Alright brother, let's go back
now. John chapter 6. Let's read this one more time.
John chapter 6. The Lord had fed the multitude
and they wanted to take him by force and make him an earthly
king. And when the evening was now come, his disciples went
down unto the sea. And they entered a ship and went
over the sea toward Capernaum. And it was now dark, and Jesus
was not come to them. And the sea arose by reason of
a great wind that blew. So when they had rowed about
five and twenty or thirty furlongs, they see Jesus walking on the
sea and drawing nigh unto the ship, and they were afraid. But
he said to them, It is I, be not afraid. And then they willingly
received him into the ship, and immediately the ship was at the
land where they went. Now Mark tells us that he constrained
his disciples to get in the ship. This multitude was wanting to
take the Lord and make Him a king, an earthly king, and he constrained
them. He constrained them to get into
this ship to go to the other side before to Bethsaida while
he sent away the people. Now that's so with all God's
elect. It's by Christ that we're brought
together into fellowship. He brings us into the same boat. So we're fellows in the same
ship. And it's just like they began crossing this sea, going
to the other side, we're crossing this sea, going to the other
side. We're on a sea, a trip across
the sea, and in the first hour and every hour, the constraint
is Christ's love. It's Christ's wisdom, his word,
his power, his love. That's what separated His disciples
from the multitude. That's what's going to separate
His people from the multitude, keep us separated from the multitude
and separated unto Him and fellowship with Him and with one another.
He was doing two things by this. He was protecting them from the
multitude and He was sending them into another test. He just
tried them, just tested them, He sent them into another. And
that's what our Lord's always doing for His people. He's protecting
us and He's sending us into another trial. He's teaching us more
about Himself. Teaching us more about ourselves.
Doing it every day. Growing His people in grace and
knowledge of Him. Growing us up into Him and growing
us down in ourselves. Up into Him, down in ourselves.
To trust Him more, trust ourselves less. He said in John 17, you
want to look there at the high priestly prayer, he's praying,
this is the Lord's prayer, John 17. He's praying on behalf of
his people and he says in verse 15, I pray not that thou shouldest
take them out of the world, but thou shouldest keep them from
the evil. They're not of the world even
as I am not of the world. sanctify them through Thy truth,
Thy word is truth. And that's how He's going to
keep us sanctified unto Him, separated unto Him, keep us united
with Him. Now, so let's look first of all
here at this other trial. Here we have another trial, another
test, another teaching. He said in verse 17, and it was
now dark, and Jesus was not come to them, and the sea arose by
reason of a great wind that blew. It was now dark. Most everything
is more difficult to do in the dark except sin and be afraid. Those are easy to do in the dark,
sin and be afraid. Everything else is difficult
to do in the dark. What was their greatest darkness?
Jesus was not come to them. They could have borne the darkness
of the physical darkness, but the greater darkness was the
Lord wasn't come to them. Christ is the light and without
His presence everything is darkness. The poor sinner who is dead in
his sins, he has no light. He is in darkness. all the time,
no light. We have to first have Christ's
light for the darkness to know the darkness of not perceiving
Christ. We've got to have Christ's light
shine into our heart and know something of His presence before
we'll miss Him not being present. But if He shined in our hearts,
you'd know when He's not present. You'd know when He's not present.
When you don't have His presence in your heart. So this was even
more troubling to the disciples because the disciples had just
enjoyed a season of great joy with the Lord. They just saw
Him work this mighty miracle and all these people be fed and
happy and that was a great joy to behold and before that they
had been out preaching. And the Lord had saved some people
and they came back and saw what great power they had through
the Lord Jesus. Now it's dark. Lord Jesus has
not come to them. So then the storm arose. Verse
18, the sea arose by reason of a great wind that blew. So when
they rowed about five twenty or thirty furlongs. Now let's
stop right there. They rowed. Now you think about
this. He put them in the boat at sundown. And we know from Mark's gospel,
or maybe Matthew, but it's now the third watch, I mean the fourth
watch. That means it's about 3 a.m.
So for 10 hours they've been rowing. And they only went three or four
miles. Three or four miles in 10 hours of rowing. These are
fishermen, they know what they're doing. Why didn't they go any
further than that? Because the storm was contrary
to them. They were going against the wind.
Mark says they toiled in rowing. It was wearisome. It was hard
rowing in Christ's absence. When He was with them, I can
picture them going out across the sea, singing, rejoicing,
everything's happy, everything's good. But without Him it was
an impossible struggle in the dark against the wind. Now we
see three things in this rowing. One, before Christ came to us
and called us to faith, before we came and He worked in our
heart and called us to faith, we rowed but we couldn't do anything
save ourselves. If we were rowing trying to please
God or find some peace in our conscience We couldn't. We couldn't. It's not by works
of righteousness we've done. We couldn't. We couldn't make
ourselves be born of his spirit. We couldn't do anything to please
God. We can row all we want to. It's he that justified his people.
It's he that caused us by his free and sovereign grace. And
two, in this rowing, after Christ caused us, it's still impossible
to row our way out of the storm. Possibility. Christ said, without
me you can do nothing. And it's good that he keeps us
knowing that, isn't it? That's what he's teaching them
here. Again, without me you can do nothing. But three, these
disciples, I think this is important, they continued rowing together,
though they made little progress, they continued rowing together.
They didn't quit, they didn't give up. Christ keeps His people
persevering in faith through every storm. He keeps you persevering
in faith through every storm. Now what do you think that made
them do? As that storm began to kick up and it's dark and
the Lord hadn't come, I can picture them as they're rowing in this
ship, I can picture them looking out in the darkness and looking
intently. I picture them calling out for
Him. They earnestly desire Him. Where
is He? And that's the purpose that the
Lord gives the trouble, to make you see our need of Him. This
is what we have to see. Our need is not in what we can
constrain others to do, or what we think they ought to do. Our
personal need is Christ. Until my heart's personally been
broken, and I've been brought down, and this is so of each of us,
until that happens, and we see I need Christ, and without Him
I can't do anything. We have to be made to see we,
ourselves, are nothing. Nothing. That's the only way
we'll be gracious and love and serve one another. The only way.
So then, we still have our next gift and we still are looking
at, we're right, you're wrong. We gotta be wrong. We gotta be sick to see that
before God, if he marked iniquity, I couldn't stand. That's the
only way we'll deal graciously. And that's where He's going to
teach us this. And He's teaching us this more
and more to make us desire Him and make us appreciate His presence
all the more. But remember, He had gone to
that mountain alone to pray. And we see a picture in there.
Our Lord right now, we might not see His bodily presence,
but He's in the heavenly mountain right now. ever living, to make
intercession for His people, and He's there, Scripture says,
now in the presence of God for us. His presence there. He accomplished redemption for
His people. He accomplished it. He purchased
His people by His shed blood so that we are His purchased
possession. And He's not going to lose one
of His purchased possessions. Not one. Not one. He never loses. He saw them toiling and rowing. That's what Mark says. Mark says
he saw them toiling and rowing. And we can count on this. He's
seated in the heavens right now, appearing in the presence of
God for us. And at the same time, he's promised us, Lo, I'll be
with you always. While he's in heaven, he's with
his people. He sees you, believer, he's present. He's an ever-present
advocate, an ever-present help, an ever-present high priest,
though he's with the Father in glory. He's making certain his
people are going to pass over the sea. He called them into
fellowship and he sent them, it says, to go before him unto
the other side. He called us, He sent us, but
we're ever before Him. We're ever before the all-knowing
Savior who's ever faithful. We're all before Him. And He's
leading us the entire time. Though we go before Him and we're
before Him, He's leading us. We become so troubled. And all we see is the waves and
the wind. We can't make ourselves be comforted
with the good news. Though we may not see Christ,
Christ always sees us. He always sees His people. We
may not see Him, He sees us. He promises, I'll never leave
thee, I'll never forsake thee. So He sees His people. He always
sees His people. Like we heard that first message,
He's always, through the Spirit, working in the heart to turn us to Him and put that
love in our heart to love our brethren. And then look at the
second thing here, just at the right time Christ appeared. He always appears just at the
right time. He says in verse 19, ìSo when
they had rowed about five and twenty or thirty furlongs, they
see Jesus walking on the sea and drawing nigh unto the ship,
and they were afraid.î The God-man, Christ Jesus, was walking on
the sea right through the howling winds upon these waves. He is walking on the sea. The
waves are rolling and He is walking on them. Christ already bore
the storm of God's wrath. He already satisfied justice
for His people. He calmed the storm of God's
wrath by putting away the sin of His people. He calmed that
sea already. making His people righteous in
Him. He'll draw near as calmly as can be through any storm. He comes calmly through the storm.
He wasn't running to Him. He wasn't troubled by the wind
and the waves. He's walking to Him on the sea. All power is His as a God-man. He made the sea. He made the
wind. He sent it. He's the Lord of
the sea. He's the Lord of the land. He's
the Lord of the storm. He's the Lord of the calm. He's
the Lord of the trial and the Lord of the good times. Listen
to Psalm 93.3. The floods have lifted up, O
Lord. The floods have lifted up their
voice. The floods lift up their waves.
The Lord on high is mightier than the noise of many waters,
yea, than the mighty waves of the sea. God has to steal these waves
in us, don't He? He has to come and steal these
waves in us so we'll believe that. Psalm 104.3, Who layeth
the beams of His chambers in the waters? Who maketh the clouds
His chariot? Who walketh upon the wings of
the wind? This is what Job said. Job 9.8,
He said, He alone spreadeth out the heavens and treads upon the
waves of the sea. And he does great things past
finding out, yea, and wonders without number. Those scriptures
I just gave you, they've got to be what Cowper was being inspired
by. When he wrote, he said, God moves
in a mysterious way his wonders to perform. That's what Job said. He does great things past finding
out, wonders without number. Cowper said, God moves in a mysterious
way. He has wonders to perform. He
plants his footsteps in the sea and rides upon the storm. Deep
in an unfathomable minds of never failing skill, he treasures up
his bright designs and works his sovereign will. You fearful
saints, fresh courage take. The clouds you so much dread
are big with mercy. and shall break in blessings
on your head. It's hard to see that sometimes,
isn't it? Judge not the Lord by feeble
sins. That's what we got, feeble sin.
Judge not the Lord by feeble sin. Trust Him for His grace
behind a frowning providence. He hides a smiling face, a smiling
face. His purpose will ripen fast,
unfolding every hour. The bud may have a bitter taste,
but sweet will be the flower. Blind unbelief is sure to err. And scan his work in vain. Look
at the works going on, look at the providence. Oh, this can't
turn out good. Blind, unbelief, sure to err,
scan his work in vain. God is his own interpreter. He
will make it plain. He was walking on the sea and
the whole time he was drawing near to the ship. He was drawing
near to the ship. Mark said, he would have passed
them by. He made it like he was going
to pass them by. He made them think he was just
going to pass right on by. He knew what he was doing, he
knew where they were, he knew what was going on, but he made
them think he was just going to pass them by. What's he going
to make us cry? Lord, please don't pass me by.
Please don't pass me by. While on others thou art calling,
do not pass me by. Job, Job had that experience
where Job had and when he cried that out and talked about the
wonders he performs. You got to think where Job was
when he said that. He's a leper. And his three friends
are pointing him, they're wounding him harder than God wounded him.
Trying to anyway. Putting more infliction on what
God had already done for him. And he still said that. And this
is what he said, listen. Lo, he goeth by me, and I see
him not. He passeth on also, but I perceive
him not. That's what Job said. That's
prophetic. That's what was happening on
this sea. The Lord made like He'd pass them by. Why? Why would He do that? He's going
to have us call on Him. He's going to make you cry out
to Him. And they did. And it says when they saw Him,
they were afraid. They were afraid. They thought
He was a ghost. Why? Why was that? Now I know we could blame the
storm and we could blame the wind and the waves and all that
was going on. But listen, we got the answer.
The scripture gives us the answer. They considered not the miracle
of the loaves, for their heart was hardened. Think about that. That mean they suddenly became
unbelievers? No. It's exactly what happens
to us. Exactly. Could this be what God's
teaching us? Could it? Will we admit it? We will if He works this in us,
we will. Not unless He works this in us
though. The Lord had just tested Philip, He just tested Andrew,
He just tested all His apostles. back there with that multitude.
And they saw the miracle that the Lord worked. They saw it.
They saw what He did. I mean, just saw it. Ten, eleven
hours ago, they just saw Him feed these thousands of people. And they boarded that ship confident.
The Lord is able. Our Lord can do anything. He
is able. Why did we doubt Him? When He asks us how we are going
to feed this mouse, why don't we just say, Lord, you are able,
you know. That's it. That's all I got to say. Lord,
you are able, you know. Believe you. Our faith is strong now. We are not going to doubt Him
anymore. We have seen Him. We are not doubting Him. Why
did we doubt? We are not going to do that anymore. We got strong
faith now. And then darkness fell, and the
Lord waited, the wind kicked up, the waves roared, their fear
set in, and in their heart they forgot everything they just saw
the Lord do. I don't know about you, but that's
me. That is me. It's easy to have strong faith
when the Lord's working mightily before us, feeding us, and we're
rejoicing in what the Lord's doing. It's easy to have strong
faith then. Real easy. We have peace, we
have our health, our job security, our bank account looks good,
but the Lord's not gonna let us trust those things. He's just
not. He's not going to let us trust
in us. He's not going to let us trust in other men. He's not
going to let us trust in things. He's not going to let us trust
in those things. That ain't our salvation. The wind blew. The waves kicked
up. The fear entered. I want to learn
this and I want to learn it. I want to learn it and I want
to really learn it. Things are never how it appears
to our natural sight and our carnal reason. That is a hundred
percent true. Things are never how we think
they are. We don't ever know everything
and we don't know what the Lord's done. If we're not careful, we
do more harm Because we think we know. We
don't. We just don't. We only harm ourself,
though. Not really. It's good for us
because it teaches us not to trust us, not to trust our carnal
psyche. It's never to hurt its child,
it's only to help us. He has not dealt with us after
our sins. He never does. He's put our sins
away and He's not going to deal with us after those. He's not
going to reward us according to our iniquities. We just sing
it. Grace, grace, God's grace. Grace greater than all our sins.
That's how He's going to deal with His child. That's not how we deal with them
though. It's not. We've got a limit. And after
that, off with His head. He don't. Thankfully, he don't.
Don't forget that now, brother, because he gonna make his child
know that. He gonna make us know that by
making us know we deserve off with our own head. This thing of humility is not
something we just do. What we usually call humility
is pride. Humility is he gotta put us in
the dirt. And that hurts. When everything
you thought was something that would be regarded as trying to
love and the Lord slays it. Can't trust in that. It's just
pride. But it never ends badly. Not
for his child. It never ends badly. How can you say that, Clay? Because
my God never does anything but good for His people. That's how. He waits to be gracious, and
therefore, happy are all they that wait for Him. That's what
He's going to end up showing us. In the end, we see this. We see how wise He is in judgment. We see how powerful He is to
work His will. We see how good He is in all
He's done. We see how righteous and how
holy He is and how righteous and holy we are in Him. And we
see how faithful He's been to us. And we see how weak and doubting
we are. And how we can't do one thing
without Him. That's something we won't admit.
We can learn all the doctrine in the world. We can do whatever
we want to do outwardly. That's something we can't learn
in our heart except God teaches that. That's what He's going
to have to do. He's going to have to teach us
this in our heart. And He does. He does. In the end, He always grows our
faith in Him more. He grows our patience more. He
grows our experience more. He grows our hope more. He conforms
us to Him more. He purges more of our draws.
He makes us hate our sin more. The abundance of His love is
shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit more. That's
a good ending, isn't it? How does He do this? What teaches
us this? How are we brought into peace?
How will it end well? Look at verse 20. But he saith
unto them, It is I, be not afraid. What happens when that happens?
Verse 21, Then they willingly received him into the ship, and
immediately the ship was at the land where they were headed. Christ spoke, He said, it's I
be not afraid. And when He said that, willingly,
they were made willing by that voice. And they received Him
into fellowship with Him, right then. I guarantee you this, if
we're troubled, and we're perplexed, and we have problems, and we're
saying to ourselves, I'm doing this for the glory of God, and
yet we're still troubled, we need to hear His voice. Because
immediately you'll be on the rock. And you can't be troubled
and be on the rock. You can't. You got peace then. You ain't on the troubled sea
then. Oh, the sea could be raging. You're there. You're right where
he brought you. You're right what the trial was
for. If you ain't been brought there, it's too soon. It's too
soon. If we're not nothing and he everything,
it's too soon. That's where we got to be brought. That's when we behold Him really
on the cross bearing our sin. We really behold Him having put
it away, really behold it we're completing, really behold that
He's doing everything for our good when He says, behold it's
high, don't be afraid. That's when we're delivered to
Christ the Rock. We're at our desired haven then. He says this to us in every trial
since the day He called us. This is it right here. This is
what He's teaching us right here. Now listen. This is what He's
teaching us. Every single time. Why is the Lord doing this? Every
single time. Here it is. peace I leave with
you, my peace I give to you, not as the world giveth." How
foolish would it have been? They didn't find any peace in
rowing, did they? They couldn't find any peace in the waves.
Let's study this, let's dissect this, let's find out what makes
these waves roar like they do. Why is the wind, how is it hitting
them and what caused these waves and what made these waves come
over into the boat? Why is this wind blowing against
us? Let's study the physics of all this and all the Earth's
processes and how all this came about. That's all these things
of trying to say it's this and it's that and it's this other
thing and that caused it and this caused it and that caused
it. He caused it. Get that. Why? For your good. To bring you down. To bring you to his feet. To
make you see he's everything. That's why he did it. And we can accuse and accuse
and accuse and accuse and accuse. And it don't purge the conscience. And it don't justify our own
sin. And we can't be justifying that. And He's going to bring you down
to see. My best thing is to sit at His feet. You know, Lord,
you know what you're going to do. You know what you're going
to do. It's peace I give to you. Here's
what He says to you. Let not your heart be troubled. Listen, He's in control of it
all. He's got it. Why would I be troubled? Neither let it be afraid." Why
am I fearful? He said, these things I have
spoken unto you that in me you might have peace. In this world,
you keep trying to figure out the waves and all the secondary
causes. You are going to have tribulation. Now listen, we are not saved
by our works. Are we? We're not going to get
out of the tribulation by trying to figure it out. We're going
to get out of the tribulation by bowing to Him who is our peace. That's how He's going to give
peace in my heart, your heart. And if He makes peace in anybody's
heart that's still troubled, that's how it's going to be made. That's how it's going to be made.
Anything else is going to make a mess. Anything else that's
trying to steal the waves with our hands and our oars and our
boat and our little bark is going to get ruined on the sea. Can
you hear that? I'm telling you brethren, this
is so. This is so. You got to just keep preaching
the same gospel. It don't matter how bad the waves
rear up. You gotta keep declaring the
same truth that you started with. This is it. This is it. He hadn't changed. His gospel
hadn't changed. And what he's working hadn't
changed. What's changed? Who changed in
all this thing that we looked at in this text? The Lord didn't
change. Who changed? Who went from being happy to
being sad and being fearful? From being confident in Christ
to being fearful in the way? We did. We did. Be of good cheer, though. Even
though you're not going to find any comfort in this world, be
of good cheer. I overcome it. I've already overcome it. I picture,
I picture John, I picture him sitting down writing these scriptures
as the Spirit of God is giving him the word to write. Each of
the gospels, they wrote their account of these things a little
differently. And I love how John wrote it.
When he spoke, they were willing to receive him into the boat
and immediately they were on the land. That's on purpose,
because that's how it works. That's how He did it the first
hour, isn't it? He put you in the sea, put you in the trial,
made you see the wind, made you see your sin, made you see your
nothingness. And He said, It's I, be not afraid. And immediately you were willing
to receive Him, and immediately you had peace. Never stops. Till the end. That day we're
dying and we're rattling like a, chattering like a crane. You
know how it's going in? He's going to say, it's I, be
not afraid. Immediately we're going to be
with Him. And I picture John writing it this way. He gets
through writing it, according to how the Spirit did it, and
he looks at that and his heart's just rejoicing. He was there,
he remembers how it went. And he wrote it, he read it,
and he thought. Fellas, if you can't preach the gospel from
that, you need to shut the book and go home. Because that's it
right there. I pray God bless you. Amen. Father,
thank you. We ask you to bless your word
and ask you to work this in us. Speak and let us know that we
have peace and bring us to that rock It's perfectly still and
perfectly calm where we have sure repose and know that all
is well. We ask it, Lord, in Christ's
name. Amen.