Jona Lawson - Class 2: Walking on Water

Automatically transcribed. Accuracy is good but not perfect, and words are sometimes wrong. Trust the audio over the text.

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   Well, good morning, everyone. Go, be a bit more enthusiastic than that. Good morning, everyone. Good morning. Awesome. It's pretty early, isn't it, to be getting straight back into another study, but hopefully we're alert and ready to go this morning to learn some more lessons about the life of Peter. Now, during Melbourne's lockdown, which went for about 290,000 days, I started running, right?

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   And I hadn't run for years. It was quite funny because you'd go out at night after dark and the streets would just be full of middle-aged dads running around, just desperate to do anything to get out of the house. Well, I was one of those dads and I started running for the last couple of years and I really enjoyed it.

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   And what I found, what I was amazed about was how much you can improve if you just do something a little bit each day. And we had an hour a day where you could go out and exercise. And every couple of days I'd go out and just run a little bit more and a little bit more.

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   And sometimes I'd run a little bit less because I'd run too much the day before. But just this process of every day doing something, that's how you grow. And Jesus now was going to teach his disciples how to grow. Because he only had two years with these disciples before he was going to go.

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   And he needed to impart to them everything that they needed for them to take on the role. Now, once he had Peter and the rest of the disciples had accepted the call, and we saw that last night, that it wasn't a simple call. It was one that happened over a process of time.

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   And after over a year, Peter acknowledged that Jesus was his Lord and he started to follow. And then Jesus, once he'd done that, he called 12 specific disciples to work with particularly. If you just come to Mark chapter 3, we see the record of Jesus choosing these 12 disciples. And it's interesting, the process of how Jesus worked with these 12 men, because we were talking about it last night down here at the front.

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   There was essentially what Jesus needed to do was just get these 12 men ready to take on the role of himself. Once he'd gone, he needed to give them all the tools that they needed to be him to other people. Once they'd left and we see him choose in verse 13 of Matthew chapter Mark chapter 3, these 12 disciples.

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   And it says, he goeth into a mountain and called unto them whom he would. And they came unto him and he ordained 12 that they should be with him and that they might send them forth to preach. And then from verse 16 to 19, he lists those 12 disciples and he lists the first one and Simon, he surnamed Peter.

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   And then he lists these 12 men that he selected to follow him. Now, it's interesting that there's four times, three in the Gospels and one in the book of Acts, where that list of disciples is made. And all of them have Peter as number one. In fact, in Matthew's record of his choosing of those 12 disciples, when he says Peter, he says, Peter was the first one that I chose.

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    So Peter was a little bit special out of all of them because Jesus chose him to ultimately be the leader of those men. Now, was Peter a leader right from the start? Was when he chose those 12 disciples, was Peter a leader of them immediately? Well, I don't think he was because there was always this conflict, you might remember, between these 12 disciples.

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    They were very competitive and one thought they were better than the other and then the other thought they were better than the other. And they were putting others down and putting themselves up. And there was this competitiveness about who was the best. But Peter ultimately was the one that God selected to be the leader of them all after two years that he was gone.

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    And when God selects a leader, as we know from other parts of the Bible, he needs to work with them, doesn't he? He needs to prepare them. So he worked with Moses and he worked with Joseph and he worked with David. And he set them apart and he prepared them for a period of time and took them through lessons and gave them roles so that when they had the people, they were ready to lead.

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    And Jesus does the same thing with his leaders, these 12 men and particularly Peter. Now, if you look at this timeline that we looked at last night again, you can see that Jesus had.

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    After Peter's calling here at the end of it sort of came towards the end of year one in Mark chapter three is the start of the second year of the Lord's ministry. So when you look at that, he only had two years with these 12 men, two years to impart everything he needed to them.

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    Now, they were called apostles. And apostles, of course, is like an ambassador or a representative. And that's what these men were going to be. They were going to be Christ to the rest of the world once Jesus had gone. And so he needed to, in these two years, give them everything they needed to take on that role.

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    Now, it was an amazing transformation that Jesus made of these men in just two years. Two years is not very long. Right. That's less than a university course. Two years Jesus had with these men. But look at what these men became. In Acts chapter four, which is, of course, a little bit after Jesus had gone, we have this record of Peter and John going to preach in front of the multitudes of people.

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    And we have the reaction of the Jewish elders who saw them do these things that they did. And they said, when they saw the boldness of Peter and John and discovered that they were uneducated and ordinary men, they were amazed. And recognised that these men had been with Jesus. Now, that verse tells us a few things.

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    What it firstly tells us is that Jesus just chose 12 ordinary men. He didn't send out a job ad and look for the greatest philosophers of the time. He didn't search for the greatest athletes or the most beautiful people that he could possibly find, that they were going to be his disciples. These elite, educated people that would know everything about him.

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    No, he just chose 12 ordinary men. But he made them amazing. And these men weren't even educated in the systems of the world at that time. But he made these men amazing. And so amazing were they that after just a few years after Jesus had gone, the record of the Acts said that these men turned the world upside down.

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    So much was the power of their conviction. And how did that happen? That happened by just two years being with Jesus. Two years spending time learning about this man. Now, we're all, as much as maybe we don't like to think about it sometimes, we're all pretty ordinary people. Some of us, I suppose, are extraordinary at certain things.

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    But as a general rule, we're fairly ordinary people. But God can work in us in the same way that he worked with these 12 men to make us extraordinary and bring about his purpose in our life. Now, how on earth did Jesus do this in just two years? It's interesting to see the process of how Jesus educated these men to be what he needed them to be.

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    Let's just go back to Matthew chapter 14. From our reading. There's three things that we want to go through this morning of the way Jesus educated these men to prepare them to be what he needed them to be. The first thing that Jesus did was.

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    I thought I had a map there, but let's go in here. The first thing Jesus did was for the first year, he spent all of the first year predominantly in Galilee. Now, if you've been to the land of Israel, some of you may have been to the land of Israel. Galilee is a beautiful place and it's quiet and it's peaceful.

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    And Jesus had that opportunity in that first year to spend that quiet, peaceful time with these 12 men. And the first way that Jesus was able to transform them was he used, he transformed their mind. And he had those 12 men for a year in which he was able to influence them with his word.

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    He spent time teaching them over that period. He spoke sermons to them. He spoke over 50 parables in the first year to them. He gave them doctrine. He taught them how to pray. He taught them how to live. He showed by his own examples how to reach out to people and be to stretch out his hands to people.

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    He taught them prophecies about the future. And all of these things Jesus kept teaching to these men. Now, he knew that they would not understand everything. He knew that there were some things that they wouldn't understand for years in the future. But Jesus kept teaching and kept preaching his words to these men.

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    In Matthew chapter 13, when he goes through all these amazing parables, at the end of it, he says to the 12, do you understand all these things? And they say, yes, Lord, we understand them. And Jesus knew that they didn't understand everything, but he kept preaching them. He kept teaching them and filling their minds with his word.

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    Now, Peter, in particular, was a man who was eager to learn. And we read that from his character, from the way he interacted with the Lord. He asks more questions than any other of the disciples combined. He's always asking questions every time there's a situation with the Lord. He asked things like, and they were tough questions.

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    He asked things like, Lord, we've given up everything. What are we going to get for our reward? What have you got in store for us in the future? He asked, Lord, my brother has done something against me and he keeps doing it against me. What's the limit of your forgiveness? When can I stop forgiving him?

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    He saw the fig tree that had withered and he said to the Lord, Lord, what on earth does this mean? I want to understand what this means, this withered fig tree. And he also wasn't afraid to ask the Lord to explain things to him. In several parables, Peter says, Lord, I just don't understand this parable.

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    Can you explain to us what this parable means? He would also, he also asked about a parable. He said, Lord, this parable, I don't understand. Is it, are you talking this parable just for us or is it for everyone? So he was very inquisitive in the way he asked questions to Jesus. And the other thing that he wasn't afraid to do was he wasn't afraid to answer questions either.

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    When the Lord posed the question, it was Peter that was the first one to put up his hand. He was always the one prepared to have a go and have a shot at figuring out what the Lord was trying to do or what he was trying to do, what he was trying to teach them.

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    So all of that summarises this man as a man who was determined to know and understand the Bible better. He wanted to understand what God's purpose was. He wanted to understand what his role was in that purpose. And he wasn't afraid to ask questions or get things wrong along the way. And Peter recognised that that inquisitive, searching spirit had been very useful to him.

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    Later in his letter, in 1 Peter 2 verse 2, he wrote this. And I'm sure he was reflecting on his own experience of time spent with the Lord. He says, you guys, and he's preaching to all of us really. He says, you need to be like newborn infants that long for the pure spiritual milk that by it you might grow up into salvation.

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    Peter says, you've got to desire this word. That's the only way you're going to get something out of it. Now, that word long there, it means to intensely crave something. And Peter said, that's the determination you need to get something out of this word. And he says, you've got to be determined like a newborn infant is for milk.

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    Now, if you've ever seen a newborn infant determined to get milk, it is a force that cannot be stopped. Right? And anyone who has had children or is a father, right, would know that that's the case. And there's nothing you can do. There's no distraction. There's no toy. There's no keys. There's nothing that you can put in front of the child that will stop them from wanting to get to that milk when they're hungry.

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    And Peter says, that's what you've got to be like with the word of God. You've got to crave it intently if you want to get something out of it. And he says, you need to get something out of it because it's essential for your growth. And he saw that reflecting back on his own life.

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    He saw that craving for the word, how much it had done for his own personal growth. Now, that's a lesson for us, isn't it? If we want to get something out of this Bible, it's going to require effort. And it's going to require time without distraction. And I think that's a challenge for modern disciples.

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    It's certainly a challenge for me. Because we live in an age where time is something that we have now more than any future, sorry, any past generation has had. We have time. And the reason why we have time is because we've got all these gadgets which have provided us spare time that we can use.

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    But unfortunately, what's come with that is more avenues to waste time more quickly than ever before. And that's hard, isn't it? And I feel that. I find in this world with phones and the internet and all the things that are going on, that I find it almost impossible to find some kind of spare time without distraction for me to concentrate on God.

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    And that's a real challenge of our age. But we need to somehow be like Peter. And what Peter was like, he was a man that craved it. And he made time for it. And he carved out. And he's inquisitive. And he wanted to know. And he's saying to us here, you need to be the same.

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    If you want to find out about God, you need to be inquisitive in this way. Now, when you're young, it's the best time to do that. Trust me. As each year goes past, as each year my kids get older, I seem to have less time because I've got more stuff to do. You have an opportunity while you're young to spend time listening to God.

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    And if you listen to God in that time of your youth, there's treasure to be found. Just turn back to Matthew chapter 13. After Jesus had spoken a whole lot of parables to the disciples, he said this. And it's a beautiful little parable he tells in verse 52 of Matthew 13. He says, So he says, If you're a person that in your youth has listened to the word of God and taken it in as much as you possibly can, he said, What you're going to be like ultimately is a man who's a householder, who has in his house all this treasure that he's collected.

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    And when he comes upon a situation in life that's difficult or he needs to make a decision that's hard, he can go into that big bag of treasure and he can find answers in that treasure. And he can find answers to help other people from that treasure as well. And that's what Peter discovered.

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    And when you read the letters of Peter in the last parts of his life, the first and second letters of Peter, they are full of treasure. They are full of principles which he's gained from all those years that he spent with Jesus, all those years of asking questions and inquiring. And he got treasure.

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    We can get treasure as well. But it's going to require us to carve out some point or some time in your day to find that treasure. And you need to be very specific about it. It's not just going to happen. You need to find a time. You need to think about a moment in time in your day where you can sit down with God and listen to his words as Peter did.

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    Now, Jesus also recognised that as well as teaching these people the word and them listening to the principles of it, he also realised that he needed to, in order for them to grow, he needed them to be involved as well. And that was an important part of their growth. Jesus was a great leader, like the greatest leader that's ever walked the face of this earth.

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    And great leaders understand that it's not all about them, that they need to pass their leadership and their skills to the next person. And that's what Jesus did. He was brilliant at imparting his skills to those disciples. And he did it. We'll just look at two examples. Two examples where he passed that on to the disciples.

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    Let's just look at Mark 6, verse 30. We looked last night about the two aspects of discipleship that Jesus, about being fishers of men, that Jesus wanted to give to his disciples. And that was he wanted to teach them how to catch fish and he wanted to teach them how to keep fish.

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    Well, Jesus threw the disciples into the deep end to learn these lessons. And the first thing he did was he sent the disciples out to preach. And he threw them out into the deep end. And they went out into the land and into the towns and villages to preach just by themselves. He didn't go with them.

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    He gave them the tools. He told them what to do. And he just pushed them out there and he sent them out to preach. And verse 30 of Mark 6 is them coming back. And the apostles gathered themselves together unto Jesus. And they told him all these things. So this is them returning and telling Jesus about what they'd done.

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    And they told him about all the things, both what they had done and what they had taught. So they became involved. And this is really important for a disciple and learning discipleship is involvement. And Jesus said, I need you to be involved. And they went out and they preached and they came back excited and passionate about it because they'd done it.

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    And they told them all these. He told, they told Jesus all these stories about how they'd gone to these houses. And some people had been interested and other people had rejected the calling. And they took ownership of the teaching that needed to be done. And Jesus was trying to get them to do that.

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    Now, he also, as well as teaching them how to preach, he also spent time teaching them how to look after people once he brought them into the fold. Now, this is so important, isn't it? It's all very well going out and preaching. And that's what we're supposed to do as disciples, go out and preach.

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    But Jesus also recognised that just as important of that is to look after people once you've preached to them and to care for them and to continually care for them. Just come to Matthew chapter 14 and look how Jesus did that from the reading that we read this morning. It's the story well known to us of the feeding of the 5,000.

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    And it says that when Jesus saw this big group of people come to him, many of them were sick. Many of them are hungry. They were poor people. They needed help. Look what happened. Look what it says Jesus' reaction was in verse 14. And Jesus went forth and saw a great multitude and he was moved with compassion.

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    That's what Jesus was like naturally. When he saw somebody in need, he was moved with compassion to help them and to reach out to them and to discover what their need was and help them. And see, Jesus wanted to give that to his disciples because he needed them to be like that. He needed them to learn compassion and to be reaching out to people.

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    And if they saw someone who had a need, to reach out to them. But they're not at that stage yet, are they? Look at verse 15. It says, And when evening was come, his disciples came to him saying, This is a desert place. The time has now come. Send them away, Jesus. Like, we need to get rid of these people, Jesus.

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    Because as if we're going to be able to feed them, they're just an annoyance to us. They're not thinking the way that Jesus was thinking. And they lacked this compassion that Jesus needed them to learn. And so he says to them in verse 16, You give them something to eat. I need you to reach out to them.

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    Because I'm going to be gone soon. And I need you to be my hands and my heart to reach out to these people. And so at the end of verse 19, it says that once he'd brought this amazing miracle to pass, and these loaves and fishes came from nowhere, what did he do?

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    At the end of verse 19, it says, He gave the loaves to his disciples. And his disciples took them out and they delivered them to the multitude. And once they'd finished, they left at the end 12 baskets full of fish and bread. And what Jesus was saying was, They're for you. Because I'm going to be gone in just two short years.

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    And once I'm gone, I need you to take up those baskets and do my job. I need you to teach to the people. And then I need you to have compassion and look after those people of the flock. So you can see how Jesus taught the disciples by their involvement, how to become disciples.

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    And Peter recognised that at the latter end of his life as well. He says, If indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good. And he's quoting from that psalm, that beautiful psalm that says, We need to taste and see that the Lord is good. The only way that we can truly understand God is if we are involved in doing that and practising what we have learnt.

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    And that's the same with us as disciples. We need to be involved. And that's one of the best ways that you can learn about discipleship is to get involved. To put your hand up and say, I want to be a part of something and help to be involved. And you have in this city an amazing amount of opportunities to be involved.

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    I was just speaking to a guy down here about the youth stuff they have on. He's got his own youth group. He's got Southern Youth Group. You've got Northern Youth Group. You've got Suburban Youth Group. You've got all these opportunities where you can be involved in every day learning about discipleship. And that's the best way that you can learn.

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    And by doing that and being involved, that's actually growing and developing your faith. And we need young people to help with preaching and mission work. Although mission work's hard at the moment, isn't it? But we need people to help in our ecclesias. And young people have passion and they have ideas that they can inject into our ecclesia.

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    And at the moment, with this new world that we've got, we need more than ever young people's ideas to bring into our ecclesia. And to show us how we can do, how we can preach and how we can reach out to different people. That's how we can learn and grow is by being involved.

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    Now, the final way we're going to look at that Jesus taught his disciples growth was he also taught them not only by the word and not only by getting them involved in preaching and compassion, but he also taught them by testing experiences that he threw them into. And we're going to briefly look for the rest of our class at this experience of them on the water in Galilee.

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    And this time on the water in Galilee was at the end of the first year of the Lord's ministry. And Jesus had been teaching and educating these men for a whole year. And then at the end of this, he gives them this test to see how much they've grown.

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    And he put any. And he so he takes them into Galilee and we'll take up the record. In verse 22, it says, And straightway, Jesus constrained his disciples to get into the ship and go before him unto the other side while he sent the multitudes away. So what actually happened was at the end of this miracle, John's record tells us that there was this huge excitement amongst the people because they'd never seen a miracle on this enormous scale before of the feeding of the 5000.

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    And people got into their eyes, into their minds that this man could be made king now. And so they rushed to try and they were going to rush to try and make him king. But Jesus knew that that wasn't the purpose. And so he constrained his disciples to get into a little ship and he pushed them to go all the way from Bethsaida, where they were, to the other side over here to Capernaum.

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    Right. Right. Which is about 10 kilometers in distance across the top part of that lake. And Jesus, it says in verse 23, when he put them into the ship, he went into a mountain apart to pray. And there's a little mountain up the top here, just near Bethsaida, where he probably went up.

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    And from that mountain, there's a little lookout and you can see right out across the whole lake. And that's where Jesus went to pray. And he was there up in that mountain alone. He was separated from them. He wasn't there physically. And it would just be one year from this moment that he would permanently be gone from these men physically.

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    And he needed to teach them how to be alone without Jesus. Now, he pushed them out onto that boat. And John's record says that when he did that, it was dark. It was evening time. So when they left from the shores of Bethsaida, it was about 6 or 7 p.m. And he pushed them out onto that boat and said, I want you to go to the other side to Capernaum.

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    And Capernaum means the city of comfort. I want you to go over there. And as they started on their journey, John's record says that all of a sudden, the sea started to rise. And the waves started to mount. And John says that it happened by reason of a great east wind that blew in.

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    And apparently that sometimes can happen in Galilee. Across from this side, because the Sea of Galilee is so low, the wind can come over the top of the mountain and into the sea. And very quickly, a storm can arise out of nowhere. And that's what happened to these men as they were going along in their boat.

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    And verse 24 says, But the ship was now in the midst of the sea, tossed with the waves of the wind, and the wind was contrary to them. John's record says that they went about five kilometres into the middle of the sea. And when they got right into the middle of the sea, it's at that point that the wind started to come and the waves started to toss.

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    And the little boat that was in the sea began to thrash amongst the waves. And the word tossed there is the word vex or torment. And this whole scenario really is a parable.

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    This picture here is a picture of us and what we go through in life. We leave Bethsaida on our little boat and Jesus says, I need you to go to the other side, Capernaum, the city of comfort, the kingdom.

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    From the mountain. And sometimes the boat gets hit by storms. And by waves. And that's what happens in life sometimes. We can be cruising along very calmly. And then all of a sudden, out of nowhere, we're struck by a storm or a trial that comes upon our life. And progress, like it was for these men, all of a sudden, which was so easy, is now almost impossible.

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    And it says there in verse 24 that the wind was contrary to them. Which means that the wind was blowing into their face and it was stopping any kind of progress whatsoever. Mark's record says that the disciples were so much trying to go forward that they were straining on the oars to make any kind of progress.

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    And they were making none. And that's what trial can do in our life when it comes upon us as disciples. And it can come from anywhere, can't it? It can be like a family problem. Or maybe a tragedy strikes in our life. Or maybe it's an individual sin that we're battling with. And it can come upon us out of nowhere.

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    And progress seems impossible. But they'd been here before. It was only a couple of months previous that they had been in a boat very similar to that. But the difference was on that occasion, you might remember, was that Jesus was with them in the boat. And they were able to go straight up to Jesus and say, Jesus, there's this terrible storm.

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    Can you stop the storm? And Jesus clicked his fingers. And the storm was gone. But now they're alone. And they're trying to battle this storm by themselves. But they weren't alone, were they? And this is what Jesus was trying to teach them. They weren't alone. Mark's record says in Mark chapter 6 that this whole time that they were in the water, the whole time that they were thrashing around with the oars and trying to make progress, Jesus was up there in the mountain and it says he saw them straining the whole time.

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    He was watching them. And between verse 24 and 25, verse 25 says, and in the fourth watch of the night. The fourth watch of the night is about 3 a.m. in the morning. So between verses 24 and 25, there's actually nine hours. So for nine hours, that little boat sat right there in the middle of the ocean and it wasn't moving as much as they strained at the oars.

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    And Jesus was watching that whole time as they thrashed upon the waters. And we might ask the question, and I'm sure they were asking the question, why doesn't Jesus do something? If he's up there in the mountain and he's watching, why doesn't he just do something now and stop this storm from coming?

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    Remember last time, all he had to say was, peace be still, and the storm was gone. Why doesn't he, he's up there praying, why doesn't he pray that now and all of a sudden the storm will be gone and it'll be finished? Why doesn't he do that now? Well, Jesus deliberately left them there, didn't he?

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    He deliberately was watching them as they thrashed around in that ocean. Because what Jesus was trying to do in that moment of testing was he was trying to develop patience and he was trying to develop endurance in these men. And that's the way God works in our life. He sends testing experiences into our life.

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    He allows uncomfortable scenarios to happen and appear in our life that just seem like, why are you doing this to me, God? Like progress is impossible. I was going along so fine and now I can't even go anywhere. And it seems like everything is against me. But see, that's the way we learn, isn't it?

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    That's the way we learn to trust. That's the way our character is developed. It'd be great, wouldn't it, if the greatest way to develop our character was to send us to some paradise beach somewhere and sit on the beach for a couple of weeks and we come back and our characters were just awesome.

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    But unfortunately, that's not the way God works with us, does it? It's only when something happens in our life where things go bad or it's a struggle, there's a test. Where we realise that we needed to make a change. And that's the way Jesus works in the life of these men, to develop dependence upon him.

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    And then Jesus comes to them at the fourth watch of the night, walking upon the sea. And I love the picture of Jesus walking upon the sea. While all the thrashing of the wind and the thrashing of the waves is coming around them, Jesus is calm. And that's what our Lord's like. He's in control the whole time.

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    And it's interesting, you know, Mark's record says something very interesting as he's walking to them. It says that what he did was when he walked close to that boat, he walked as if he would go past the boat. Deliberately. And we think, why would Jesus do that? Why wouldn't he just, he sees them in trouble.

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    He's going to decide he's going to go to them. Why wouldn't he just go straight to them? It's a very similar phrase. You might remember in Luke chapter 24, where he was walking with the two men on the road to Emmaus. And he was walking to their house. And as he got to their house, he made as if he would go past and continue on.

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    And they grabbed hold of him and said, we don't want you to go, Lord. And that's what Jesus is doing here. He's trying to teach these men that when you get in trouble, I want you to reach out to me and call to me. And when they did call to him, Jesus was there immediately.

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    And verse 26 says that when they first saw him, they struggled to recognize who he was. Verse 26 says, Now you imagine them on the boat, what that would have been like. They see this figure in the distance. And it wasn't like Jesus was just walking on this calm ocean to them. There's these huge waves that are going up and down.

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    And every now and again, they'd see this figure getting closer and closer and closer. And some of them thought, oh, maybe it's Jesus. And others thought, maybe it's a spirit. And they couldn't recognize who it was in the storm. And that's what happens in our life too. It's difficult at times when trouble comes into our life to recognize God's presence in those storms.

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    What is God's plan in this moment? Why is progress so difficult? And I've asked myself those questions over the last couple of years about the situation that we all find ourselves in. What is God's plan in this situation? Why is it so hard for us to get together as young people? Why is it so hard to even get together as an ecclesia?

99. 40:33

    Why would God do this? Why would he restrict? Why would he create all these things? And that's like us on the boat looking out and trying to see God and trying to see Jesus in the situations that come across in our life. But Jesus is there all the time. And when they're so scared and they don't know who it is, the voice comes out across the waters.

100. 40:56

     And Jesus says, take courage. It's I. So calm. It's I. And Jesus is trying to remind these men of the last time they were in this storm. When he was asleep, this is the power of Jesus. He's asleep at the end of the bed and this huge storm's going on around them. And they come up to him and they wake him.

101. 41:24

     I don't know what you're like when you wake up. I'm not good. Not good. And Jesus wakes up out of his sleep. And he's just going to say two words or three words. And the storm's gone. You see, Jesus was trying to teach the disciples and he's trying to teach us that just because he's not physically here does not mean that he's not aware and in control the whole time.

102. 41:58

     He's always in control. Here's a beautiful psalm and we don't have time to go to it, but Psalm 107 has this whole story just beautifully laid out in a couple of verses, the whole story of the boat upon the sea. And what it says there about God, about the start of the sea, is that God commands the wind that makes the waves.

103. 42:17

     God's in control. And that was what formed the storm, wasn't it? It was the wind that made the waves. And God makes that wind. And though mankind might be in trouble, God is always in control. And that's what Jesus wanted to teach his disciples. And then out of nowhere, Peter, when he hears the Lord's voice, Peter says, yells out to Jesus.

104. 42:51

     And this is an amazing moment in the life of Peter. Verse 28 says, and Peter answered him. So once he got the call from Jesus, Peter, it was Peter that answered Jesus. And he said, Lord, if it's you, let me come out to you on the water. Now, what on earth was Peter doing here?

105. 43:16

     The rest of the disciples must've looked at him and thought, what are you doing, Peter? Right? You're going to walk out there to Jesus. Like, look at the water. What was Peter doing? Why was he motivated to do this? Well, in the last year of being with the Lord, he'd learnt to trust the Lord.

106. 43:34

     He knew what this, the power that this man had. And he wanted to be with him. He wanted to walk like him. You see, Peter, and this is one of the greatest characteristics about this man. Peter was a man of action. He wasn't afraid to step out and try and live like Jesus Christ.

107. 43:56

     And to attempt to do that in his life. Just like his master did. Now, often he failed. He failed. He failed. In his attempts. And he'd fall flat on his face. Or sometimes when he did it, he was misguided in his motivation and perhaps he was doing things or saying things to try and outdo his brother.

108. 44:19

     But as a result of acting and doing, he had some amazing experiences. And he learnt much in the process, even when he fell. And this is what God encourages us to do. He encourages us to put our hand up to serve him, to step out of the boat and to act. He says, don't be just hearers of the word, but be doers also.

109. 44:52

     And that's what Peter was. And if we never step out like Peter did, then we'll never learn and we'll never grow. And so Jesus says to Peter, I want you to come. And Peter steps down, verse 29. Peter came down from the ship. You imagine what that was like, came down from the ship.

110. 45:15

     So it must have been a huge ship. And he stepped out of that ship onto the thrashing oceans beneath him. And when Peter was come down from the ship, it says he walked on water. That's amazing faith, isn't it? That that man had. And sometimes people criticise Peter for doing this. But this was an amazing act of faith and trust in his Lord.

111. 45:41

     And he actually walked on water to go out to the Lord. But then all of a sudden in verse 30, it says, but when he saw the wind that was boisterous, he was afraid. And he began to sink. And he cried unto the Lord and said, save me. That word boisterous in reference to the wind is in the margin, it says strong.

112. 46:08

     And it's the same word that was used about the children of Israel when they were about to go into the promised land and they looked at the strength of the enemies around them. And they were just about to go in and they looked at the enemies around them and they were strong.

113. 46:26

     And it stopped them from keep going. And that's what happened to Peter. He stepped out to live like Christ. But then as he got further in, he started to look at the obstacles in his way. And he was afraid. And he began to sink. And the word means not just to sort of slowly go down.

114. 46:50

     It says he plunged down. Imagine what he felt at that moment as he plunged down into the sea and he was about to sink. Now, what would you do in that circumstance? Well, probably what I would do, I'd be trying to swim or I'd try and swim back to the boat at least.

115. 47:11

     But Peter did something that was beautiful in this moment. It said that he cries out to the Lord and he says, save me. And immediately, Jesus put out his hand and it was there for Peter. Three times in this story, Jesus, it says, reacted immediately. And that's how Jesus reacts in our life.

116. 47:42

     If we need him, we need to call to him immediately and he will come. That's the response of our Lord. And that's a very important lesson that Peter learnt from this moment on the sea. He learnt that when I get in trouble, however I got in trouble, whatever the circumstances were in leading me up to that trouble, I just need to cry out to the Lord and he will be there for me immediately.

117. 48:11

     Now, that was a really important lesson that Peter needed to learn, wasn't he? Because later on in his life, as we'll see later on in the week, he was going to need to reach out to the Lord. And he would remember back to this moment and moments like this, where when he'd reached out, Jesus' hand was there for him immediately.

118. 48:29

     And that's a lesson that we all need to learn. We will find ourselves in life in trouble. Sometimes it will be through circumstances of our own making. And sometimes it will be not, it'll be other circumstances. But we need to know that we can cry out to the Lord and he will answer to us immediately.

119. 48:54

     And Jesus brought Peter back and stood him up again next to him. And he said to them, he said to him at the end of verse 31, O you of little faith, wherefore didst thou doubt? Now, Jesus wasn't having a go at Peter. He was admiring the little faith that he did have.

120. 49:17

     And that small faith, we know that Jesus said that if you have the faith just as a tiny little mustard seed, you can do amazing things. And Peter had already grown that faith. And he was already able to walk on water if he believed in God and believed in his Lord. But Jesus says to him, why did you doubt?

121. 49:38

     You need to go further next time. And Peter learnt the important lesson that he needed to keep his eyes on the Lord at all time. Don't be distracted. Don't be discouraged by problems or obstacles that come in your way. Remember that I am in control of everything at all times. And if you reach for me, I will be there.

122. 50:06

     And that's an important lesson, I think, that we can take in 2021. There are problems that beset us. There are things on every side and it seems discouraging to us. And we can become discouraged and think, well, these problems are all too big. But God is bigger than all of it. He's the one that sends the wind to create the waves.

123. 50:33

     Now, the other beautiful final picture we get of Peter is him walking back with Jesus to the boat. And Peter had walked out to Jesus and then he'd sunk, hadn't he? And then by reaching up to Jesus' hand, Jesus had brought him back up again. And then they walked back together to that boat.

124. 50:59

     And that process is a process that goes on all the time in the life of Peter. This process of walking and then falling and then getting back up again and then falling again and then getting up again. And that's the process of discipleship. That's the way that we grow. We will fall down.

125. 51:22

     Our progress in discipleship is not going to be this continuous line that just keeps going up. We will fall down, sometimes very, very hard. But the lesson that we take from Peter, the wonderful thing about Peter and the trait probably more than anything else that we need to take from him is he was a man that was able to be taught.

126. 51:46

     He could get back up again. And even though he'd in front of all the rest of his disciples, he'd said that he was going to walk on water and he'd fallen flat on his face, he got back up again and he went forward. He was teachable. And so he comes back into the boat.

127. 52:05

     And let's just go to Mark chapter 6 where we see the response of his disciples, the rest of the disciples when they get back into the boat. Verse 51 of Mark 6.

128. 52:34

     They come back into the boat and it says, he went up unto them into the ship. So they climb back up into the boat. And as soon as they did that, the wind ceased. And they, being the disciples, were sore amazed in themselves beyond measure and they wondered. So this, what happened that day on that boat, witnessing Peter, the storms and Jesus walking out into them, it affected them more than anything else that had happened in their life to this point.

129. 53:11

     It says they were sore amazed within themselves. Each individual on that ship was just like, I cannot believe what has happened in this circumstance. The faith of Peter, the Lord reaching out to him. And it left an impression upon these men. So much so that verse 52 says, they considered not the miracle of the loaves for their heart was hardened.

130. 53:35

     So even this amazing miracle, which Jesus did of the loaves and fishes, like feeding these thousands and thousands of people, that miracle had not affected them like this miracle had affected them. This changed them within themselves like nothing before. And you see, that's what personal experience and trial does for us. That's what builds personal conviction more than anything.

131. 54:05

     Is when God puts us through a trial and we've got to rely on the things which he's given us to grow and to lean upon. And that's what these men did. And they learnt conviction in their hearts because of that, more than anything else that had happened previously. You know, it's interesting because that was a test that Jesus, that God had done previously in the past, right?

132. 54:30

     In Exodus, in Exodus chapter 14, which I think you're doing at conference, God had tested Israel in the same way and he got the same response. You remember when they came to Exodus chapter 14, they were sore afraid. And they were sore afraid even though they'd seen all the miracles that God had done to the Egyptians in Egypt.

133. 54:51

     But now the problem was coming upon them. And the Egyptians were bearing down upon them. And they cried out to the Lord. And the Lord said to fear not. And then he sent a strong east wind.

134. 55:11

     And he sent it in the morning watch. And they were in the midst of the sea. And God, it says, stretched forth his hand.

135. 55:23

     And the response from Israel in God saving them on that day at the end of that chapter is that Israel walked on the dry land in the midst of the sea, just like Peter had done. And that experience of them, imagine what it would have been like, them going through the Red Sea with their family, seeing these amazing walls of water on either side and them personally walking through that water, just like Peter had walked upon the water and the disciples themselves had seen that happen around them.

136. 55:54

     That built conviction in them more than anything because of their involvement in that. And at the end of that story, it says that they feared Yahweh and they believed Yahweh. That was the thing that convicted them of the power of their God. Now, just finally come back to Matthew chapter 14 where we see the final response from the disciples.

137. 56:35

     Verse 33 of Matthew chapter 14 says, You know, the previous time this had happened when they'd been in that storm, at the end of that storm, they'd said, who is this guy? We don't understand who this man is. He's got power over the wind and the rain and the oceans. Who is he?

138. 57:10

     But now they're convinced. They are convicted that this man surely is the son of God. A year spent in close proximity to Jesus, listening to his words, watching his example, practicing everything that he taught, being involved and trying to learn the things that he'd done and then trusting them, trusting Jesus in a time of trial, had learnt to personal growth and conviction in these disciples.

139. 57:51

     And that's what Jesus was aiming at. Just finally turn to 2 Peter chapter 1 verse 5 to 8 where Peter talks about this growth that he wants to have in each of the disciples.

140. 58:22

     2 Peter chapter 1 verse 5 to 8 says this. And besides this, give all diligence to add to your faith virtue and to your virtue knowledge and to knowledge temperance and to temperance patience and to patience godliness and to godliness brotherly kindness and to brotherly kindness love. Step by step day by day, week by week, this is how Jesus taught growth and discipleship to his disciples and that's what Peter recommends for us.

141. 59:09

     Let's take three things away from the study from this morning. One, the first step to spiritual growth is the word and we need to make time for it. the second one is involvement. We need to taste and see that the Lord is good ourselves and take ownership for those things and then finally, testing in moments of testing, that's when personal conviction is built.

142. 59:41

     and then the Lord Thank you.