Remember John the Baptist? The fiery prophet preacher who wore camel skins and ate locusts and called the Religious and Political Establishment broods of vipers and baptized people way out in the desert, far away from the temple? Well, John was eventually arrested and thrown into prison when his sermons hit too close to home and Herod couldn’t take it any more. He died there. John – Jesus’ cousin – died in prison. Tortured and Beheaded.
And Jesus was desperate for some time for himself – for time with his Daddy, his Abba, time to take in what had just happened, and to get his grounding once again and his courage back.
In the Dominican Republic, or Nigeria, or Syria, or any number of countries like the Palestine of Jesus’ time, when a cousin is arrested and murdered by the authorities – you know it is time to get real quiet and if possible, go somewhere else, far away.
Jesus had no intention of leaving or getting quiet. But he did need to maybe throw up – he was fully human, remember – to cry, to plead, to wonder what was next, and he most definitely needed to pray. So he went to the wilderness – and the crowds followed. The sick. The hungry. The homeless. The seekers. The ones enlightened enough to recognize this Shining Sun of God. And so in the wilderness, he is surrounded – and even in deep grief, he is moved by compassion and responds to their needs – healing and teaching and preaching.
It grows late in the day. The disciples are tired and hungry. And they tell him to send the crowds away. Instead he tells them to cater a dinner for over 5000 people.
Hosting a planned dinner for a few people is hard – at least it is for me! So I am in full sympathy for the disciples when they look at him like he’s slipped a cog. But he is unperturbed, and entirely serious.
You know the story. Andrew finds a boy who’s got a bit of bread and two fish – and Jesus says – OK. That’s enough. Somehow, throughout the day, surrounded by the crowd with power flowing from his mouth and his hands, he has immersed himself so deeply again in his Abba Daddy, that he can lift the bread and the fish up and say “Thank You. “ The simplest prayer and, besides, “save me,” the only one we need to know. “Thank You.” Then he divided the bit of bread and the fish – and the crowd is quieted and fully fed.
And thus we come to our text for today. Immediately after the crowds are satisfied, he tells the disciples to go on ahead to the other side – while he finally has time to sink deeply into the inconceivable abyss which is God, his Abba – your Abba – my Abba. He sinks into the Silence and in the Deep Silence of the Divine he himself is calmed and quieted and fed. Somewhere in the early morning hours, he arises from his meditation and prayer and starts towards the disciples.
They, meanwhile, are in real trouble. Trouble tripled. They are battered by waves, far from land, with the wind against them. They were experienced seamen. They could have dealt with one or two of these troubles – say for instance, they were battered by waves, far from land – but the wind was not against them – or the wind was against them and they were far from land – but not battered by waves – but to have all three – battered by waves, far from land And the wind against them – AND it’s night when they can’t see – it’s too much. They are in trouble. And now they are seeing phantasms, ghosts.
Don’t they so truly reflect the actual lived life of faith – faith that is full one minute and then stumbles and runs into trouble because of perceived reality? They have JUST participated in a Happening – a spontaneous Happening – their Rabbi Teacher Master had gone to grieve and to rest and pray and instead found a people out there in the wilderness who needed him. Miraculously he was able to let go of his own troubles and respond with authentic compassion and deep power. And then the miracle of the feast – a bit of food broken and shared proved to be more than enough. This had just happened with them at the center of the whole thing, just a couple of hours before – and now, like it had been for John and for Jesus – the wind and the battering was overcoming them and they were no where near the safety of dry land.
We know about this too – living as we do in a world that is battered and far from shore, with more changes happening more rapidly than we can deal with. According to some scholars, the entire Gospel of Matthew aims to help us deal with Change – change that is chosen and change that is unexpected and change that is beyond our control. I cannot think of a better year than this one to be hearing from the Gospel of Matthew.
We are in very turbulent waters, battered by waves, far from shore, and the wind is against us. When I wake up in the morning, I have the habit of getting online and reading the NYTimes headlines – that’s all – I don’t even read the stories until later in the day. Then I turn to my lectionary app and read the Psalm and the Gospel for the day. It helps, let me tell you! I pray, as I know you do, for our many brothers and sisters around the world, who live in circumstances, and with the wind so against them, so far from safety, so battered by waves of violence and poverty and famine, that our prayers seem like so little in comparison to the need.
The truth is, along with our Somali brothers and sisters, you’re in the boat along with the rest of the world, the world of melting polar ice caps unprecedented heat waves and flood and drought, rising food prices, S&P downgrades, persistently high unemployment numbers – whether you want to be or not. Here we are.
And there the disciples were. What to do? Peter stepped out of the relative safety of the boat to walk out on the water towards Jesus. It’s easy to idealize him for this – having this complete trust in Jesus – and then it’s easy to point the finger when he begins to sink and chide him for his loss of faith! It’s easy to fall into either/or thinking – total faith on the one hand, loss of faith on the other hand.
A commentator posed this question about this kind of either/or thinking: Trusting Jesus entirely seems impossible – do you know anyone who can actually do that? And the alternative seems to be to rely on our own resources, and sink. Do you know anyone who has done that? Most of us have.
But instead of either/or, what about the more integrated path that Matthew’s narrative points towards? The integrated path of the gospel is this – in Jesus’ name, trust entirely in your own resources – remember Jesus said to the disciples – “Feed them yourselves.” And Know and Trust that God’s power can fill you and give you capabilities far beyond your imagining. Remember the mustard seed story, earlier in Matthew’s Gospel? That tiny seed that grows into a bush and shelters the birds of the air? Or the story of yeast – that small bit of lively yeast that leavens the flour, and produces loaves of yummy bread?
We are surrounded by need far beyond our own capabilities to fill – just as Jesus was in the crowds – just as the disciples were in their little battered boat – just as the Mother Teresa was in India, or Dr. Paul Farmer is in Haiti, or our companion Bishop is in Western Tanganyika, or Susie is at Rancho Cielo in Northeast Salinas. What to do? The Gospel of Matthew points us towards the integrated way of mature faith – pull out all the stops, trust our resources, And reach out our hands to the Divine. Call out – “Save me! Save us! Lord God Almighty, have mercy upon us.” Call out, knowing deep in the inherited bones of your faith – that God, through the lively action of the Holy Spirit, working through you, can do more than you can ever ask or imagine.
Amen.