Title: Ye Fearful Saints, Fresh Courage Take

Date: Easter – April 8, 2007

Text: Matthew 14: 28-31

By: Kendall H. Brown

An eclipse of the sun is a wondrous, goose-bump producing astronomical event. The very first thing that we are taught about a solar eclipse is how to look at it. The event is too brilliant to look at directly with an unprotected eye. I remember my first solar eclipse. My grandfather darkened a piece of glass as a viewing instrument. The glass was so burnt that I was as amazed that I could actually see the eclipse through it, as I was left in awe by watching the moon pass in front of the sun.

Easter and solar eclipses have much in common. They are both wondrous and brilliant events. Maybe, Easter is so brilliant, that like the face of God in the Old Testament, we cannot look at it directly without being blinded. So this morning, I am going to use another Gospel story as my filter for looking at the Easter story. The story of Peter walking on water found in Matthew 14:28-31 is particularly suited for this purpose.

First, a little memory refreshing about the context: Jesus and his disciples had finished up a long hard day of preaching and feeding a multitude of people with a handful of fish and bread. After all of that, they needed a break. Jesus planned a little retreat for his disciples on the other side of the Sea of Galilee and sent them on ahead in a boat. He wanted to be by himself and said that he would walk. Of course, he failed to mention that he was going to walk across the water!

A little while later, in the middle of a storm in the middle of the sea, the disciples learned about Jesus’ walk as he caught up with them by surprise. The disciples, already scared out of their wits by the storm, thought that they were seeing a ghost. There are people in the Easter story who think that the risen Lord is a ghost, also, - see why I think this story serves so well as a lens for looking at the Easter texts? But Peter recognizes Jesus and here is how Matthew describes what happened:

But when the disciples saw him walking on the lake, they were terrified, saying, ‘It is a ghost!’ And they cried out in fear. But immediately Jesus spoke to them and said, ‘Take heart, it is I; do not be afraid.’

Peter answered him, ‘Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water.’ He said, ‘Come.’ So Peter got out of the boat, started walking on the water, and came towards Jesus. But when he noticed the strong wind, he became frightened, and beginning to sink, he cried out, ‘Lord, save me!’ Jesus immediately reached out his hand and caught him, saying to him, ‘You of little faith, why did you doubt?’

Matthew 14: 26-31

In the Gospels, the great spiritual problem to be overcome is not the devil, not even sin. The antithesis to faith is fear. Over and over again, we encounter fear as the stumbling block to a faithful response. Angels announce to the shepherds that a messiah has been born and along with that message also have to say, “Fear not.” We encounter story after story about fearfulness as we follow Jesus’ biography. His birth struck fear into the heart of Herod. His miracles and teaching left the religious leaders shaking in their shoes. Jesus often mentions fear in his instructions to his disciples. The Gospels end with the Easter story which over and over tells us of fear-filled hearts as the disciples encounter the risen Lord.

We continue to be driven by fear instead of faith today. Recently, I was in a conversation with another person and sharing some of the story about our ESL program here at Christ Church. In the telling, I was becoming excited about our work and its importance. I remember mentioning my conviction that seminaries should be making a second language a requirement for graduation. I so often experience my own handicap in ministry by not knowing how to speak Spanish. My conversation partner started to share that he too was interested in a ESL program and had been involved in one to learn some Spanish. Then he told me why. His reasons had nothing to do with ministry, or building community or having a tool to reach out in love to others. He and his wife spend several months every winter in Florida. He told me how they live there in an area where one encounters many of “those people” - meaning people of Hispanic descent. He vividly described being on the street surrounded by people speaking in a tongue that he couldn’t understand and how he was filled with fear - even a paranoia - that “THEY” were talking about him. He took ESL to learn enough words like, “knife,” “mug,” “rob,” “wallet,” so that “THEY” wouldn’t be able to sneak up on him.

This man is a Christian, probably worshipping today in celebration of the resurrection. But there is a difference between belief and faith, between belief that the lord arose and living out of an Easter faith. The difference is huge and is the difference between being spiritually dead, even though we hold dear to many correct and good beliefs, and being spiritually alive - living in the faith and trust that god’s spirit is alive in the world too.

We are in a deplorable war today from which we cannot seem to find a way to extract ourselves. War has always been and always will be a spiritual matter that manifests itself in the worst of all physical ways. We must extract ourselves from our fears before we can extract ourselves from the two wars in which we presently struggle, Afghanistan and Iraq, and all the wars that these two will lead us into unless we can first become spiritually a different people. The people we must become are an Easter people of faith, not a Christian people of fearful belief.

There is absolutely no difference between Christian extremists and Islamic extremists. Both are motivated, more accurately driven, by fear. I am disturbed as much as anyone by pictures of extremists with signs saying, “death to Americans.” I also hate seeing pictures of so called “Christian” extremists picketing the funeral of an American soldier for another whole set of reasons. There is not an iota of difference between the two groups of demonstrators. Fear drives them both. We need to ask ourselves about that fear and become acquainted with it to be peacemakers instead of war makers. We should ask ourselves what creates enemies that chant “death to Americans.” They are motivated by fear. They fear our culture. It is incredibly arrogant on our part to think that they hate us because they are jealous of us and consequently want something that we have. It is not because we have something that they want that causes their fear.

They are afraid of our culture because we have something that they absolutely don’t want. They perceive us as godless and crazed consumers. They fear our irreligion and our materialism. There will never be peace, certainly we will certainly never be peacemakers in this world, until we can see some of that in others and in ourselves.

Fear combined with our leaders innate ability to play on our fears got us into this war in the first place. Fear will keep us at war in the world because fearful people are at war with themselves. Such a people can only be at war with others. Fearful folk are those who have forgotten that we are spiritual beings whose essence is faith not fear. Easter really doesn’t present anything new. It just calls us back to be what we were created to be in the first place: Spiritual beings - people of faith, and faith is quite easily defined with one word – TRUST.

Jesus was walking towards his disciples in the boat. He was walking through and in the storm and stormy sea. In Easter story after Easter story, Jesus is approaching the women who came to the garden and his disciples. He walks toward them in the garden, in Emmaus, on the shore in Galilee, and in closed up rooms. Jesus walks toward his disciples in and through all their fears and fearful events of their lives.

Look at any fearful event in your life, even war, and Jesus is walking towards you challenging you to discard your fears and live the risen faith and trust of Easter’s new day and new life. Not just a renewed life – the same old same old over again for a second time – but a genuinely new and profoundly different life – a life based on trust and not on fear.

The story of Peter on the sea gives us a way to move from fearfulness to faithfulness. Peter stepped out of the boat and started to walk, himself on the water, towards Jesus. Then he began to sink. I think that he started to sink at that point when he started to give more attention to the waves than to Jesus. The difference between fear and faith is a matter of focus.

On the first Easter, the disciples, the women, all who knew and loved Jesus, were focused on his death, their loss and grief, and their safety as they ran and hid in a variety of places. Their focus was on all the waves that came rolling toward and over them that weekend. The risen Christ came walking through, in and out of those waves towards them. By refocusing on him and not the waves, the disciples moved from fear to faith, from death to life. Christ is risen. Christ is risen indeed. Praise be to God.

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