Walking on water

Jesus and Peter on the water, Gustave Brion, 1863  

Address given at St Mary's Nenagh and Killodiernan Church on Sunday 9th August 2026, the 10th after Trinity

Have you ever been out on the water at night in a small boat in a gale? If so, were you frightened? I have been, and I can tell you I was terrified!

I was a teenager, and it was a wild night. To get back to a cottage on an island in Lough Derg, my mother and I had to row less than a hundred yards. It was blowing a gale, with a big sea running, and waves breaking. With one oar each, side by side, we pulled against the wind, inching forward, often being thrown sideways as the wind caught the side of the boat, shipping water all the while. We made several attempts and were thrown back, but eventually we made it to calmer waters, and arrived safely on the other shore. By that time I was shaking like a leaf. My mother probably was too, though she never let me see it of course. It taught me a lesson I’ve never forgotten: respect for the water. It’s not our native element, and we underestimate the power of wind and wave at our peril.

Today’s reading from St Matthew’s Gospel (Matthew 14:22-33) brings this memory back to me. The same event is recorded in Mark’s and John’s Gospels. I feel I can identify with the disciples, even though I suppose I wasn’t in real danger, as they must have been. The Sea of Galilee is renowned for the fierce and dangerous storms that suddenly appear out of nowhere, and abate just as quickly. I see it in my minds eye as rather like our Lough Derg – it’s about 40% bigger in area and wider, but not so long. And sailors know how quickly a squall can blow up on Lough Derg.

The disciples had got into trouble in one of Galilee’s notorious storms.

Immediately after feeding the 5000, Jesus sent the disciples off in a boat, while he told the crowds to go home, and went off up the mountain to pray by himself.

The disciples had set out in the evening light, unaware of the coming storm. Mark tells us that Jesus ‘saw that they were straining at the oars against an adverse wind’. I imagine the night was bright and moonlit for Jesus to be able to see the little boat.

‘Early in the morning’, Matthew tells us, Jesus ‘came walking toward them on the lake’. The Greek words translated as ‘early in the morning’ literally mean ‘in the 4^th watch of the night’. In those days, with no clocks, time during the night was counted in 4 watches of 3 hours each. So sometime between 3 and 6 am, just before dawn, Jesus, walking on the high ground after praying all night, saw the little boat struggling through waves and spray, and came down to help.

But what is this about Jesus walking on the lake?

Should we imagine Jesus far from land, in the middle of the lake, walking on the water, stepping over the waves? This is how most Christians have imagined the scene, and many artists have depicted it. But we should be aware of a possible problem with translation here. The Greek words translated as ‘on the lake’ could equally mean ‘towards the lake’, or ‘at the lake’, that is by the lake shore.

The truth is that there are two perfectly reasonable interpretations of this passage. The first describes Jesus miraculously walking on the water in the middle of the lake. In the second, the disciples’ boat is driven by the wind to the shore, Jesus comes down from the mountain to help when he sees them struggling in the dim light of dawn, and Jesus walks through the surf towards the boat. Both interpretations are equally valid, I suggest. Some will prefer one and some the other.

When the disciples saw Jesus they were terrified, believing him to be a ghost, until Jesus spoke to them, saying, ‘Take heart, it is I; do not be afraid’. However we interpret the story, the significance to the disciples is perfectly clear: In the hour of their need, Jesus came to them, to help and reassure them.

Only Matthew adds the detail about Peter trying to walk on the water too.

It’s a charming vignette, and so in character for Peter, from the other things we know of him. He was brave and impetuous, but he often found it hard to live up to his good intentions. Remember, it was Peter who swore undying loyalty to Jesus, only to deny 3 times that he knew him the very next day.

When Jesus said ‘Come’, Peter bravely ‘got out of the boat, started walking on the water, and came toward Jesus’, we are told. But his courage failed him and he started to sink. ‘Lord, save me!’ he shouted, and ‘Jesus immediately reached out his hand and caught him, saying to him, “You of little faith, why did you doubt?”’

Whether Jesus was miraculously walking on water, or whether he came through the surf on the shore to help the disciples in the boat, Peter surely learned this: It is not always easy to follow Jesus, but Jesus is always there to catch you when you stumble and sink.

Is there anything we can learn from this story today, 2000 years on?

Well, surely the same things that Peter and the disciples learned! They were privileged to know Jesus the man and to sail the Sea of Galilee with him. When Jesus saved them, they ‘worshipped him, saying, “Truly you are the Son of God”’. But we are privileged too, to know the spiritual reality of the living Christ.

In life the wind is often against us. Life for every one of us sometimes feels like a desperate struggle, with ourselves, with our circumstances, with temptations, with sorrow, with the consequences of decisions made. But none of us need struggle alone. In the hour of our need, Jesus will come to us as he did to the disciples long ago, to help and reassure us. Just listen for  his voice saying, ‘Take heart, it is I; do not be afraid’!

If we seek to follow Jesus, we will find like Peter that it is not always easy. It will test our faith at times. Our faith will not always be enough and we will have doubts. But when we feel ourselves going under, if we cry out ‘Lord save me’, Jesus will be there for us, just as he was for Peter, reaching out his hand to catch us. Jesus is always there to save us when we are sinking. Just listen for his voice saying, ‘You of little faith, why did you doubt?’

Finally, I shall finish with the Collect of the Word set for today

Mighty God and ruler of all creation,
give new strength to our faith,
that we may recognise your presence
even when all hope seems lost.
Help us to face all trials with serenity
as we walk with Christ through the stormy seas of life
and come at the last to your eternal peace.
We ask this through Jesus Christ our Lord,
who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever. Amen

Holy simplicity

Address given in St Mary's Nenagh and Killodiernan churches on Sunday 11 August 2019, the 8th after Trinity Year C

Are you a hoarder? I know I am – as Marty will confirm if you ask her!

I am surrounded by ‘stuff’ – the attic is full of it, so is the garage. Some has sentimental value, such as things I’ve inherited which I remember from childhood. Some I don’t need right now, but a nagging voice tells me they might just be useful sometime. And then there is some old stuff which I tell myself I might be able to sell, if I ever find myself down on my uppers – little enough, for in truth most of it is just junk.

And it doesn’t stop there either. There is something inside me which covets more stuff than I have already, and the security that money and wealth brings. There is that urge to accuumulate in most if not all of us, I think.

It is this covetous human nature that advertisers constantly play on. Their siren voices tempt us to buy that new car, the latest smartphone, cosmetics to make us young again, exotic foreign holidays. If we cannot have it all we feel cheated.

The capitalist market economy we live in has created great wealth for many.

Most of us in rich societies like Ireland have enjoyed a high and growing standard of living for many years. We have all come to expect that we will have more than our parents did. But this kind of economy depends on growing production driven by growing consumption, bringing ever-growing waste and pollution, which the finite resources of our beautiful planet cannot sustain.

As you may have seen in the news, July 29th this year was declared to be ‘Earth Overshoot Day’, the day after New Year’s Day when humans have consumed more resources than Earth can regenerate in a full year. Put another way, this year humanity is using the sustainable resources of 1.7 Earths – only 50 years ago we were more or less in balance, using about 1 Earth.

As a species we are faced with a perfect storm. Growth continues, even as greenhouse gases change our climate, causing heatwaves, droughts, floods, and rising sea levels which threaten coastal cities. Other pollutants such as microplastics and industrialised, unsustainable agriculture reduce the biodiversity on which all life on earth depends. When growth inevitably falters - as it must - those with the least will suffer the most - but it will affect us all.

So we fear for the future. We worry that our jobs and pensions are precarious, we suspect that the lives of our children and grandchildren will be harder than our own, we are anxious about the damage being done to the natural world about us, and we dread the prospect of runaway climate change.

Today’s Gospel reading (Luke 12: 32-40) has a lot to say to us in present circumstances.

Jesus understands that people are often selfish and greedy because they are anxious and afraid for the future. So he tells the disciples – and through them, us – that we should put aside such anxiety. God knows what we need, and God will give us all we need when we work for his kingdom – in other words, when we try to be the people God wants us to be, loving God and his wonderful creation, and loving our neighbours as ourselves. ‘Do not be afraid, little flock’, he says, ‘for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom’.

God has given us all that we have so that we may be generous with it, not hoard it. What we give away, to those who need it more than we do, is ‘an unfailing treasure in heaven, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys’. But it is not just about giving away what we have. It is also about using what we have to stand up for the weak and the marginalised against the forces that oppress them, as Isaiah saw in his vision in today’s 1^st reading (Isaiah 1:1,10-20). God calls us to ‘seek justice, rescue the oppressed, defend the orphan, plead for the widow’. If we want to be good Christians we must focus on these kinds of spiritual wealth, rather than accumulating material wealth, ‘for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also’.

And we must be alert at all times for opportunities to respond generously, as and when God prompts us to do so. As Jesus puts it, ‘Be dressed for action and have your lamps lit’. We should not put off calls on our generosity, waiting perhaps for a better time or a more pressing need to come along. We are mortal – we do not know when God will knock on the door to call us out of this life. ‘You also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an unexpected hour’, says Jesus. And it would be shameful, when he does come knocking - as we know he will - to admit that we wasted the opportunities he gave us to act like the good people he created us to be.

Jesus calls his disciples to live lives of holy simplicity and generosity.

In the passage from Luke immediately preceding the one we heard (Luke 12:22-31), Jesus talks of the birds of the air and the lilies of the field.

‘Consider the ravens: they neither sow nor reap, they have neither store-house nor barn, and yet God feeds them … Consider the lilies, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin; yet I tell you, even Soloman in his glory was not clothed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field … how much more will he clothe you.’

As Christians we need to live like the birds and the lilies. That doesn’t mean that we should not work and plan for the future. Unlike the birds and lilies we must sow and reap, build store-houses and barns, toil and spin, and we must do so as a community, because that is what it means to be human. That is how we have evolved to make our living, how God has made us to be - just as the birds and the lilies have evolved to make their different livings. But we must also recover a sense of what it is to have enough. We must resist the temptation always to seek more than we need, more than God has already given us. And we must cultivate a generous spirit.

As I see it, our globalised world is like an over-wound clockwork toy, in which the spring that drives it is ready to snap. Our example of holy simplicity can show others how together we can release the tension, how we can return to a way of living which will enable everyone to continue to flourish in the wonderful world God has given us, alongside the birds and the lilies.

Holy simplicity is liberating, and our world needs liberating now as much as it has ever done. Let us live simply, so that others can simply live!