RCL Year A (Proper 20) - September 21, 2008

The Rev’d Kenneth H. Saunders III
Christ Episcopal Church
Cleveland, NC
RCL Year A (Proper 20) - September 21, 2008


Exodus 16:2-15
Psalm 105:1-6, 37-45
Philippians 1:21-30
Matthew 20:1-16

The church has been grumbling for at least 7000 years… and we haven’t stopped yet… We seem to think sometimes that the grass is greener on the other side of the fence… That another way of life is better…

We sometimes act like little children and say, he or she got something that I didn’t get… they got more to eat than I did… or they got the toy they wanted and I didn’t get anything. Or worse yet… they got to do what they wanted and I didn’t get my way… or – they won’t cooperate and play the way we want them to play, so I am going to take my to take my toys and go home…

Have you ever had a job and it seemed your rate of pay was ok, until you found out what someone else was making?… If they were making more… we say, “how dare they think that they are doing as good a job or better than we are”… And if they are making less… we say, “why am I put to work side by side with such worthless people”…

Some of you may be able to identify with this… When I was a technician, I got lots of overtime for the extra hours that I worked… Each minute was accounted for as the clock was punched… but when I moved into management, and became a “professional” employee I caught myself working all the time, not punching a clock, I made a decent wage, but I always worked more hours than I was paid for... It didn’t seem fair… grumble, grumble, grumble…

And look at look at the way we live our materialistic lives… we have always got to have the best toys, the best clothes, the best homes, and the best cars… There is a popular saying that started out with a comic strip early in the 20th century, “Keeping up with the Joneses” – where one is expected to have or maintain a certain standard of living… I personally haven’t figured out who the Joneses are or why in the world we would want to keep up with them.” But for some reason, in our society we want to be considered as good as they are, and we envy what they have… And if we don’t get it, we grumble about what we don’t have. Then when we get it and we have it, we grumble about what a burden it is in our life…

What part of “thou shall not covet” don’t we understand? Don’t we realize that “he who dies with the most toys is still dead?” We grumble about what we should have gotten, or we grumble about the decisions that we should have or could have made…

Today’s lessons are about grumbling… grumbling about the should a, could a, would a’s in our lives…

The Israelites were fussing with Moses in the wilderness after being miraculously delivered from slavery in Egypt… They say… “If only we had died by the hand of the LORD in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the fleshpots and ate our fill of bread; for you (Moses) have brought us out into this wilderness to kill this whole assembly with hunger." Grumbling about it was their answer to starving to death…

They would rather grumble than figure out how or where to get some food… and remember – when you are grumbling, be sure that you blame the leadership. Cause we all know that it is the leader’s fault… it’s always someone else’s fault… Grumble, grumble, grumble…

They seem to think that the situation they are in now is somehow worse than living as a slave in Egypt… Yes, they were walking around in the desert, and they were hungry. But they didn’t trust God… They witnessed all the miracles that got them to the point that they are, and yet they were still grumbling… Thinking that God had forgotten them – and just left them in the dessert to die. Somehow, to them, being a slave in Egypt was somehow better than being free…

Then we come to the parable that Jesus tells us about the laborers in the vineyard… We get the image of a day-labor house, where a person like a vineyard owner (or a general contractor) can go and hire others that want to work… But this isn’t the case in Jesus’ story… these peasant workers are standing idle in the marketplace… not refusing work… but not doing the honorable thing and seeking it either…

We jump right in… and we are quick to identify with the ones that have worked all day in the scorching heat… We quickly say… “whoa… wait a minute here… we have worked hard all day – and they have only been here a little while… How come they got the same pay that we did???” Because it was expected back then, as it is now, that the folks who worked longer hours get more pay…

But what if, by chance, we were to identify with the ones that had only been on the job for a couple of hours… Would we think that we had gotten away with something? Would we think that we didn’t deserve the wage that we were given? I hesitate that any of us would say… “Hey, wait a minute, I was only here a couple of hours, yet you paid me for the whole day.”

Jesus once again turns the values system of his time on its’ head. Telling them a story like this, and then telling them, “this is what the kingdom of God is like” would completely shock his peasant audience. Shocked, because they still related what Jesus was saying to material wealth. Shocked, because like you and me, they identified immediately with the workers who had worked all day in the scorching sun, only to be given an unfair wage for their labors… Shocked, because they choose to set their minds on earthly things and things passing away, and not focus on heavenly things and things that shall endure…

The past few Sundays, we have learned a lot in the lections about living in community. Of how we are to be together… as a family, on a planned focused mission… and how to act if something goes amiss… How we are to approach our brothers and sisters in Christ, hash it out, learn from each other, pray together and remain focused…

That led up to a parable that we had last week explaining how we are to forgive, without limits, showing others the kingdom of God to others through our actions of forgiveness. We learned that forgiveness is a difficult, but regardless of how difficult it is, forgiveness is a thing that we should continuously work at… letting God be the ultimate judge.

Today we get a glimpse of the generosity of God… but not monetarily… God provides manna in the wilderness, and feeds the Israelites with the manna of the wilderness… God shows grace to God’s people, providing for them, and delivering them from their hardships as they continue on the journey that God has set them on… Jesus has used our system of thinking against us, and sheds light for us again on what the kingdom of God might look like… Not monetarily… but of the generosity of God’s grace and blessing, equal for all who turn to God and focus on things heavenly…

We have a chance this morning to experience the equality and the generosity of God. When we come down the isle, and kneel at the rail, as always, we are all equal in the eyes of God, receiving the grace and blessing that God gives to us through the spiritual food provided to us to sustain us on our spiritual journey.

What we do from there with our material lives – our time, our talent and our treasure – and how we use that life to honor God is all a response to the generosity that God has provided to us…

And we all are so very very blessed in this life… so why do we grumble so much about what we think is happening or could happen?… or about what we think we should be getting in return for our labors?? or about what we think our brothers and sisters in the community should be doing???

Our focus this morning is on things eternal – those things that endure in our life now and in our life to come, Not on things of this earth – those things that pass away… Regardless of what we feel about the equities or inequities of our life, God is always there, loving us equally, providing for us, guiding us, and blessing us…

What we do in response to the generosity of God’s grace in our lives is up to us… Thanks be to God!

RCL Year A (Proper 19) - September 14, 2008

The Rev’d Kenneth H. Saunders III
Christ Episcopal Church
Cleveland, NC
RCL Year A (Proper 19) - September 14, 2008

Genesis 37:1-4, 12-28
Psalm 105, 1-6, 16-22, 45b
Romans 10:5-15
Matthew 14:22-33

Have you ever been so frustrated with someone that you just wanted to grab them by the throat and choke the life right out of them? As gratifying as it may be to any of us… we know that it doesn’t solve anything.

This kind of action solves nothing in our world, but only adds to the frustration and violence that caused the original situation in the first place. We know that violence and a physical altercation like that wouldn’t solve a thing because we are intelligent people of reason and understanding, but most importantly, we know that we have a God that has forgiven us…

Last week, Jesus taught us what to do if we felt that someone in the Church wronged us… We were to go to that person face to face and speak to them, reason with them, learn the circumstances, forgive them and pray with them…

If that didn’t work, we were to take a couple of more with us to meet with the person, letting those others help us digest the situation, reason together, learn from each other, and forgive them and pray with them…

These are all tough things to do when you are angry… I mean really angry… with an anger so deep that it becomes the acid of hate that starts to eat right through the container of your soul…

Paul understood anger, and we know that he understood forgiveness, but he comes to Jesus anyway and asks… How many times do I forgive? As many as seven?… the amount according to Hebrew custom, that was considered extremely generous… and Jesus says no… you should forgive them 77 times… which was a colloquial way to say always.

So Jesus tells us a parable to explain the teaching… The parable of the unforgiving servant… about a King wishing to settle his accounts going to the folks that owed him money and collecting…

A servant was brought to him that owed him 10,000 talents… now how much is 10,000 talents? Well, a denarii is a days wages… and talent would be 15 years of wages… so this guy owed 150,000 years of wages.

If we compare this to a person today that makes the full time minimum wage a mere $13,625 a year – He would owe about $2,043,750,000 an absolutely absurd amount in any standard of place and time…

So the king calls him forward and demands that he liquidate everything that he has, all his possessions… himself and even his wife and his children which were considered property back then… to make payment…

The servant is devastated and pleads with the King for mercy and the king has pity and releases him, and then does the unheard of and forgives him his massive amount of dept…

Wow… this guy should be thankful, happy… dancing on a cloud… he owed over 2 billion dollars and his account was completely zeroed… but what did this guy do?

Yeah… he got real bold and full of himself, and when he came upon someone that owed him money, in this case only 100 denarii, he grabs him by the throat and says “give me what you owe me!” The man pleads with the servant, just as he did with the king… but when the man couldn’t pay, the servant had him thrown in jail… Oooo… This didn’t make the king happy one bit…

When the King found out, he had the servant brought before him again, to find out why the servant had not forgiven the other as he had been forgiven. Then he handed him over to be tortured until he repaid all that he owed…

When a member of the church sins against me? How many times must I forgive them? As many as seven? Jesus says, no -“You must forgive them always…”

Sometimes the pop-Christian perspective is to say – that’s pretty easy… forgive and forget… let go and let God… this in part may be true, but the human memory can be far more durable than human will… in being lassie-fair about it all, the act doesn’t become fully erased in our minds, despite our hearts determination to be rid of it completely.

Forgiveness is difficult and our patience runs out very quickly… This causes our reactions to look like more of the servant, choking his fellow servant. The root of the difficulty to me seems to be our hardness of heart…

Jesus sets up a dichotomy of difference between the seven and seventy-seven years, the servant and the king, the 100 days and the 150,000 years… all to show us that forgiveness is not easy, even when it seems outrageously simple on paper.

As Christians, we should continuously work on accepting our forgiveness and start to let go of the things that aren’t worth holding onto… As Christians, we are to be the bearers of the message of reconciliation…

I spent some time last week defining the Church - The Church Christ centered and mission focused… The focus of its sole mission: to restore humanity to God through Jesus Christ our Lord…

We should work at being Christ to others… But that forgiveness part, that’s difficult, and it doesn’t do us any good to pretend otherwise. I am here to tell you that forgiveness is only possible, by the Grace of God! But it is hard work for us and in order to forgive… We have to work at it… to let the flakes and the layers fall off of our tough exterior shell that has become hardened and bitter by our powerful desire for vengeance.

Paul reminds us that we are not to pass judgment on others, nor or we to despise them… because God judges rightly and with an accuracy that we cannot even claim to have. God judges, but God also redeems with great generosity.

We should show others this great generosity… especially the folks that we want to choke the life out of… We need to reconcile with them to show them true forgiveness… And have them encounter in us the vision of God in Christ, the God that loves us and suffers with us to seemingly impossible degrees… only then can the love and empathy in them spring up and grow in their hearts as it does ours.

I saw an incredible movie several years ago called “Pay it Forward.” It is a story about Young Trevor McKinney who got caught up by an intriguing Social Studies assignment. The assignment was to think of something to change the world and then put it into action.

Trevor conjures the notion of paying a favor not back, but forward - repaying good deeds not with payback, but with new good deeds done to three new people. Trevor's efforts to make good on his idea bring a revolution not only in his life but that of his family, and even in those of an ever-widening circle of people completely unknown to him. In effect, he was changing the world… by “paying it forward” –

Even though this movie had no religious theme or undertone, for me it really summed up the just of our lesson this morning… Pay it forward… never letting the chain of love end with you! Whether we are the offenders, in need of great mercy or the offended in need of divine grace and patience…

We have no refuge than that of the goodness of God, made known to us in the person of Jesus Christ. And if our hearts are open to such mercy and grace, -- out of that divine mercy and grace flows true generosity and forgiveness…

We have a God that has forgiven us… all we need to do is accept it, act on it, and pay it forward… thanks be to God…

RCL Year A (Proper 17) - August 31, 2008

The Rev. Kenneth H. Saunders, III
St. Andrew's Episcopal Church/Christ Episcopal Church
Cleveland, NC
August 31, 2008
RCL Year A – Proper 17
St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church – Homecoming Service

Exodus 3:1-15
Psalm 105:1-6, 23-26, 45c
Romans 12:9-21
Matthew 16:21-28

Surrounded by the beauty and history of this holy place, it is easy to get distracted…

So this morning, I am going to try to help you out a little bit…

Several years ago, my spiritual director taught me this centering exercise, and I still use it often to reorient myself and focus, to remind me of what my purpose on this Earth is.

So I am going to pass it along to you today… and I hope you will use it on your own spiritual journey.

I want everyone to please take a deep breath and repeat after me very slowly…

“be still and know that I am God”
“be still and know that I am”
“be still and know”
“be still”
“be”
(again)

God is!! God is a form of being… God is! God was! and God always will be!

Moses knew it! The Apostles and Prophets knew it! Paul knew it! The founders of St. Andrew’s Church knew it! and We know it still today!

God is!! – sometimes we just need to be still for a moment and remember that God is...

You and I both know that this is a busy, busy world… we should sometimes just take some time out, time out to be still and remember that God is…

Moses was busy. He had been raised in Egypt in the family of Pharaoh, and been placed as a taskmaster over some of Pharaoh’s projects. But one day, he was protecting one of the Hebrew slaves who was being beaten by and Egyptian. Needless to say, Pharaoh got word of it and sought to kill Moses. So Moses left Egypt and fled to Midian, and married Zipporah, one of the seven daughters of Jethro, who was the local priest there.

This is where we pick up the story today… Moses is busy minding his father-in-law Jethro’s flock and led it beyond the wilderness… a place of danger and mystery…
in the ancient world, the wilderness was a wild place… one just didn’t go to the wilderness for fun… often when we see the word wilderness in the Bible, it is intend to make us think of a place of thirst, hunger, and deprivation, a place haunted by beasts and demons, and a place echoing with frightful noises…

We can assume that Moses had good reason to be there… but the part that sticks out, the part that we all know and love isn’t the fact that Moses was in the wilderness, tending his father-in-laws sheep… In fact we even forget about the sheep at the point that Moses encounters the flame of a fire that is coming out of a bush…

I am sure that it wasn’t strange in a dry and barren land, to see scattered brush fires here and there… but this one was a bit different… and got Moses’ attention… Moses went up to inspect… and saw that the bush was blazing, but wasn’t being consumed…

Now most of us know that there are 3 things in our physical world necessary for fire… heat, oxygen, and fuel… Moses caught on very quickly that this fire was very real but it was missing something… fuel… the bush was burning, but is wasn’t being burned…

Then in the still quiet, out of the blazing bush, God calls out “Moses, Moses…” and Moses responds “here I am”… God instructs Moses to come no closer and remove the sandals from his feet… God tells Moses… “you are on holy ground.”

Then, in an act of complete submission, Moses removes his sandals… To a shepherd, his shoes are his protection, making it possible to navigate the rough terrain of the countryside… Removing his sandals in the wilderness makes Moses completely vulnerable to his surroundings… Moses was frightened, yet listening intently to God’s every word…

God goes on to tell Moses that God has seen the torment of the Hebrews in Egypt, and has listened to their cry… God sends Moses back to Egypt to retrieve God’s people and lead them to a land promised to them… the land flowing with Milk and honey…
and God instructs Moses to bring them back to the Mountain to worship God…

God redeems God’s people… God heard them… God heard their prayers for deliverance, and their cries out for salvation… And God sent them a savior… Moses… God delivered them out of slavery in the land of Egypt and led them across the red sea to a land flowing with milk and honey… God redeems God’s people…

And God still redeems God’s people… God hasn’t stopped…
In the time of Hebrew history when the Roman government was growing strong and dominating the lands around the Mediterranean, the whole world was a mess… God heard the cries once again of a broken and battered world… and God is faithful… God redeems God’s people… But this time, God didn’t send us a Moses to lead us out of the bondage of slavery… God came to us himself in the person of Jesus Christ… his only son, the righteous man who walked on this earth and died on a cross, God became fully human being, to save us from ourselves…

God redeemed us then from the mistakes we have made, taught us by his example how to live in community and in relationship with one another, and how to love one another. All we have to do is be still long enough to listen, follow, and believe…

Jesus reminds us this morning that following him is not going to be easy… following him is not going to be the easy way… nor even the desired way caught up in the way of the world…

He tells us that in order to be focused, and do what he needs us to do, that we need to focus on divine things… not human things…

This is where we learn from Moses… in order to be focused on divine things we should be still and listen. Listen for that still small quite voice of God…

Then we should humble ourselves… we should to take off our sandals and make ourselves vulnerable to be formed into what Christ desires for us…

we should be still for a while and listen…

Moses asks What shall I say to the Israelites when I get back to Egypt???
Gods says, “Tell them that the God of your ancestors has sent me to you, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob….”
Then Moses asks what if they ask me “what is his name?” What do I tell them?
God said to Moses, I AM WHO I AM…

Be still and know that I am God…
Be still and know that I am
Be still and know….
Be still…
Be

RCL Year A (Proper 15) - August 17, 2008

The Rev'd Kenneth H. Saunders III
Christ Episcopal Church
Cleveland, NC
RCL Year A (Proper 15)

Genesis 45:1-15
Psalm 133
Romans 11:1-2a, 29-32
Matthew 15: (10-20), 21-28

After a year of being here in the wonderful metropolis of Cleveland, NC – y’all have taught me a lot… I have learned a lot about the area, and the wonderful little towns that surround Cleveland…

Mt. Ulla (and after a year, I finally learned how to say that correctly), Woodleaf, Barber (which I have learned is now part of Cleveland), and even the greater surrounding areas… the larger cities of Mooresville, Mocksville, Salisbury, and Statesville...

Being here in the middle of everything, Cleveland is very unique and in some ways isolated or closed off. People outside of Cleveland, sometimes don’t even know where Cleveland is…

I ran into someone in Salisbury the other day – I actually had to explain where Cleveland was… Even within Cleveland, as small as it may be, there are different groups that are a bit isolated within itself.

I went to the Third Creek Presbyterian Church last Sunday for the installation of their new pastor Don McCann (did y’all know there were Presbyterians in Cleveland?)

It is so easy sometimes to draw circles in our travels so that some are inside and others are out. It may be around people of a different race or ethnic origin, different gender or gender orientation, age, educational background or abilities…

It is easy to look at that person with too many tattoos or too many body piercings, or that person who stutters or the one who didn't make it through high school and say “this person is just not like us.”

Our Gospel text for this morning speaks directly to "us" and "them."

Jesus has gone out of the land of Israel into the region of Tyre and Sidon –– he is a Jew that has just crossed into Gentile territory. Then a woman from the area comes to Jesus –– Matthew uses the word "Canaanite" rather than "Syro-Phoenician." Now, this term is loaded for Jewish people because the Canaanites were the pagans with whom the Israelites fought for centuries. The Canaanites were idol worshippers and didn’t believe in the one true God.

It was a Canaanite woman who comes to Jesus. She came alone without a man to escort her… without a husband or son or father – this was totally unheard of in her culture. And she came to Jesus shouting loudly, "Have mercy on me, Lord, Son of David."

This woman had three strikes against her –– she was not Jewish – She was a pagan Canaanite . She was a woman –– strike two –– and she presumed to speak openly to a man without a male intermediary. And strike three –– she was a pest, whose screaming and shouting behavior would possibly bring trouble to Jesus and His followers.

So, the disciples came and urged Jesus, “Send her away, for she keeps shouting at us." They clearly draw the circle –– Jesus and the disciples and Jewish men are inside – and this bothersome, Canaanite woman is outside.

What I find interesting is how much a man of His time and place that Jesus really was. It seems at first that Jesus agreed with his followers so he tried to brush the woman off. Because his mission was to Israel only. But, she confessed him Lord and Messiah, something many of the people in Israel would not confess.

She asked him for mercy and knelt down before him in a posture of supplication and worship. And she had faith that Jesus could heal her daughter of a tormenting demon.
But what did Jesus do when she wouldn’t go away? He called her a dog.

Did you know that in the Middle East, even today, people do not keep pet dogs? But we do! We shampoo them and trim them, buy them treats, and even dress them up for holidays. Ours is a world that is definitely far away from that of the Middle East.

In Islam, dogs are considered unclean and are reduced to scavenging at the edges of the villages and towns. It was the same in Bible times. The Jews called the Gentiles "dogs" and it was NOT a term of endearment but rather of derision.

It is the term used by Jesus for this woman, "It is not fair to take the children's bread and throw it to dogs." But she turned around and used the same phrase to say to Jesus, "Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master's table."

She had Him there. With that reply, she broke the circle and entered in. Salvation came to her and her possessed daughter not because she became Jewish or promised to keep the Law of Moses. Not because she became the only person in scripture to outwit Jesus.

Here in Matthew's Gospel she finds salvation through faith in Jesus alone. Jesus said to her, "Woman, great is your faith! Let it be done to you as you wish." And her daughter was healed instantly.

The Gospel is not just for men, for Jews, or for people who conform to our expectations of them. It actually took the Church a long time to realize this. In fact, the first great controversy in the Christian Church was whether Gentiles had to become Jews before they could become Christians. Paul the great apostle to the Gentiles even argued that Gentile men did not need to be circumcised to be baptized.

Peter had revealed to him by God that the dietary laws commanded in the Hebrew Bible were no longer required. No person was to be called common or unclean. And - At the first Council of Jerusalem (about year 50 – revealed in the book of Acts) it was agreed that Gentiles could become Christians.

Paul, writing to the Romans, declares that Jews and Gentiles are both sinners and are invited to be God's people through faith in Jesus.
We are not saved by our gender or our status, our by our race or our educational level, or our good behavior. We do not find our self worth in what others think of us – but by being children of God and heirs to God's Kingdom through faith in Jesus Christ alone.

What our Gospel text clearly says today – is we are saved by faith in Jesus alone. And in our text we see how Jesus can set aside even clear Scripture teaching for the sake of people.

In the first part of our reading from Matthew, Jesus takes on the Holiness Code of the Old Testament. He and his disciples were accused of not washing their hands before they ate. Jesus argues that it was not what went in a person that defiled but rather the evil and malice that come out of the human heart.

If the rules and regulations hurt people, they could be put aside. Remember that the Sabbath was made for humans not humans made for the Sabbath. God's Laws are made to free not oppress and even Scriptural warrant can be set aside for the greater good of loving God and others.

In the second part of the same chapter, Jesus sets aside the whole system of salvation from the Old Testament. The Hebrew Bible cared about the Gentiles, and looked for the day when all the nations would come together in Zion.

God was to accomplish God's mission in and through the Jewish people only. This is what Jesus starts to affirm –– the Gospel is for the lost sheep of the house of Israel. But the text does not stop there and in this passage, we see that the Old Testament scheme is set aside.

God's good news is for all people, not just some. Christ died for all people, not just for some. Forgiveness is for all people not just for some. The only condition is faith - which is itself a gift of God.

Others may be different from ourselves and often what makes them different is something we don't like – or something that is not like us. The Church has been guilty of keeping people out rather than inviting them in.

We are just human beings and fallen, sinful ones at that. We know what we like and we like what we know. Think of the disciples, they were the same way. Remember, the disciples were not God. Remember that neither the Church nor the rector nor the vestry is God either.

God is faithful and loving even when God's servants may not be. Only God draws the circle wide enough to bring everyone in into God’s loving embrace. Never let anyone or anything try to separate you from God's love in Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen!

RCL Year A (Proper 14) - August 10, 2008

The Rev'd Kenneth H. Saunders III
Christ Episcopal Church
Cleveland, NC
RCL Year A (Proper 14) - August 10, 2008

Genesis 37:1-4, 12-28
Psalm 105, 1-6, 16-22, 45b
Romans 10:5-15
Matthew 14:22-33

When I was about 4 years old, my parents were determined to teach me how to ride a 2 wheel bicycle. I can remember my father or mother securely holding the seat of the bicycle while I peddled and tried to steer strait.

Again and again I would try, and knowing he or she was back there made it ok…

Ok of course, until they let go. Then I got scared…

I was unable to go it alone… the front wheel would start to wobble a little and I would eventually fall… over and over again I would try… and after a case or 2 of band-aids, I got better and better, growing more and more confident… and less fearful…

Now - quite unlike trying to ride a bike, in today’s gospel, we hear the story of Peter trying to walk on water. We all know the story well. And it’s not like he got a whole lot of practice…

The disciples were alone in the boat, a terrible storm had come up, and Jesus was walking toward them across the water like ghost or an apparition, and the Gospel says that they were filled with fear… they were down right scared.

The storm was very, very real, and they were in that small fishing boat. If you have ever been in a small boat when a storm came up, you know what I am talking about… they had good reason to be scared.

And then, to see Jesus walking across the lake in the dark, in the violence of the storm, doing what was impossible by any human standards - That must have been completely terrifying.

In fact, to try to do anything that might be considered impossible all alone… all by ourselves, without God, is always terrifying.

but Peter listens… And Jesus simply says, “Come,” and Peter gets out of the boat in a response that defies every bit of logic that we can imagine. Peter walks a few yards… but Peter could not walk on that water for only one reason: fear. He looked around at the worldly reality of the storm, the physics of the water, the incomprehensibility of the situation, the total absurdity of it all, and his own fear overwhelmed him. Peter began to sink.

And then Peter did what we must all do at times. Peter cried out, “Lord, save me!” because In our life, we all create our own boats… and these boats are often symbols of false security, often reflected in our materialism, our bank accounts, what we drive or where we live… And these boats of ours are also floating on troubled waters… and they are being tossed and turned by the way we live our lives…

So I ask you this morning… to overcome your fear and get out of your boat… What is the boat in your life that you are afraid to get out of? What is the boat in your life that prevents you from following God’s call to come? What is the fear that imprisons you and makes you sink and start to drown in the stormy waters?

You know, I eventually learned how to ride a 2 wheel bicycle – In fact, I got right good at it and when I was growing up, you could hardly get me off of my bike. (but I probably don’t ride often enough today.) Thinking back, I remembered how I learned to ride… and that is what parallels the gospel story this morning.

See, my fear started when I thought that my father had let go… I learned to ride because, I stopped worrying about it… and just imagined him there, right beside me all the time… helping guide me and keep me balanced. How do we live this life… knowing that we are loved and protected… knowing that we are safe and guided by the very hand of God???

We shout out… Lord save us! Lord save us all!

The Paul’s letter to the Romans today gives the directions for what we must do to receive that salvation of Jesus. We must ask. We must cry out, “Jesus save me!” We must believe in our hearts – really believe – that it is Jesus the Christ who gives us life… forever eternal life. And we cry out.

We proclaim it with our lips. We believe, and shout it out loud, “Jesus is Lord.” And then we can get out of the boat and walk on the water, the water that tries to overtake us and drown us, we can rise above the troubled water of fear.

Jesus save me! Amen!