"My Love Colours Outside the Lines" (sermon)

Two Rivers Pastoral Charge

August 7, 2022

Scripture:  Matthew 14:22-33

 

 

Peter, Peter, Peter. What can I say about Peter?!  He was the first disciple that Jesus called, along with his brother Andrew and another set of brothers, James and John – all of them fishermen on the Sea of Galilee.  He was part of Jesus’s inner, inner circle – one of Jesus’s closest friends and disciples.  He made extravagant promises, promising to follow Jesus wherever he might go, even to death itself, but then the very next day he denied three times that he knew Jesus.  Peter was the very first person to name Jesus as the Messiah, the Christ, the Anointed One; but then right away tried to stop Jesus from talking about his death, causing Jesus to utter those famous (or infamous) words to Peter, “Get behind me, Satan.”  Jesus called Peter a rock, and said that upon the foundation of this rock would be built the entire church.  And after Jesus’s death, Peter was, indeed, one of the leaders in the early church, preaching to crowds, healing people, and leading the church through a time of rapid growth and expansion throughout the known world.

 

With all that we are told about Peter, I get the sense that he probably had a pretty big personality.  I get the sense that he was the sort of person who would rush headlong into things without thinking them all the way through, the sort of person with no filter who would blurt out the first thing that popped into his mind.  Do and say first, then think later.  I wouldn’t be surprised if there are at least one or two people here today who can relate to Peter!

 

As an introvert though, I don’t relate to Peter.  I tend to think things through in 50 different ways before doing or saying them.  Overthinking can be my downfall, for all of the missed opportunities.  Add in a dose of social anxiety, and I am usually the last person to rush into things – new things, new experiences, new people can make me nervous.

 

In today’s story, we get to see Peter in all of his Peter-ness.  The disciples are in a boat, part-way across the water, being battered by a storm with wind and with waves; when all of a sudden they see Jesus walking across the surface of the water coming towards them.  They are afraid – is this a ghost?  Surely no mere human would be able to walk on the water.  But Jesus reassures them – “Take heart; have courage; it’s just me; don’t be afraid.”

 

In to the conversation jumps Peter.  He says, “OK Jesus – if it’s really you, tell me to get out of the boat and walk on the water like you.”  Surely this has to be Peter’s impulsiveness at play here!  Surely he hasn’t taken the time to think this through.  Even though he was a fisherman, it is highly unlikely that he knew how to swim, and we are still many centuries away from lifejackets and PFDs.  And in the worldview of that time and place, the water was the place of chaos, of evil, of monsters and demons.  If Peter had thought through what he was saying, would he ever tell Jesus to tell him to get out of the boat in the middle of the lake in the middle of a storm?!

 

But impulsive Peter does just that.  And Jesus calls him out of the boat.  And wouldn’t you know, Peter starts walking across the surface of the water towards Jesus.

 

But as soon as his mind slows down, as soon as he starts to think about it, as soon as he realizes what he’s doing, then he starts to sink.  It’s that moment when a child is learning how to ride a bicycle – the adult has let go of the seat and they are riding on their own, but as soon as they realize they are riding on their own, they panic and fall.

 

Peter begins to sink; he cries out to Jesus to save him; Jesus reaches out his hand, and pulls Peter to safety.  And as he does so, Jesus says, “You of little faith, why did you doubt?”

 

I hear the voice of a parent hear, teaching their child to ride a bicycle – you have to trust yourself, you can do this, you ARE doing this!

 

It’s a great story, but I’m not Peter, I’m not in a boat in a storm on the Sea of Galilee, so what might we be able to take away from this story?

 

An easy, and maybe trite answer might be to keep our eyes on Jesus.  Whatever we are doing, we should keep our whole focus on Jesus, because it was only when Peter lost that focus that he began to sink.  Let’s not give Jesus cause to say to us, “You of little faith, why did you doubt?”

 

That is an easy take-away from this story, but it doesn't quite sit with me, at least not today, not this week. If I wanted to go a little deeper, I might say that we all need - or at least I need - a little more Peter in us, in me.  After all, Peter is the only one who dared to risk stepping over the gunwales of the boat that day.  Peter is the only one who dared to risk walking on water, and even though he began to sink, the other disciples didn’t even get that far.

 

This is a hard lesson for me to hear.  Like I said, I am an over-thinker who tends to be happiest with routine and same old / same old.  I need have a bit more Peter in me.  I sometimes need to risk stepping out from the safety of the boat into the risky unknown.

 

One thing that I have learned in my life is that the more reluctant, the more hesitant I am about a new experience, the better the payoff will be in terms of joy and friendship.  I’ve had to learn to push myself out of the boat into the unknown.

 

I think of yesterday’s Pride Parade in Saint John.  It would have been a whole lot easier for me to have said, forget it, I’d rather spend my Saturday at home with my cats and a book; but instead, because our group from Two Rivers was willing to step out of the boat and take a risk in proclaiming the expansiveness of God’s love, to take a risk in proclaiming that all people are created in God’s image – because we were willing to take that risk, our afternoon was filled with joy and with love.

 

And I think that love is the bottom line.  We aren’t stepping out of the boat to show off – look at us, look at what we can do.  As a church, we are called to step out of the boat for the sake of love.  We are called to follow Jesus’s voice, to take risks, for the sake of proclaiming a message of love and for the sake of increasing the love in the world.

 

And I know that we are supposed to be exploring the theology of our favourite hymns this summer, and I promise you that I’m getting there.  “My Love Colours Outside the Lines.”  We are called to love in new ways and in new places.  We’re called to walk beyond the boundaries where we’ve never been before – in love.  As the powerful chorus reminds us – “We’ll never walk on water, if we’re not prepared to drown; and we’ll never move the gravestones if we’re not prepared to die.”

 

We have to be prepared to take these risks – to love boldly and expansively in the way that Jesus calls us to love.  And then… then our love will be colouring outside of the lines.  And may it be so.  Amen.

 

 

Saint John Pride Parade – August 6, 2022 - so much joy!

“Created in God’s Image”