Matthew 14:31

either faith chases out fear or fear chases out faith.

Fear also helps us to forget who God is and what he's done. He heard the wind and he began to sink. And he forgot that voice that said, take heart, it is I. Do not be afraid. Then Peter cried out in prayer-like fashion, Lord, save me. His faith faltered, but he did the right thing. He called out to Jesus and Jesus saved him. Let me give you five bite-sized points of interest and five bite-sized applications. Number one, points of interest. Number one, Peter's standard failure. Everybody talks about this. He took his eyes off Christ. Don't do that. That's the lesson learned. Interesting, but incomplete. because Jesus never takes his eyes off Peter. Never, ever. Number two, Peter did not, cannot answer Jesus's question. He might explain, he might rationalize, he might justify, but there's no cause ever to doubt Christ. The biggest show of pride in the world is doubting the Lord. And the biggest and sweetest humility in the world is to put your trust in the Lord. Number three, be wholly dependent on Christ. Not partially. We don't compartmentalize. We can't pick and choose, although we love to do that. Peter's like all disciples. He's like us. We've got some faith. We've got some doubt. We walk toward Jesus. We trust him, but not fully. Not all the way. Dependence is in play, it's in motion, and it does make progress. The similar scene earlier in the book ended with,

what kind of man is this?

This scene ends with,

truly, you are. the Son of God.

They confess his deity, even if they don't understand all of it. Number four, Peter is of little faith, but technically he's called a little faith. That's the terminology. It mixes faith with lack of faith. And Matthew actually uses that five times in his book. A little faith, he is a little faith. The term sounds negative, a little bit of mocking perhaps. but it's a good start and it grows, it's progressive. We are striving to possess in full what is ours in Christ. And in this scene, Peter is moving toward Christ. And as we know, the Lord blesses anything that includes or features movement toward Jesus. Peter continued to grow, as we know. Strong enough to lead the church, fulfill the Great Commission. Number five in the points of interest. This is not a story about Peter as much as we like to take lessons from Peter or about us. It's not a story about Peter or us. It's a story about the mercy and the power of the Savior. Jesus is patient with us as we persevere toward him. Quick pause. Does this story resonate with you? In between points of interest and applications, do you see yourself in this scene? On a related note, are you a risk taker for Christ? Is he a big God with you? Or do we live in Ed Welch's world when people are big and God is small. Are you a faith demonstrator? Or does that belong to somebody else? Maybe that's not your style. Five applications. Number one, when we are looking at trouble, when we are surrounded by trouble, nothing but trials and tribulations, recognize that God is sovereign over that trouble. That's not, may not be our first inclination, but he is. In a similar vision, we tend to focus on the chisel instead of the sculptor. Number two, we need to remember that he's helped us in the past and he will help us into paradise. We live not only in a broken world, but in a contentious world. There's tension between the old man and the new man, the old nature and the new nature, holiness and sin, faith and doubt, strength and weaknesses. So we need to contend for the faith. Number three, when we cannot or will not come to Christ, then we need to come to him in prayer, just like Peter did. When we are weak, when our faith is weak, our prayer must be strong. I think it's interesting that Peter did not ask anything of the disciples, only of Christ. And Peter was delivered immediately on that prayer, and he was rebuked, but like we talked about before, The rebuke had a little compassion in it and maybe a little sense of humor if in fact little faith was an example of name calling. But the rebuke of the elements in the similar scene was the rebuke that followed again in this particular scene. Number four, the beginning of a clear sense of our own weakness or our own necessity, but I like the phrase weakness, is often the beginning of a display of the power of Christ. Sometimes we don't see that because we are so self-absorbed and looking in. Again, unbelief, we think of ignorance. We think of distractions, but again, we add forgetfulness to that. That's why scripture always tells us, remember, remember, remember who God is. Remember what God has done. Remember, we are prone to wander and we forget, we get distracted. Number five is the framework provided by the apostles when they asked the Lord to increase their faith. In the book of Luke, only God can address the fragility of our faith. We can't be intentional. I just need to love more and I just need to be more faithful. Again, as we all know, our hearts are desperately wicked, more deceitful than all else. Only God can address the fragility of our faith and that faith as we know. comes in small doses and even fragile measures. You know, we hear Paul talking about in the New Testament,

each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned.

We live in the moment and the real test is not that first step. Peter took the first step. The real test is after the first step, where you find, where we find that real staying power, faith and assurance. Bottom line, as we close, we all battle with our fate. even if we appear to be cruising or struggling, no one is immune. Disciples, so we need to nurture our faith. Don't feed our doubts and we need to trust that sweetness of trust in Christ, that he will preserve our faith and that our trials, your trials. And again, I just need to insert, are we people, brothers and sisters in Christ, that share those trials and tribulations because we want somebody to encourage us and pray for us? Or are we one of those people that thinks that they're too personal? to share and I keep it to myself. And so nobody knows that. Again, I walk in or we walk in, Don, how are you doing? I'm good. God is good. Praise the Lord. Wonderful, absolutely. But we're in fellowship. I should be able, we should be able to hurt and to share and to be prayed for. Again, he will preserve our faith and those trials will perfect our faith. Let's pray. Father, we thank you for your word. We thank you for this series on faith. We are encouraged by your loving patience with us and we pray for perseverance as we nurture our faith and you increase our faith. In Jesus' name we do pray, amen. And now may hear the benediction

and now may the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God the Father, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with us all forever. Amen.