The disciples waved from the boat and watched as Jesus returned to the crowds. He taught a lot that day and had to be exhausted. The twelve ran around to keep everything in order while he spoke and they were beyond tired. They were ready for a couple of hours in a boat with no people around. They were all ready for some rest. None of them really fell asleep but they definitely weren’t making any efforts to stay awake, either. Waves slapped against the side of the boat but it wasn’t anything to worry about at that point in the evening.
JESUS!
The impulse of a recognized oversight jolted John from his daze. He sat up as he yelled and startled everyone else with the exclamation. “We never figured out where we’d meet Him!”
“Dude. He always finds us. If He wanted to ditch us, He would have done it by now.”
Most of them looked at each other and nodded at Andrew’s statement and returned to their previous attempts at relaxation. The rest of the night passed in the kind of slumber that one could expect in a boat on choppy water. It wasn’t anything that would keep them from Gennesaret, but amounted to a rough enough ride that sleep was almost impossible.
What the deuce? It’s a ghost!
A couple of the others echoed this cry as they watched a form approach them on the water. They had been around Jesus long enough to see some pretty freaky things, especially when it came to the whole exercising demons thing. None of them would have been surprised at a random manifestation like this. It continued to approach and when it got close enough, said,
Don’t be a bunch of wimps, it’s me!
(Jake translation)
Amazingly, Peter stood on the rocking boat and yelled back at the form who claimed to be his Rabbi and Lord,
Jesus, if it’s really you, tell me to walk to you on the water!
Jesus couldn’t have responded any better. All He had to say was,
Come.
Jesus wasn’t more than a few steps away at this point. Regardless, the disciple shot out of the boat. He thought that running on the water could help him stay on top of it. Haven’t we all thought this way at one point or another? He made it far enough for his compatriots to realize they were witnessing another miracle. After that, Peter began to sink. Fortunately, Jesus was close enough to grab him and drag him back to the boat. It was actually pretty awkward. Jesus was walking on the water, but had to bend down to keep his grip on Peter who was half-submerged and panicked when he got some saltwater up his nose. The waves were crashing and it seriously looked like someone was going to get hurt. But with the complete composure that Jesus always seemed to have, he looked down at the thrashing man and said,
Peter. You had faith, but what happened?
★ ★ ★
Jesus called His disciple out of the boat. Peter had to ask first. He saw a situation where he could do something amazing and knew that his Lord would get the glory. Of course Jesus knew it was going to happen like this. He had been thinking about it all night. He saw it when He told the twelve to go on without Him. He talked to the Father about it when He went up to the mountain to pray. Jesus was excited because He knew what would happen, He knew that He’d get to experience Peter’s faith in rare form that night.
Your faith excites God.
Jesus believes in you.
That doesn’t mean you’re exempt from looking, initiating, asking, believing.
Maybe you need to ask God about stepping out.
Jesus believes in me. Something I need to remember. Continually.
We all need to hear it more often. God knows better than we do what we can do and what we’ll fail miserably at. It makes the whole listening to Him thing even that much more important!
“Your faith excites God. Jesus believes in you.”
Powerful words, Jake, and so true. I know at times it’s easy for me to forget this, probably cause I don’t always believe in myself (who does?!). It’s always a great reminder that even if we think we fail, God still believes in us. Thanks for this post!
I’ve been accused of being a little humanistic on occasion because I honestly believe that God invested a lot in us and we’re capable of tremendous things. They all lead back to Him because without God they aren’t possible, but we undersell ourselves to God as well as ourselves! Know the gifts He gave you and be confident in them. Some people won’t like it, but it’s because they’re probably self-conscious or whatever else, but maybe being a good example to them could help!
Sometimes I wonder if my faith excites God. I want to be more like Forrest Gump when he sees Captain Dan on the dock and just walks right off that boat and into the water.
Kathy, I get yelled at every time I say admit this, but I’ve never seen Forest Gump. I think that our faith vacillates between seasons. I think a lot of people see Jesus asking Peter, “What happened?” as a rebuke. I think Jesus saw that Petey had it in him to trust God enough to get him that far which was a start. Maybe a “good job” from Jesus was in order to clarify? Just a guess…
Great post!
Great point, our world and modern culture are so impressed with the technological advances we all begin to believe even more in our flesh and the physical laws of our senses. We forget that the world has another set of laws that God created as well in the spiritual world. While we live in the flesh we become trapped by the ignorance of it. We ignore the all the laws of God and write miracles off as coincidences. We quit believing we could move mountains with just the faith the size of a mustard seed… Thanks for the reminder that God is in the business of miracles.
Floyd, you’re right. Small faith isn’t to be treated as meaningless or insignificant. God can do a lot with just a little trust in Him.
Maybe sometimes having faith means trusting that God has something better for us than we imagine for ourselves. Maybe having Great faith means finally letting go of a dream.
Abby. Boo. We don’t like that around here. God lets us do what we want, right? 😉
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And just maybe, Peter fell because he doubted himself.