“Immediately he made the disciples get into the boat and go before him to the other side, while he dismissed the crowds. And after he had dismissed the crowds, he went up on the mountain by himself to pray. When evening came, he was there alone, but the boat by this time was a long way from the land, beaten by the waves, for the wind was against them. And in the fourth watch of the night he came to them, walking on the sea. But when the disciples saw him walking on the sea, they were terrified, and said, ‘It is a ghost!’ and they cried out in fear. But immediately Jesus spoke to them, saying, ‘Take heart; it is I. Do not be afraid.’
“And Peter answered him, ‘Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water.’ He said, ‘Come.’ So Peter got out of the boat and walked on the water and came to Jesus. But when he saw the wind, he was afraid, and beginning to sink he cried out, ‘Lord, save me.’ Jesus immediately reached out his hand and took hold of him, saying to him, ‘O you of little faith, why did you doubt?’ And when they got into the boat, the wind ceased. And those in the boat worshiped him, saying, ‘Truly you are the Son of God.’” (Matthew 14:22-33 ESV)
Sometimes, when we are in the middle of difficult circumstances, and all seems to be going against us, and not for us, and Jesus enters into those circumstances, we may not even recognize that it is him there. We may be so focused on our problems that we don’t even see him there waiting to speak to us, to bring comfort and encouragement to our hearts, and to counsel us in the way that we should go. For all we see are the waves crashing against us, and all we see are impossible situations, when instead we need to see that Jesus is right there and he has it all under control.
And if we pray, and we ask the Lord to reveal himself to us, so that we know that it is him speaking to us, and he shows us that it is him, and that we should not be afraid, then we need to trust him to lead us in the right direction. And if we then step out in faith, and we walk by faith and not by sight, but then something happens that shakes our faith, we are not to give way to fear. We are not to lose sight of Jesus and that he is there and that he is in control of what is going on about us. And we need to trust him. For he has it all handled. We just need to believe that he does.
Now, this is certainly not teaching that we sit back and do nothing. For the Lord has things for us to do, by faith in him. He has given us gifts of his Spirit, and he has assigned us particular roles (body parts, functions) in his body which he intends for us to fill. And he has given us all sorts of instructions in the Scriptures regarding what we should be doing and not doing. But we must not go in the flesh, and we must not leave God out of the picture, but we must walk by faith in his strength and power, letting him lead and empower and equip us to do the work he has called us to do.
For he is not going to call all of us to easy stuff. In fact, he taught us that if we follow him that it means death to sin and to self and following him in obedience wherever he leads us, and it means we will be hated and persecuted and that we will be faced with a lot of challenges and difficult situations to try our faith. But we are to grow in our walks of faith through these trials and not let them defeat us. And we are to trust the Lord that he is there and that he has all things under his control, and then we must follow his lead and walk by faith and not by sight.
So, the encouragement here for all of us who profess faith in Jesus Christ is to trust the Lord fully with our lives, to surrender all to him, to die with him to sin, and to live for him and in righteousness, holiness, godliness, and in obedience to his commands. And then we are to walk by faith and not by sight, trusting the Lord to lead us in the way that he would have us go. And then we need to obey him, even if it means having all kinds of things crashing against us, and people hating us and disapproving of us. And we need to believe that God has all things under his control. So trust Him.
[Matt 5:10-12; Matt 10:16-25; Matt 24:9-14; Lu 6:22-23; Lu 21:12-19; Jn 15:1-21; Jn 16:33; Jn 17:14; Ac 14:22; Rom 5:3-5; Phil 3:7-11; 1 Pet 1:6-7; 1 Pet 4:12-17; 2 Tim 3:12; 1 Thess 3:1-5; Jas 1:2-4; 2 Co 1:3-11; Heb 12:3-12; 1 Jn 3:13; Rev 6:9-11; Rev 7:9-17; Rev 11:1-3; Rev 12:17; Rev 13:1-18; Rev 14:1-13]
VOICE OF TRUTH
By Mark Hall & Steven Curtis Chapman
II Corinthians 12:7-10/I Corinthians 1:20-24
Oh what I would do to have
The kind of faith it takes to climb out of this boat I’m in
Onto the crashing waves
To step out of my comfort zone
Into the realm of the unknown where Jesus is
And He’s holding out His hand
But the waves are calling out my name and they laugh at me
Reminding me of all the times I’ve tried before and failed
The waves they keep on telling me
Time and time again, “Boy, you’ll never win!”
“You’ll never win!”
But the voice of truth tells me a different story
The voice of truth says, “Do not be afraid!”
And the voice of truth says, “This is for My glory”
Out of all the voices calling out to me
I will choose to listen and believe the voice of truth
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Walking Wounded 