One of my favorite stories in the entire Bible is when Jesus led Peter out on water because although Peter lost faith and sank, I think that’s what would happen to all of us if we tried that.
It’s one of those examples where we realize we’re a whole lot more like the flawed people in the Bible than we’d like to admit, but I believe that can make us connect to the Bible more.
Because if those stories were about perfect people, we’d probably go away from reading the Bible wondering how it relates to us, but thankfully, the Bible is about imperfect, fearful, and untrusting people and a perfect God who is faithful, despite the fact that they are faithless.
The Bible is a story about how even though all of humanity messes up every single day, God loved them to the point of sending His Son to die on a cross. He did this, even after seeing up close the true faithlessness of His people.
Even the disciples after seeing many miracles up close didn’t believe completely, but Jesus kept leading them out further and further deep into faith. And as I mentioned earlier, He even led one of them to walk on water, which is pretty incredible when you think about it.
It’s not incredible because Peter did it, though. It’s just that crazy, amazing because Jesus led Him there in faith. He called Peter out onto the water Himself.
But before Peter got to that time in which for a moment, he walked on water, he saw many, many miracles performed by Jesus, and he heard many of His teachings and spent time with Him.
This time spent in Jesus’ presence strengthened his faith, and it allowed Peter to grow closer to the One who would later call out into something that before, would have seemed impossible.
You see, God doesn’t expect us to walk on waters He hasn’t led us to yet. He doesn’t expect us to be able to navigate a circumstance that we’re not in yet, nor does He ever want us to go through something alone.
In Deuteronomy 31 Moses instructs the Israelites with one thing, twice almost back to back. The first time he said, “Be strong and courageous. Do not fear or be in dread of them, for it is the LORD your God who goes with you. He will not leave you or forsake you.”(vs. 6) and then only one verse later he said, “It is the LORD who goes before you. He will be with you; He will not leave you or forsake you. Do not fear or be dismayed.”(vs. 8)
The reason Moses said almost the same thing over and over was because the Israelites were about to go into the Promised Land, something that had been promised to them for a while, a future that they had looked forward to, but they had heard terrifying things about the thing they were getting ready to head into.
They had even let what they’d heard scare them into not walking into what God had for them 40 years prior to where we picked up with Moses’ instructions.
They had let the fear from stories about giants, powerful armies, and ruthless kings keep them from placing their faith in God, despite the circumstances. The Israelites let worry make them forget that God had called them to walk into this specific future.
And of course, since they had abandoned God’s plans and trusted their own words more than His, God was pretty upset, but being the merciful God He is, He gave them another chance.
And that’s right where we are during Moses’ speech: They have another chance to walk into God’s perfect plan for them. The question is are they going to take it with full faith and confidence in the One who got them there, or are they going to back down?
Actually, I think the better question is are you going to chose to trust that God goes before you and has the strength to lead you out onto the waters and into the storms, or will you turn back around for fear?
Because whether or not you’re scared because you don’t know what the future holds, or whether you’re trying to decide to take a chance to do something that’s a bit scary, if God leads you there, then you can know it’s not more than you can handle with Him.
But there’s one more thing you should know about the Israelites first. One of their kings, David, his lineage is the one that Jesus came from.
God used them to bring the Savior of the world.
If they had backed down the second time, they would never have been able to experience the way God wanted to use them, which brings me back to the story about Peter walking on water.
You see when Jesus called His disciples, He asked them to give up all they had and follow Him. It would have been so tempting to say “no” and some did because that’s a big step of faith, but the ones who did say “yes” experienced the presence of Jesus and saw absolutely incredible things.
For Peter, it was walking on water, even though he didn’t do it perfectly.
Because even though he wasn’t perfect and he began to sink not long after stepping onto the water after he called to Jesus, Matthew 14:31 tells us that “Jesus IMMEDIATELY reached out His hand and took hold of him,”
Jesus didn’t hesitate. He reached out right away in grace and mercy to save Peter from sinking.
And He will do the same for us if we trust Him and walk in His plans with faith because even though we will stumble along the way, God called us considering all our weaknesses first, but still choosing us for the job.