Good songs and a very good scripture
reading for our text tonight as well. What we're going to
read tonight took place just prior to what Brother Art read
there in John 6. Let's turn to Matthew chapter
14. Matthew 14. We'll begin reading in verse
22. And straightway Jesus constrained His disciples to get into a ship
and to go before Him unto the other side while He sent the
multitudes away. And when He had sent the multitudes
away, He went up into a mountain apart to pray. And when the evening
was come, He was there alone. But the ship was now in the midst
of the sea, tossed with waves, for the wind was contrary. And
in the fourth watch of the night, Jesus went unto them, walking
on the sea. And when the disciples saw him
walking on the sea, they were troubled, saying, It is a spirit. And they cried out for fear.
And straightway Jesus spake unto them, saying, Be of good cheer,
it is I, be not afraid. And Peter answered him, and said,
Lord, if it be thou, bid me come unto thee on the water. And he
said, Come. And when Peter was come down
out of the ship, he walked on the water to go to Jesus. But when he saw the wind boisterous,
he was afraid. And beginning to sink, he cried,
saying, Lord, save me. And immediately Jesus stretched
forth his hand and caught him and said unto him, O thou of
little faith, wherefore didst thou doubt? And when they were
coming to the ship, the wind ceased. Then they that were in
the ship came and worshipped him, saying of a truth, Thou
art the Son of God. Now last week we heard the psalmist
declare God's works and wonders in the deep, in the sea. And here tonight we see God. We see God working His works
and His wonders in the sea. Our text shows us that this is
the first place recorded in the Scripture where the disciples
came and declared the Lord Jesus to be the Son of God. It says
they came and they worshipped Him and they said of a truth,
Thou art the Son of God. This is the first place they
said that. Now that's my proposition to you tonight. That's what I
want you to get out of this message. Of the truth, Jesus Christ is
the Son of God. And to back it up and to help
you to remember the point, the title I've given this message
is, Our Savior is God. Our Savior is God. Now we worship
one God in three persons. We worship God the Father, God
the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. They're separate persons, but
they're equal persons. And our Lord Jesus is the second
person in that Trinity. He's the Son of God. That means
He is God. It means He is God. And scripture
tells us, in Him dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily. The man Jesus Christ is God manifest
in the flesh. That's what Paul said in 1 Timothy
3.16. And therefore, there's nothing,
there's absolutely nothing in God our Savior that is impossible. He has supreme power over all. Nothing ever did hinder Him,
and nothing shall ever hinder Him from fulfilling all of God's
will and saving His people from our sins. We read of Him back
there in Isaiah, in chapter 42, and it says, He shall not fail.
It says, Nor shall He be discouraged, till He hath set judgment in
the earth, and the owl shall wait for His law. In the New
Testament Scripture that says the exact same thing is, She
shall bring forth a Son, and thou shalt call His name Jesus,
for He shall save His people from their sin. By one offering,
Christ has perfected forever them that are sanctified. He's eternally made us righteous
because He's eternal God. Everything He did had eternal
effect because He's eternal God. He obtained eternal redemption
for us because He is eternal God. He's eternally reconciled
all God's elect to Him because He is eternal God. When He enters into His child,
His child has everlasting life formed within them, created within
them. Why? Because He's that eternal
life. He is Jesus, God, life. That's who He is. And everything
He does for His child is eternal because He is eternal God. We have eternal security in Him.
We have preservation in Him because He is God and none can stay His
hand or say unto Him, what doest thou? When you read that scripture
and you think of the Lord God, think of Jesus Christ because
He is God. He is God. Do you know there
are people that deny that? There are people that deny that.
They really are. If the so-called Jehovah Witnesses
knock on your door, you ask them one question. Is Jesus Christ
God? And that will end all the discussion
because they'll say, no, He's not. No, He's not. Yes, He is. He's God. He is God. And that's what I want us to
behold tonight. The reason that His disciples declared that He
is the Son of God is because they beheld the works He did.
And the works He did brought them to His feet. And they beheld
all His power to work everything to bring them to that place.
And they said in true worship and true awe of a truth, Thou
art the Son of God. Remember we saw last Thursday
when He works these works and these trials and in every trial
the point is to bring you to the feet of Christ. If you're
His, that's where He's going to bring you. And when He does,
you're going to say, of a truth thou art the Son of God. Now,
this is my goal in preaching this. I pray tonight that God
will do that. I pray God our Savior, Christ
Himself will bring us to His feet to say of a truth, Thou
art the Son of God." Alright, the first thing we behold, showing
us that Christ is God, is that we see that He is over all men. He has power over all men, both
His people and our enemies. Now look there in verse 22. It
says in straightway, Jesus constrained his disciples to get into a ship
and to go before him unto the other side while he sent the
multitudes away Now we behold Christ is God over all of God's
elect over his people because watch the wording here straightway
Jesus constrained his disciples he constrained his disciples
to get into a ship and and to go before Him unto the other
side. Now look at, and this is the
next thing, Christ is God over the rest of mankind, turning
them whithersoever He will. And we see that here in this
wording. Look, while He sent the multitudes away, He constrained
His disciples in grace and love. But he sent the multitudes away. Why? Why did he do that? Well,
when you read John 6, and he's declaring there, what Art just
read, he's declaring there what their problem was. You see, just
prior to our text, he had fed over 5,000 people with just a
few loaves and a few fish. 5,000 people. Well, the scripture
says, after he did that, he told them in John 6, he said, you're
seeking me now, but it's not because you saw the miracle.
It's not because you beheld I am the Son of God. It's not because
you own the fact that I am of a truth, the Son of God. He said,
the only reason you're seeking me, you want your belly filled.
You want something in this life. You want something to be better
about this life. But you don't want to be saved.
You don't want salvation. You don't want God to have the
glory. You want something for your belly. And the scripture
says, what they were going to do is, they decided, we will
take this man and we'll make him a king. We'll take him and
we'll make him a king. Look over at John 6 with me. Real quick, John 6. Have you
ever heard a preacher ask this question? Have you made Jesus
Lord of your life? They're saying, have you made
Jesus King of your life? Have you made Him King of your
life? Well, let me show you what Christ said about these folks
who would take Him and make Him a King. John 6 and look at verse
15. Let me get there. Hold on just
a second. John 6.15. It says, When Jesus therefore
perceived that they would come and take Him by force to make
Him a king, He departed again into a mountain Himself alone. He left them. He sent them away
and He left them. He told them later in John 6,
no man can come to me except the Father which has sent me
draw him. And what he's declaring is, you
and I do not by our sinful will, by our unregenerate will, decide
one day, I'm going to make him king of my life. And come and
take him by force and make him a king. If you'll read the scriptures
it says, he was born king. He's born King of Kings and Lord
of Lords. That's who He is. He's the King
and we don't make Him a King. But the disciples, being sinners
like you and me, you just imagine if you're in their shoes, you've
been walking around with the Lord Jesus and everybody's been
rejecting Him and everybody that is anybody in religion has been
just snarling at you. and renouncing Him as a hypocrite
and as a charlatan. And then all of a sudden, you
see Him work this incredible miracle where He feeds over 5,000
people with loaves and fish, and now you've got the majority
of that people, if not all of that people, wanting to follow
you. And you're there with Him and
He's getting all this praise now. Granted, it's just temporal
praise. but they're wanting Him to be
a king now, that would sort of puff a man up, wouldn't it? That
would sort of feed our pride and our ego a little bit. Well,
the Scripture says when that happened, straightway, straightway,
Jesus constrained His disciples to get into a ship and go before
Him unto the other side while He sent the multitudes away."
He sent them away. This was an act of grace and
mercy to His disciples. He saved them from their own
pride. He saved them from the multitude
and He did it by divine constraint. He put them in fellowship by
divine constraint. That's what we are. And that's
how we got to be this way. Every believer is fellows in
the same ship. We're in fellowship together. Just like you put them all in
a ship. And you only get in that fellowship by divine constraint. That's the only way. That's the
only way. The scripture says this in 2
Corinthians 5.14. The love of Christ constraineth
us. That's the word used here. The
love of Christ constraineth us. But now concerning the rest of
mankind, concerning men who think themselves kings and men who
are kings, the scripture says, the king's heart is in the hand
of the Lord. As the rivers of water, he turneth
it whithersoever he will. He sends the enemy away to protect
His people. That's what He did here. Now,
does that manifest He's God? Yes. Nobody else has power to
do this. He has power to do this. He's
God. And it shouldn't come as a surprise
to us because think of the rest of our enemies He sent away from
us. We had no ability to fulfill the precepts of the law. We couldn't
fulfill the Ten Commandments. And we had broken all the Ten
Commandments, so we owe divine justice to it. But when the law
came knocking at our door, you know what he did? He fulfilled
it completely. And he sent it away, protecting
his people. Because he fulfilled it. He didn't
brush it, put it out of the door. He didn't set it aside. He didn't
diminish it. He didn't just look over our
sins. He gave the law everything the law demanded. turned it away
from being our enemy. Now the law is our friend. What
about the fact that you and I were ignorant in our minds? That was
an enemy of ours. Well, he sent that enemy away
too. You know what he did? By his
blood, through the Spirit of God, he has purged our conscience
from dead works to serve the true and living God. These are
works that are so much grander and so much greater than him
being able to take an enemy and just turn their heart withersoever
he will. When Justice Scalia died this
week, I told Melinda, I said, do you just see the hand of God
working? I don't know what God's going
to do. I don't know what's going to happen. But I'll tell you
this, there's just about have to be blind to not say this nation's
under the judgment of God. And all He's got to do now to
just let us go is just put somebody, just a liberal in that place
right there and we're gone. We're gone. Or He can turn it
just the other way. It's going to be interesting
to see, won't it? What the Lord's got in store for us. Brethren, when He constrains
us in this life, it may not always be understood by us. It might
not be something we necessarily want. They didn't want to leave
there. These disciples didn't want to
leave there. They didn't want to get in that ship and take off on
the sea. They didn't want to leave Christ. But He sent them
away. He said, go before Me. And He
constrained them to do it. And then look at this though.
Though He is the God-man, though He is God and man in one body,
look at this. Representing His people as our
federal head, He was constantly living in perfect faith, ever
dependent upon God the Father. Look at verse 23. And when He
had sent the multitudes away, He went up into a mountain apart
to pray. And when the evening was come,
He was there alone. Whenever He was tempted, whenever
His disciples were in trouble, whenever He was about to do some
great work, He always went away alone to pray like He did in
the Garden of Gethsemane before He went to the cross. Look over
at Hebrews 5.7. This is what the Scripture says
in Hebrews 5.7. This is showing us, brethren,
that He is the Son of God. Look at this, Hebrews 5 and look
at verse 7. Who in the days of His flesh,
when He had offered up prayers and supplication, with strong
crying and tears unto Him that was able to save Him from death,
He was heard in that he feared. That means he reverenced God.
Though he were a son, though he were the son of God, though
he was equal with God, yet learned he obedience by the things which
he suffered. He experienced obedience and
he perfected obedience. That's what the next line says.
And being made perfect. He didn't have to be made perfect.
He was perfect. But He perfected obedience as
our head and our representative. And He became the author of eternal
salvation unto all them that obey Him. Now look back over
there at Hebrews 4 now. And look at verse 14. Here's
the application. Seeing then that we have a great
high priest that is passed into the heavens, Jesus the Son of
God, Let us hold fast our profession, for we have not a high priest
which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities,
but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin.
Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that
we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need."
He's now gone up, not into an earthly mountain, he's now gone
up into the mountain at God's right hand. And now here we are
in the evening of this world, just like it was the evening
there. And there He sits at God's right hand, ever living to make
intercession for His people. If any man sin, we have an advocate
with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous, and He's the propitiation
for our sin. So let us do what He did now,
seeing that He's now, not only does He have this power as the
Son of God, He has this power as the Son of Man. Let us go
to Him. with all our prayer and all our
supplication. All right, secondly. We see Christ's
divine omniscience. He knows everything. He knows
all. Look at verse 24. But the ship
was now in the midst of the sea, tossed with waves, for the wind
was contrary. Now you put yourself in the disciples'
shoes. They did what the Master told
them to do. They obeyed Him. They got in a ship and they set
sail for the other side. And it had been a while they
had been out there on this sea because he had to send away 5,000
people and then it says he went up into the mountain to pray
and it was evening time. So they had been gone for quite
a while. And there they are, by themselves,
out in the middle of the sea, and now they're thinking, here
we've obeyed our Lord, our Master, here we are in this sea, and
all of a sudden a storm comes up. Do you think our Lord Jesus
Christ was surprised by that storm? He knew that storm was
coming. He was in control of that storm
coming. We'll see that in a moment. He
knew. He's omniscient. He knew the
storm was coming. It was coming on purpose. Do
you suppose they were afraid by that storm? We know something
about this, don't we? Disciples were in a ship in the
midst of a sea and they were tossed with waves. You know what
every believer is? We're in fellowship together
and we're in this sea of sinful humanity in the midst of this
sea of our sinful flesh, and we're tossed very often with
all kinds of trials, all kinds of tempests, all kinds of troubles.
And we become troubled. We become afraid. We become very
troubled. But you know what our Lord told
us? He said this, in this world you shall have tribulation. It
shouldn't surprise us. Why do we get so surprised when
trouble comes? Our Lord told us it would. Our
Lord told us that's all we can expect from sinful flesh in a
sinful world is trouble. That's all. But, He said, be
of good cheer. That's what we're going to see
Him say in a moment. Be of good cheer. I have overcome the world. And because He's overcome it,
brethren, we're safe. We're safe. The storm is only
working His sovereign will to bring us to His feet. That's
the purpose. That's what every trial is doing.
He knows the trial. He's in control of the trial,
just like he was in control of these winds. Now, no matter where
we are, the Lord knows. Verse 25 says, "...in the fourth
watch of the night." It's gone from being afternoon when everybody's
hungry, dinner time, to evening, to it's the fourth watch of the
night. But watch this. It's the fourth watch of the
night and Jesus went unto them. How did He know where they were?
You didn't have GPS back then. I'll tell you how He knew. He
knows everything. He's God. That's how He knew.
He knew right where they were. Now, it was the fourth watch
of the night. He might wait. He may wait. But you know, His timing is always
impeccable. His timing is the right time.
Because what He's doing by waiting is He's proving us. And you know
when He's proving us, He's never doing something to teach Himself
something about us. He's always doing it to teach
us something about us. And He's doing it to prove to
us, to show us how weak we are in our flesh. He's doing it to
show us how prone we are to forget it. He's doing it to show us
how fearful we are of all the ways You know when you're fearful
of the waves, you know what you're doing? You're sanctifying the
waves. You're exalting the waves. We're giving the waves more credit
for having more power than we do our God. That's what we're
doing. When He says, sanctify me, He
says, let Him be your hope, let Him be your fear, let Him be
your dread. He's more powerful than all. Sanctify Him in your
hearts, not the waves. But that's what we do, we exalt
the waves. Because we're flesh, we're sinful,
and that's what we do. That's what we'll always do in
our flesh. But even in the dark, even in the midst of the sea,
Wherever we are, God our Savior knows where we are, and He knows
what we're going through, because He purposed it Himself. He sent them there. And if you're
in the middle, a child of God... Now let me say this, everybody
be turning to Psalm 139. Everybody goes through trouble. We're sinners, and you're going
to go through trouble as sinners. Let me tell you something different
between a rebel and God's child. When God's child goes through
trouble, it's on purpose. God's doing it on purpose. God's
doing it to teach us. God's doing it for our good and
His glory every time. Every time. Now turn with me
to Psalm 39. Does he know where we are? Does
he know what we're going through? I want to read quite a bit of
Scripture here, but I just couldn't stop when I wrote this down. Psalm 139.1 O LORD, Thou hast
searched me and known me. Thou knowest my down-sitting
and mine uprising. Thou understandest my thought
afar off. Thou compassest my path and my
lying down, and art acquainted with all my ways. Look at verse
7. Whither shall I go from Thy Spirit?
Or whither shall I flee from Thy presence? Look at verse 9.
If I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts
of the sea, even there shall thy hand lead me, and thy right
hand shall hold me. If I say, surely the darkness
shall cover me, even the night shall be light about me. Yea,
the darkness hideth not from thee, but the night shineth as
the day. The darkness and the light are
both alike to thee. He knows everything. That's showing
us He's God. That's who Christ is. Now thirdly,
Let's go back to Matthew 14. Matthew 14. Thirdly, we see our Savior's
divine power to protect us. He's omnipotent, He's all-powerful,
so He can protect us. He can protect us. Look at verse
25. The verse ends there with these
words, Jesus went unto them walking on the sea. And when the disciples
saw him walking on the sea, they were troubled, saying, It is
a spirit. And they cried out for fear.
But straightway," Do you like that? Immediately he sent them
away, constrained them to go away. Here again, straightway
Jesus spake unto them. We're going to see that again,
straightway. Saying, Be of good cheer, it is I, be not afraid. Now our Savior still walks on
the sea just like He did then. That's showing us, brethren,
He's in charge of the sea. He rules the sea. The sea of
providence, the sea of trial, He even rules the waves of turmoil
in our hearts. And when He hears our cry of
fear, when He hears that, He's all-powerful to speak peace into
our hearts. Straightway. When he heard them
cry straightway, Jesus spake unto them, saying, Be of good
cheer, it is I, be not afraid. He said, Be of good cheer, I
have overcome the world. And here he tells them, Be of
good cheer, it is I, be not afraid. When am I going to be of good
cheer? When am I going to stop being afraid? When this effectual
voice speaks and says, Be not afraid. When He says, be of good
cheer, that's when I'm going to be of good cheer. That's when
I'm not going to be afraid. You remember the other accounts
of the disciples on the sea? Back over in Mark 4, you don't
have to turn there, but He arose, remember He was in the back of
the ship and the storm came up and they ran back there and they
got Him and they woke Him up and they said, don't you care
that we perish? And He arose and rebuked the wind and said
unto the sea, Peace be still. And the wind ceased and there
was a great calm. That's all He's got to do in
your heart and my heart. All He's got to do is say, Be
of good cheer. Peace be still. And these waves
were still going on all around them. But now, they've got some
good cheer. They've got some peace. They've
got reason not to be afraid now, because he spoke it. And he can
do that. He can do that. He doesn't have
to... You know, the world looks at the carnal. The natural man
looks at carnal things. That's all he looks at. And so,
if he doesn't see his carnal condition change, he doesn't
have peace in his heart. But you can see believers going
through some of the toughest trials, the toughest ordeals,
and you think, how on earth could they have such peace? It's because
He can say this in your heart. He doesn't have to change the
circumstances. He can say it in your heart. He's not going
to change all the circumstances. One day we're going to die. I
was talking to my grandmother this week and she told me what
I've heard Brother Don say often. She said, Clay, I don't really
fear dying. She said, I really want to go
and be with my Lord. She said, it's that process of
dying that I fear. Going through that process. but
you know He can speak peace into the heart even during the process.
He's not going to always change the outward circumstances. He
won't that, He won't then, but He'll still give you that peace
and carry you home with Him. Alright, He's got power to do
that in your heart. He's God. He's God. Now He did
this to Peter. Now look here lastly, and this
is the last thing I want to show you. We see His faithfulness
as our God and Savior now. We read in 1 Corinthians 1, God
is faithful. And here we see the faithfulness
of our God. He's the Son of God. God is faithful.
Watch this, verse 28. And Peter answered Him and said,
Lord, if, and probably the better word there would be since, since. Lord, since it be Thou bid me
come unto Thee on the water. Notice this submission in Peter's
request. Now some people say here this
was unbelief because that's translated if. But I think, and it doesn't
matter much what I think, but it's clear to me that this is
submission. The Lord just spoke and said
be of good cheer. The Lord just spoke and said
fear not. And Peter now, he's of good cheer. He doesn't fear. He sees the Lord and he says
Lord, Since it be thou bid me come unto thee on the water.
That's submission. He didn't say, Lord, I'm just
going to come to you. No. He said, Lord. He's saying,
Lord, will you bid me to come unto you? He's saying, Lord,
will you command it so that I can come unto you? That's submission. That's what that is. That's submission.
And I'll tell you this, if a person asks God, remember when Christ
was passing by? Remember, was it the leper that
said, Lord, if Thy will, if You will, You can make me clean?
If You will, You can do it, Lord. That's what Peter said. If You're
willing, Lord, You can bid me to come to You. And I'll tell
you what, if you have a true heart to pray, Lord, will You
bid me to come unto You? The Lord don't ever turn that
down. He'll never turn that down. Look at what He did, verse 29,
and He said, Come. Come. And when Peter was come
down out of the ship, he walked on the water to go to Jesus. You think He did that? I know
He did it. I know He did it. My God's God
of gravity. He is the rule of nature. He
is nature and He's the rule of nature. That's who God is. I know He did that. I know He
did this because He put away my sin and that's much greater
than what He's doing right here. He made an axe head swim one
time. He can make a man walk on water.
That's no problem for Him. He put away my sin. He put away
the sin of all His people. No problem for Him. But you just
picture Peter here. Can you just put yourself in
his shoes? He comes down out of that ship,
and he stands down, and he puts his feet in that water, and he's
standing in the water. And he takes a step, and he's
walking. He's walking on the water. What would you think? What would
you be thinking if that was you? Would your heart just be amazed at what was happening,
I'm walking on the water. I'm walking on the water. And
you know what we do very quickly when God... See, when God speaks,
He gives the power to do it. What do we do very often when
He gives you the power to do it? It's not very long and we
start thinking about how we did it. How we did it. And it wasn't very long that
we find that the problem's in us. The problem is we start looking
at the carnal. We take our eye off Christ and
we start looking at the carnal. Look at verse 30. But when he
saw the wind boisterous, he was afraid. He took his eye,
the eye of faith, off Christ and put the carnal eye on the
wind and the waves. And beginning to sink, he cried,
saying, Lord, save me. You know when we sink? You know
when we sink? We take our eye off Christ. That's
when we sink. Paul said, I can do all things
through Christ that strengtheneth me. The moment we take our eyes
off Christ, we lost our connection with our strength. And what happens? We start sinking down. We start
sinking down. And when is it we truly pray
to God? What did we see last week? When
do we truly pray to God? Look at this. He saw the wind
boisterous. He was afraid, beginning to sink,
and then he cried. And listen to this prayer. Lord,
save me. Don't you like how whenever we
really need God to save us, when we really see we're utterly incapable
of saving ourselves one iota, don't you love how all the flowery
language and all the repetition of words and all the everything
we call prayer, that just goes out the window? Lord, save me. Doesn't that say it all? That
acknowledges who He is. That acknowledges His holy name. That acknowledges His power.
It acknowledges His kingdom. It acknowledges He's Lord. It acknowledges He's salvation.
Lord, save. It acknowledges I'm totally helpless. I'm totally incapable of doing
one thing for myself. Lord, save. And it acknowledges
the one who can't do one thing for himself, me. Lord, save me. That's one of the best prayers
you'll find in the Scripture and one of the shortest. Lord,
save me. And that's when we behold His
faithfulness. That's when we behold His faithfulness.
He'd come to him already when the wind was boisterous, and
he told him, Be of good cheer. We saw it there. But now Peter's... He's bid Peter to come. And when
he says come, he gives you the power to do what he commands
you to do. So Peter walks on that walk.
But now Peter's sinking. He says, Lord, save me. And we
see another one of those immediately. Let's look at verse 31. And immediately,
Jesus stretched forth his hand and caught him. Now let me make
a point right here. Three times we see straight way,
immediately, straight way, three times right here. Each time we
saw that, it was when they were in immediate danger. Immediate
danger from the multitude, immediate danger, what was the other one? I forgot now. But anyway, all
three of them here was when they were in immediate danger. When
he came to them in the fourth watch and they were out there
on the seat, they weren't in immediate danger then. If they
were, you'd read, straightway. It was when they were fearful
and turned from him that he said, straightway, he said, be of good
cheer. And then right here when Peter's singing now, straightway,
he reached out and saved him. When you're in immediate danger,
he's going to save you. He's going to grab you, because
you're in his hand all the time. So just make, what I'm getting
at is, if we think that the Lord shut up the heavens to us and
we think He's waiting to be merciful to us, let that be an insurance
to us that I'm not in immediate danger. If I was, He'd immediately
be taking care of me right now. Alright, look at this. He stretched
forth his hand and he caught him. Divine faithfulness. He
wouldn't let him go. And with the same faithfulness,
he corrected him. Just gently, but he did. He said,
O thou of little faith, wherefore didst thou doubt? Now think about
that question. I want you to think of that question
for you and I'll think about it for me. O thou of little faith,
wherefore didst thou doubt? Wherefore didst thou doubt? Now
what do we see here? Christ our Savior is God. Why
do I doubt? Christ my Savior is God who sends
our enemies away just like He put away our sins. Why do I doubt? He's God who constrains us by
His grace to do exactly what we need to do. Why do I doubt
Him? He's God in His holy mountain,
interceding as our advocate, the propitiation for our sins,
just like when He went up into the mountain to pray when He
was on this earth. Why do I doubt? He's God who is omniscient. He
knows everything. Everything about me, everything
about my enemies, everything about the situation I'm in, He
knows all. Why do I doubt? He has all power
to protect us, to rule the wave, just like He did when He walked
this earth below. Why do I doubt? Why do I doubt? And He is perfectly faithful
toward us all the time. Why do I doubt? Why do I doubt? Well, let's answer it. We doubt
because we look with carnal eyes at carnal waves instead of looking
at Christ our God with eyes of faith. That's the only answer. I'll answer. But you know what
He does when we do that? He teaches us this all over again.
And when He's brought us back into fellowship with Him, that's
when again we find the waves are calm. Look at verse 32. And
when they were coming to the ship and to fellowship with Him,
the wind ceased. The wind ceased. You get the
point there? When they came into fellowship
with Him, communion with Him, the wind stopped. The storm was
over. That was the point of it, to
bring them to that point. Then the storm was over. And
then we truly worship Him in awe. Look at verse 33. Then they
that were in the ship came and worshipped Him, saying, Of a
truth, Thou art the Son of God. That's what He's bringing us
to every time. I pray He'll make the waves work their purpose,
make them a calm, and then bring us to Himself and teach us that
very lesson of a truth, our art, the Son of God. That's salvation. That's salvation. He says the
man that declares and believes and rests in Him being the Son
of God. That includes who He is and everything
He accomplished for His people. Everything He's doing now for
His people. The man that trusts Him, acknowledges
Him as the Son of God and rests in Him, that man will be saved.
He'll be saved. I pray God will do that for us
now. Let's pray together, brethren. Father, we thank You. Lord, save
us. We ask it now, according to Your
omnipotent power, Your all-knowing, Your faithfulness, according
to your ability to save us from all our enemies. Lord, do it
for your name's sake. This is who you are. We ask it
in Christ's name. Amen.