Testament Tuesday – Buoyed by Faith

There’s a story in the Bible that I feel like is a pretty well-known one. The story of Peter walking on the water with Jesus. In this story (in Matthew chapter 14:22-33) Jesus calls Peter to come out and walk on the water with him, so Peter gets out of the boat and starts walking towards Jesus. But then a gust of wind comes, and Peter begins to sink crying out for Jesus to save him.

Fear. It can be paralyzing. It can come out of nowhere. It can consume our thoughts, words, and actions. It fills us with uncertainty and makes us look for ways to “fix” the situation. But what it does the most is make us take our eyes off of God. And when we take our eyes off of God, we sink. It’s when we sink that we cry out to God for help, for saving. But why do we wait to cry out for help until we’re sinking? Why don’t we ask God for help and guidance every single day, whether we’re sinking with fear or not? God is always there to pull us up and embrace us when we sink. Just like He was there for Peter, look at these verses here.

Matthew 14:31-33,

“Instantly Jesus reached out His hand and caught and held Peter, 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 knelt and worshiped Him saying, ‘Truly You are the Son of God!’”

Fear is easy to sink into. As we see in this passage that even Jesus’ disciples lived in fear. We see this fear in several stories throughout the Bible. But here we see Peter feeling confident and reassured enough to step out onto the water. He boldly stepped out of the comfort of his boat and onto the sea trusting that Jesus would protect him. And yet once he answered Jesus’ call for him to come, he still let fear creep in and took his eyes off of Jesus. We do this too don’t we? We answer the call to do something bold, but the second we see the “wind” (whatever that may be) we start to sink. It’s times like this we must ask ourselves, am I actually “seeing” this wind? The answer is most likely no. Instead we’re letting our imaginations run wild with all of the negative possibilities and outcomes that could happen instead of simply trusting in God’s plan.

God doesn’t give us the spirit of fear. That’s something that we’ve developed ourselves overtime from outside factors. What God has given us is a spirit of power, love, and self-control. And those 3 things are all we need to keep our faith buoyed.

2 Timothy 1:5 says,

“the leaning of your entire personality on God in Christ is absolute trust and confidence in His power, wisdom, and goodness.”

That statement right there is something we should work towards and pray about every single day.

Here’s a start for our prayers today: “Dear God, I don’t want to give in to fear. Help me keep my faith buoyed in you and your word. Help me tap into my God-given potential and spirit of power, love, and self-control. Help me see that You’ve made a way for me and to trust in it. In Jesus’ name I pray, Amen.”