Sermon: Everything I need to know about discipleship I learned in fifty feet of water
Everything
I need to know about being a disciple I learned in fifty feet of water. Well, maybe not everything; but three things
at least.
One
is that human beings are not meant to walk on water – not created for it, not
called by God to do it. Seems like a
no-brainer, but you know me. I know now
it was my ego, but at the time I thought it was all about Jesus. I thought, “With Jesus, anything is possible. If he is God, everything is possible.” I see now you have to be careful what you
mean by “anything” and “everything” and how you interpret “possible.” And maybe even what kind of “God” you have in
mind.
We
were out on the lake in a storm with the wind against us, and we were not too
confident. We were still reeling from
the execution of John the Baptist in prison by King Herod. We weren’t surprised he was in jail; his and
Jesus’ message about the kingdom of God put them at odds with the government
and the dominant culture of our time. But
when Herod so easily disposed of him it shook us that John’s being a prophet of
God and speaking God’s truth about the king in the end didn’t give him any protection.
After
that the feeding of the thousands momentarily bolstered our belief in the real
coming of the kingdom of God. But now we
were out on the sea again – that place of primordial chaos, and we were alone. Jesus put us in a boat, told us to meet him
on the other side where there would be more people to reach with the kingdom of
God, and then he disappeared.
Didn’t
he know the sailing would be rough, and that against the currents and trends
and tides of the world we’d be getting nowhere?
The boat on the sea has always been our symbol of the church in the
world, and no matter how hard we rowed and how hard we tried to find a favourable
wind we seemed to be getting nowhere, blown off course, maybe even going
backward.
So when
we saw Jesus coming to us across the water we imagined the worst. They must have got him, too. They must have killed and silenced Jesus,
just like John and just like the world always seems to silence the real
prophets, and this was his ghost coming to haunt us.
But “Take
heart,” he said, in the way he always did.
“It is I,” like Yahweh saying to Moses, “I am that I am” – that holy
affirmation of sacred being-with-us. And
“do not be afraid” – the one thing that angels and messengers and Sons of God
always say to us to put us at ease.
The
others in the boat believed when they heard that, and accepted the mystery and grace
of his coming to us in the storm. They
waited for him to come and join us in the boat.
But
me? Oh, no.
“If
you are the Son of God,” I said, “command me to come to you on the water.” I had to make Jesus prove himself in some special way for my benefit. And I had to be the one, didn’t I, to be different
and special; who could go beyond limits and boundaries; who could go that one
step beyond everyone else; who could be just like Jesus – at least like I
imagined him. Only now do I see the
devil’s hand in it, like in the temptations Jesus faced in the desert: “If you are the Son of God, turn these stones
into bread … if you are the Son of God, why don’t you claim all power and
authority … if you are the Son of God, leap from the top of the temple and God
will send angels to protect you from harm.”
Jesus
humoured me, though, and let me learn the only way I know how – by failing and
falling. I felt so close to him and was so
totally focused on him that I really did walk a few steps. But who was I fooling? How could I imagine I could do it by myself
apart from the others, and why did I imagine that was actually what Jesus
wanted me to do?
Which
brings me to the second thing I learned: boats are good, and that’s why Jesus
sends us out in them. In the boat, for
one thing, we disciples are together – listening to one another, supporting and
correcting one another in what we feel and believe and think we know, helping
one another to see Jesus and God more clearly, seeing and hearing Jesus and God
in one another. The idea of
“just-me-and-Jesus” walking on water together is tempting to people like me; far
better though is the reality of being with the others in the boat, rowing
together in the direction Jesus sets for us.
Because
the boat does get us through. As leaky
and slow and cumbersome and sometimes too big and sometimes too small it may
be, from the Ark of ancient times to the church of tomorrow, the boat is how we
get from A to Z, how we find the courage to venture out from safe harbour where
we’re really of no use to anyone out there in the world, and how we get to the
other side and to the new groups of people Jesus wants to reach out to with us.
And
even when it is slow going and we seem to be getting nowhere, Jesus is patient
with us. He knows how hard it is
sometimes to make headway, whether it’s the tide and trends of the world
against us that slows us down, or our own slowness and stubbornness to go in
the direction he wants. Either way, when
he was coming to us on the water it was not to scold us for not being further
along. It was to join us wherever we
were and to be with us for the rest of the journey.
Which
is the third thing I think we all learned: that Jesus is always ready to save
us wherever we are, rescue us from whatever predicament we are in, and help us
find a place in the boat – help us find ourselves among whatever people and in whatever
community of belief we need for our own healing and wholeness. No matter how foolish or sinful or proud any of
us – or anyone else, might be at times, there’s a place in the boat for us all
and for anyone else who might come along, because that’s just how Jesus
is. It’s how God is.
Neither
Jesus nor God want anyone to be out there – either on the sea or another shore,
all by themselves. And if we really
believe in Jesus as the Son of God, we’ll use the boat we have to leave the
safe harbour behind and go out on the sea like Jesus wants us to, to reach
anyone or any group of people who need to know about God’s love and God’s
kingdom at work in the world and in their lives.
And
that’s not the devil talking this time; that’s me and what I learned in fifty
feet of water about being a disciple of Jesus.
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