Last Sunday's Thought: on getting out of the boat to follow Jesus

Of the three gospel accounts of Jesus walking on the water, only Matthew (14:29) has the story of Peter getting out of the boat to join his master. It all ends badly: Peter sinks and has to be rescued by Jesus. The traditional argument is that Peter's enthusiastic love is accompanied by insufficient faith. In his intriguingly titled If you want to walk on water, you’ve got to get out of the boat, John Ortberg suggests to us that the real failure in the story is not Peter, but the eleven disciples who remain behind huddled in the boat, still wondering if they are seeing a ghost. Peter at least takes the first steps to meet Jesus. Jesus is not in the boat; we have to leave our boat of comfort, our place of security, to follow him. This story could just as well be a parable on our adventure off as a self-governing church in a Conventional District. Peter walks on the water momentarily until he feels the strong wind and his attention wavers. He walks on the water, in other words, as long as he remains focused on Jesus and reaching his Master, as long as he keeps the end in view. Our focus is to strengthen our church numerically and to deepen our discipleship. As long as we keep to our main focus we will be doing what God calls us to do and we will not fail.