19th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Readings: 1 Kings 19:9a, 11-13a; Romans 9:1-5; Matthew 14:22-33

We modern people have problems with miracles:
many of us simply do not believe in them,
and those who do believe
feel vaguely guilty about it,
as if we haven’t quite kept up
with the modern age.
They seem to be a relic
of the world before Science,
which we now believe
(with unwavering faith)
can explain everything
through material cause and effect,
and which definitely excludes
the miraculous.
Science (at least as popularly conceived)
offers us a world
that is regular and predictable,
and even those of us who believe in God
like our world regular and predictable.

Take the case of Jesus walking on the water.
We have become quite ingenious
at coming up with explanations
of what really happened.
Some 19th-century historians
suggested that Jesus was actually
walking on rocks just beneath the water’s surface;
more recently, an article that appeared
in The Journal of Paleolimnology claimed,
“A rare set of weather events
may have combined to create a slab of ice
about 4 to 6 inches thick on the lake,
able to support a person’s weight.”
These sorts of explanations,
appealing to things
like conveniently placed rocks
or extremely rare weather events,
may be implausible
(not to mention the fact
that they make Jesus
into something of a fraud),
but as implausible as they are
they still keep us firmly rooted
in a world within our control,
a world from which God is kept
at a safe distance.

But if we look
at our Gospel reading today
we see that this miracle
is no less of a problem
for Jesus’ disciples,
even though they lived
in the world before Science.
Matthew tells us that when they see
Jesus walking toward them across the water,
the disciples reach for what,
in their world,
is the more plausible explanation:
they are seeing a ghost,
not a flesh and blood human being.
Ghosts are odd and disturbing,
but not as odd and disturbing
as the flesh and blood Jesus
striding across the water;
not as odd and disturbing
as a God who joined himself
to the frailty of human nature;
not as odd and disturbing
as the power and presence
of God drawn so near.

It is not Science that makes the disciples
doubt that it is Jesus whom they see;
it is what it might mean for them,
that the flesh and blood Jesus
is lord of the wind and the waves.
They too want a world
that is comfortable and predictable
(even if populated by ghosts).

But let’s face it,
this world of comfort and predictability
that we believe Science can secure for us?
It’s an illusion.
We’re not safe.
Our boat is battered and buffeted
and nearly swamped:
saber-rattling threats
of nuclear war with North Korea,
white supremacist terrorism
in Charlottesville,
twenty-four people killed
in the wake of the election in Kenya,
thirty infants dying in an Indian hospital
because of a billing dispute
with the company that supplied oxygen.
The safety and comfort and predictability
are all an illusion.

But what if the presence of Jesus
dispels the illusion and unhinges the world
in such a way that I can no longer
hold God at a distance,
and I can no longer calculate outcomes,
and I must now think differently
about everything?
What if the drawing near of God in Jesus
means that the world
is not in the iron grip
of cause and effect,
but is ruled by the mystery
of cross and resurrection?
What if it means
that love is stronger than violence,
and that God is found not in fire and fury
but in the tiny whispering sound
heard by the prophet Elijah?
As the band The Violent Femmes put it
in their song “Jesus Walking on the Water,”
“Oh my, oh my, oh my, what if it was true?”

Would I, like Peter, get out of the boat,
out of the illusion of comfort and predictability,
to walk toward Jesus across the watery abyss,
the abyss of everything that I fear:
pain and poverty, dishonor and death?
Could my faith sustain me in such a walk,
or would I, like Peter, begin to sink?
Do I believe that,
even if my own faith should fail,
Jesus will stretch out his hand
and catch me
and hold me
up over that abyss?

At the end of the day,
the problem for us
with Jesus walking on the water
is not that it goes against Science.
The problem for us
with Jesus walking on the water
is that it challenges us to get out of boat,
to abandon our illusion of safety.
The flesh and blood Jesus,
suspended over the abyss,
invites us, people of flesh and blood,
to join him there;
he invites us to trust
that God truly has drawn near;
he invites us to believe
that he will hold us up.
“Oh my, oh my, oh my, what if it was true?”

19th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Readings: 1 Kings 19:9a, 11-13a; Romans 9:1-5; Matthew 14: 22-33

Somehow, somewhere people came up with the idea

that the chief motivation behind the belief of Christians

was a sense of comfort in this life

and the promise of even more comfort in the next.

In this view, Christianity is for those who cannot face

the harsh realities of this world

and so hope for a better life in another world.

Christians are smug and complacent in their faith,

sure that they know all the answers

and have a firm footing in life.

I can speak only for myself,

but this is not my experience of being a Christian.

For me, the Christian faith seems at times

to make my life

much more complicated,

much more of an effort,

and, in a way, much more uncertain.

Faith places an infinite demand upon me

because it is assent to the truth of the infinite God,

a God whom we can never comprehend or control.

As the twentieth-century theologian Karl Rahner once said,

Christians are those

before whom the abyss of existence opens up –

those who know that they have not thought enough,

have not loved enough,

have not suffered enough.

So do not let anyone tell you otherwise:

to step out in faith

is to step into that abyss of existence.

Think of Peter in today’s Gospel:

Jesus had made the whole walking-on-the-water thing

look pretty easy

and this seemed like a good opportunity

to demonstrate that he,

alone among the apostles,

really had faith;

so Peter succumbed to his impetuous nature

and stepped out of the boat.

It seemed like a good idea at the time.

And for a while, it continued to seem like a good idea;

as Peter began to walk across the water toward Jesus.

But then he began to focus more on the wind and the waves

and the watery abyss beneath his feet

and he began to doubt

and he began to sink.

And suddenly the idea of stepping out of the boat

and into the abyss

began to seem like not so much of a good idea.

When I read this passage earlier this week

I thought, “yes, that’s exactly what it’s like.”

When I think about my life as a Christian,

I sometimes feel as if I have foolishly, impulsively,

climbed out of the boat,

inspired by God-knows-what impulse,

and I realize

that the waves are much higher than I thought

and the wind is much stronger than I thought

and the water is much deeper than I thought.

And I realize that I cannot think deeply enough

to grasp the mystery of God.

I realize that I cannot love passionately enough

to be worthy of the love that has been shown to me.

I realize that I cannot suffer willingly enough

to take upon myself the pain of others,

the pain of our world.

I stand suspended

over the infinite depth of divine mystery

and, as my fear takes control,

I begin to sink

and the only prayer I can utter

is to cry out, like Peter, “Lord, save me.”

And then there is Jesus

who grasps our hand and says,

“Take courage, it is I;

do not be afraid.”

As with Elijah in our first reading,

God comes to us not in a strong and heavy wind

or an earthquake

or a fire

but in a tiny whispering sound

that says “do not be afraid.”

God comes to us in the person of Jesus.

In Jesus Christ,

God has reached out to us with a human hand,

amidst the wind and the waves,

to catch us and hold us up over the abyss.

It is not our thinking

or our loving

or our suffering that can save us,

but only Jesus,

“who is over all, God blessed forever.”

If we trust in him,

if we cry out to him, “Lord, save me,”

we can trust that the storm will not overcome us,

the abyss will not swallow us up.

The Christian faith is hard,

not because it is complicated

but precisely because it is so simple.

All that it asks of us is that we see the world as it truly is,

to embrace the abyss that is the mystery of God,

and to trust the tiny whispering sound that says,

“Take courage, it is I;

do not be afraid.”