Walking on Water - can you tread the waves?

*Photo: "Our Refuge and Strength" by artist, Morgan Weistling

Matthew 14:22-33

22 Then he made the disciples get into the boat and precede him to the other side, while he dismissed the crowds. 23 After doing so, he went up on the mountain by himself to pray. When it was evening he was there alone. 24 Meanwhile the boat, already a few miles offshore, was being tossed about by the waves, for the wind was against it. 25 During the fourth watch of the night,[a] he came toward them, walking on the sea. 26 When the disciples saw him walking on the sea they were terrified. “It is a ghost,” they said, and they cried out in fear. 27 At once [Jesus] spoke to them, “Take courage, it is I;[b] do not be afraid.” 28 Peter said to him in reply, “Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water.” 29 He said, “Come.” Peter got out of the boat and began to walk on the water toward Jesus. 30 But when he saw how [strong] the wind was he became frightened; and, beginning to sink, he cried out, “Lord, save me!” 31 Immediately Jesus stretched out his hand and caught him, and said to him, “O you of little faith,[c] why did you doubt?” 32 After they got into the boat, the wind died down. 33 [d]Those who were in the boat did him homage, saying, “Truly, you are the Son of God.” –New American Standard – Revised Edition (NABRE)

What happens to Peter when he focuses on the waves beneath him instead of Jesus in front of Him? We know that he starts to sink and cries out to the Lord to help him. But what happens specifically between Peter and the waves? He becomes consumed by them. If we focus on the waves in our life, instead of on Jesus who causes us to tread over them, we become consumed by them; they overtake us. The waves literally overtake Peter, and Jesus says, ‘’oh you of little faith, why did you doubt?’ Peter doubted Jesus’ ability to sustain him on the water – and so do we.

The waves didn’t have to overtake Peter and they don’t have to overtake us either. If our focus remains fixed intently on Jesus – intently – we can overcome the waves, we can rise above them. If we fix our eyes on Jesus, He enables us to tread over the waves around us – whatever they may be or whatever form they take; waves of sin, temptation, anger, pain, suffering, relationship difficulties, work difficulties, illness, weakness, etc.

This is the case, and we know this – we know to keep our eyes on Jesus, yet, we still feel consumed by the waves in our lives. Why? Because we equate conquering the waves with having them disappear. We don’t fix our eyes on Jesus, trusting Him to overcome them, trusting that He will sustain us. We look at the waves and then back at Jesus saying ‘fix this’. We don’t want to overcome the waves, we want Jesus to take them away. What exactly does this mean from a spiritual perspective? What is happening in our souls when we react this way? It means that we are rejecting grace. Jesus says ‘look at me. I will give you the sustenance you need to walk over this, to overcome it and not be consumed’ and we say ‘but Jesus, that’s not what I want. I don’t want to rise above it, I just want You to take it away’. In this, we are still focused on the wave – whatever it is – and its role, not on Jesus’ role. Jesus says, ‘here, take My help’, and we say ‘no’. We don’t want to overcome the problem, we want Him to eradicate the problem for us, to make it disappear.

In this we display such a gaping lack of trust. As Peter doubted that Jesus could sustain him walking over the waves, we too doubt His ability to sustain us. It’s easy to trust God if He does what we want. It’s easy to trust Him when the waters are calm and we can walk contently toward Him, undistracted. But when the waters rage, how much more this needs to increase our trust. And yet, we doubt; we doubt the all-mighty, all-powerful God. Is He worthy of such great trust? Can He truly help us navigate over such tumultuousness? Of course He can, but the problem is: we don’t let ourselves believe it. We don’t want to think He can really make it that easy; not just possible, but actually easy. We refuse to accept this because we just want it to go away. He can help us, but we have to let Him. If we don’t want Him to do that for us, then He won’t; not because He doesn’t want to, but because we’ve chosen not to accept His help. We’ve chosen to reject Him.

When we reject Jesus, we reject pure goodness and so side with evil. We choose to let the darkness of the waves overtake us. We let the devil win because we crowd Jesus out. We keep the waves between ourselves and Jesus. We keep the waves above us, sinking beneath them.

Even when we know this, it can still be hard to change this attitude. I know that I can still consciously choose to live that way, not wanting to fight for goodness, tired of battling the tumultuousness. I see it as some huge effort and don’t want to expend the energy to keep on top of the waves. And this is because of one reason: I am relying on myself. And when I do, I will surely sink. I don’t rely on God’s strength, I rely on my own and I have none; none outside of what God gives me which is all we can rely on – His strength. And so I see this change of attitude as a huge difficulty, but the reality is, it’s not that difficult if we draw our strength from Him. He can make it so that it is easy to walk over the waves. He reaches down to pull us up out of the water and walk over it again… will we reach and grab His hand?

We have to choose Jesus. And I know for me, I can much too easily focus on the waves in my own life. I’m stubborn enough to choose to focus on them because I feel justified in my anger against them. I feel I have a right to focus on them because they are there, they are difficult, and Jesus won’t take them away. Even when I know that Jesus supersedes them, I just want to keep pointing at them and saying: ‘But…!!!! This!!’ Satan wants me to focus on the waves because then I lose sight of Jesus and I start to sink. This steals my joy and causes such great spiritual suffocation, but I again, feel so justified in being upset with them that I choose to let the devil bate me, and I don’t fight for my view of Jesus. I give in and I give up, and I get tired of the fight. But this is because I am trying to survive in drowning conditions under my own power, just wanting the difficulty to go away, not trusting that Jesus can lift me above it all. I don’t truly rely on Him. And when I am really this stuck and feel like I still struggle knowing all of these realities, and yet still not wanting to rise up, feeling the pressure of the water pushing me farther down, I pray – simply and slowly. I ask God for the grace for me to be able to choose Him because I can’t even do that on my own. I pray for the grace to simply have the wherewithal not reject His grace, to not reject the help that He offers me. I pray for the grace to not give into the darkness. I pray for the grace to be willing to accept His help.

We don’t need Jesus to take our waves away; we just need Jesus. Then the waves will no longer overpower us because of our attention on Jesus. We might even become totally unaware that the waves even exist.

Lord Jesus, you know how easily we can let waves overtake us and not even care because we feel so worn, and so tired of trying that we just settle into our misery. Sometimes we come so close as to see You reaching down to lift us up and still we don’t reach out to grasp Your hand. Lord, we repent of having refused Your graces, of rejecting Your love and Your help, knowing that this has only made it more difficult for us to fulfill Your will. We repent of having willfully taken our eyes off of You, causing us to be consumed by the difficulties around us, stealing our joy. We cry to you now for help, O Lord, renewing our trust in Your ability to sustain us and lift us above every obstacle. Grant us the grace of being able to willingly accept your grace and your help. We stretch out our hand and grab hold of Yours, to rise above those waves that want to overtake us. Keep our eyes firmly fixed on You, O Savior, that we become so enveloped by Your presence and Your power, so as to not even be concerned with how we are to cross over the raging waters, but to have complete confidence in Your love for us and Your power to sustain us over all. Amen.

_________________________________________________________________

Scripture Passage footnotes:

1. 14:25 The fourth watch of the night: between 3 A.M. and 6 A.M. The Romans divided the twelve hours between 6 P.M. and 6 A.M. into four equal parts called “watches.”
2. 14:27 It is I: see note on Mk 6:50.
3. 14:31 You of little faith: see note on Mt 6:30. Why did you doubt?: the verb is peculiar to Matthew and occurs elsewhere only in Mt 28:17.
4. 14:33 This confession is in striking contrast to the Marcan parallel (Mk 6:51) where the disciples are “completely astounded.”