture out of safe harbor. We must step off the curb to run the risk of encountering the busy ways of life.
We say to Jesus, “Lord, if it is you, command me to walk on the water. Lord, if it is you, command me to step off the curb.”
Doing Risky Things
Every summer, God inspires a number of our young adults to go on short-term missions to other lands. They are at a stage of their lives when they are seeking for meaning and purpose. They wonder with all of the resources and talents that have been given to them from loving and supportive family and friends, they ask the Lord, “Lord, if it is you, command me to step off the curb!”
Next Sunday, we will meet with those who are praying about going to Thailand in January 2006. We are calling it “Thailand Mission Discovery” because we are seeking to discover how God is calling us to be about missions. 125 years ago, we saw ourselves primarily as people whose God’s mission reached. We are no longer those heathens who people once thought can’t know Jesus Christ. But we have matured in faith, no longer children, tossed to and fro and blown about by every wind (Eph. 4:14). We are the Body of Christ with Christ as our head with each part working properly so we say to the Lord, “Lord, if it is you, command us to step off the curb!”
Today we begin our annual Youth Camp at Redwood Glen. The leaders are down at camp already. I heard that we were successful in reaching about 20 youth who attended our Day Camp this year. For some of these youth, this might be their first time away from home; first time sharing a cabin with other kids; first time not eating Chinese food everyday. These young people don’t have to go to camp but when they received the blessings of this year’s Day Camp, they asked the Lord, “Lord, if it is you, command me to step off the curb!”
You have heard me share about the community youth who have made our corner of Chinatown a safe haven to hang out. I continue to see them whenever I am at church in the evenings. They are eager to hear the Good News of Jesus Christ; eager to know people from our church who care for them; eager to receive the love of Christ that has been given to all creation. So today we will be meeting with those of you who may be interested in re-activating the church’s Social Action Committee. Might you say, “Lord, if it is you, command me to step off the curb!”
Recognizing Christ
You might say, “Okay, Pastor, we hear you. We are always stepping off the curb when we cross the streets.” But do you really understand the meaning of stepping off the curb? It’s doing something new and different.
Did you know that there are people who actually train fleas? Flea trainers have observed a predictable and strange habit of fleas while training them. Fleas are trained by putting them in a cardboard box with a top on it. The fleas will jump up and hit the top of the cardboard box over and over again. As you watch them jump and hid the lid, something very interesting becomes obvious. The fleas continue to jump, but they no longer are jumping high enough to hit the top. They got headaches!
When you take off the lid, the fleas continue to jump, but they will not jump out of the box. They won’t jump out because they can’t jump out. Why? The reason is simple. They have conditioned themselves to jump just so high. Once they have conditioned themselves to jump just so high, that’s all they can do!
Many times, people do the same thing. We are conditioned to stay on the sidewalk where it is safe. We walk on the sidewalk and stop at the curb. We see Jesus walking on water and we are afraid. Just like the fleas, we fail to jump higher, thinking that we are doing everything we can do. We fail to live up to the potentials that God has given us. Sometimes we fail to step off the curb!
The good news is that when Peter ventured forth, even though the going was rough, even though he almost sank and perished, Jesus reached out his hand and caught him, just at the right moment. He helped Peter back into the boat, he stilled the wind and the waves, and Peter was saved. But if Peter had not ventured forth, had not obeyed the call to walk on the water, then Peter would never have had this great opportunity to recognize Jesus.
Too many of us are merely splashing in the shallow end of the pool and not testing our faith. Too many of us are walking on the safety of the sidewalks and not testing out our faith by stepping off the curb. If we want to be close to Jesus, we got to venture forth out on the sea, step off the curb. We’ve got to prove his promises by trusting his promises, through risk and venture.
Only after Peter step out of the boat, started walking on the water, became frightened and began to sink, cried out to the Lord to save him is when Jesus reached out his hand and caught him. The Scriptures say, “When they got into the boat, the wind ceased. And those in the boat worshiped him, saying, “Truly you are the Son of God.””
We will also recognize Jesus and say, “Truly you are the Son of God” when we step off the curb!
Let us pray.
Lord God, help us to recognize you in the world when we faithfully follow you into discipleship and service. Strengthen our commitment to not play it safe and venture forth by stepping off the curb where the needs of your people and the world can be found. Lead us to take the risk of being disciples and in doing so, recognize you that you are truly God. In the name of Jesus Christ, we pray. Amen.