13^th Sunday after Pentecost - August 10, 2008

Kingswood UMC - Buffalo Grove IL

Text: Matthew 14:22-33

What do you think about Jesus? Maybe some of you have seen the sign at the Lutheran Church down the road asking this question. What do you think about Jesus? At first this question along a public highway kind of annoyed me? What are they really asking? I don’t know. But I’ve realized that one of the reasons it annoys me is that I’m not sure that we main stream types really do much thinking about Jesus. We may sing about him, and pray in the way he taught us. We invoke his name, tell some of the stories he told ... and we tell his story. But generally, the core of our spirituality is more likely to be focused on God ... or maybe the Holy Spirit.

Perhaps the more relevant question is, Do you think about Jesus? I’m not sure of all the reasons, but I know that many of the people in main line churches are skittish about Jesus.

So we wouldn’t want to be considered too literalist or intolerant. But I think there may be another reason... at least I want to confess my own avoidance of thinking about Jesus and why. During my years in seminary and first years as a pastor I worked very hard to avoid Jesus by focusing on God and the Holy Spirit. I pretty much ignored Jesus as much as I could. Part of it was the reasons I’ve suggested already: I wanted to be seen as enlightened and tolerant of all. But I think the deeper reason was that Jesus was/is more threatening. God can be thought of more abstractly or philosophically so focusing on God didn’t require me to think about relationship as much. I found and fell in love with the existential theology of Paul Tillich ... God is the ground of being. It may be existential ... focusing on human existence ... but is still pretty abstract!! And then I found something called Process Theology ... and was enamored with the idea of God as the lure toward life.

The Holy Spirit was also intriguing to me ... maybe because it seemed gender neutral, or even a little feminine in a lot of ways, at least in contrast to the male God I had grown up with and to Jesus. And I could relate to the energy and color and dynamism that seemed inherent in the idea. But again, it was an idea ... even if it was an idea I could relate to better.

But Jesus. Well, I’d been a little afraid of Jesus ever since that time when I was a young teen and had been invited by some slightly older girls to go to the beach while we were on vacation. Fairly soon into the conversation they asked me if I was a Christian. When I said yes ... after all, I’d just been confirmed a few weeks earlier ... they asked me how I had met Jesus. When it became clear that I wasn’t answering in a way that matched their experience of meeting Jesus, I was excluded from their conversation while they talked about Jesus as if he was their latest hot date. I was devastated at being left out ... and decided that I really must not have any faith. Because ... at least according to them ... I really wasn’t a Christian. He was their personal savior ... and that wasn’t language I knew or an experience to which I could relate at that point. Above all, he seemed to belong to them and not me. I think the hurt of that experience left me not trusting Jesus .... for a very long time.

This is a difficult example of the other reason that I think Jesus is threatening. He is not an idea to think about but a person to whom we must relate one way or another. We can reject him, avoid him, engage him, love him, be afraid of him. But he is a human being that lived as we do .... in relationship to persons in a given time and place ... and who had a personal and deep relationship with the sacred, with God. And whatever we think about him, we have to decide how we are going to relate to him.

I bring this up today because our scripture .... the report of Jesus walking on water ... is especially focused on who Jesus is. Usually we want to make this a story about Peter and his doubt .. or "little faith." But most of the action has Jesus as the subject .... so today I want to pay attention to Jesus.

If you just look at the verbs in this passage you will see a picture of Jesus as actively involved in shaping his circumstances and relating to the needs of those around him. Remember that this story begins at the end of the feeding of the 5000. So once that is done, he made the disciples leave ... get into the boat and go on ahead to the other side, he told them. Then he dismissed the crowds. Once he had done that, he went up the mountain by himself to pray. And he was there alone.

Jesus has shaped his own circumstances ... directing people toward the future ... back to their homes, to the next day’s work across the sea ... so that he can catch a break for prayer, for spending time connecting to the source of his wisdom and power, to God. God wasn’t an abstract idea for Jesus ... but a deeply personal relationship that sustained him at a most basic level.

Then the time and the scene changes. While Jesus has been up on the mountain, the disciples have been struggling on a windy and stormy sea. Now it is morning and Jesus came walking toward them ... frightening them out of their wits. He reassures them, saying, "It is I ... ego eimi" in Greek. This is the same construction used in the Old Testament to speak of God or of God’s presence. And in the Johannine gospel, this phrase is used to express various titles or roles ascribed to Jesus ... the so-called I Am’s .. the light, the door, the way, the bread of life. It is I ... take heart, be not afraid. Jesus pays attention to the needs of these beloved followers and reassures them.

Peter isn’t so sure what to make of this and issues a challenge ... if it is you, call me to come to you.... and Jesus responded and said, "Come!" Peter left the boat and was moving toward Jesus, when he was distracted by the waves and the wind ... and forgetting to pay attention to Jesus ... he began to sink into the sea. He cried out for help ... and Jesus reached out his hand and caught him.

Pay attention to the verbs in this story: he MADE them get in the boar, he DISMISSED the crowds, he WENT to pray, we WAS alone, he CAME to them and SAID, I am, he RESPONDED to their request with a command....COME.... and REACHED OUT AND CAUGHT Peter.

If we pay attention to Jesus in this scene we see that he not only shapes the circumstances but that he responds to the need he encounters.

As the church we frequently call on the name of Jesus .. but I’m not sure we’re so good at paying attention to him ... really paying attention. And it seems to me that to call on his name and then not acknowledge his presence ... saving us, calling us, pulling us into community .... might even be a little dangerous.

There is a sailing term ... seriatim ... that describes the process necessary for sailing into the wind. Apparently you can’t sail directly into the wind ... but must move crossways of it, so the wind can catch in the sail and move you along. That works fine if you don’t want to go in the direction from which the wind is coming. But to sail into the wind you have to strategize ... moving first one direction across the wind and then another ... creating a kind of zig zag pattern as you move toward the goal. And, you have to keep a clear focus on the final destination ... somewhere on the other side of the wind ... even while you move one way and then another toward it.

Maybe that is one way to image this journey of relating to Jesus. Sometimes we move in one direction ... and then find we need to turn and go another. But if we keep Jesus in our sight, paying attention to how he is shaping circumstances and responding to needs ... saving us, calling us, pulling us into community, we may discover that the journey into the wind ... and to the other side of the lake where his mission is to be extended ... is a journey to the heart of God, a journey home.