Do Not Fear

Two announcements that I forgot.

I'm not a very good announcement giver.

On the back of your bulletin in the bottom corner, there is a QR code.

If you are even hypothetically interested in maybe being a part of a community group starting in the fall, we'll be starting some new ones.

Please fill that out.

Visitor or a member.

And also, if you are a visitor and you're interested in more information about the church, potentially even joining August the 2nd and August the 9th up in the house at 9 a.m.

We'll have what we call Discover Cahaba Park.

It commits you to nothing, but it gives you kind of all the information you need to know if you're interested in joining the church.

So excited that all of you are here.

Open your Bibles to Mark chapter 6, please.

Mark 6 · chapter mention

Let me pray one more time.

Father, we would see Jesus.

Would you open the eyes of our heart to behold wondrous things out of your law?

Would you speak for your servants who are listening?

Would you feed us with the spiritual bread that we need so much?

Christ's name.

Amen.

Mark chapter 6.

Mark 6 · chapter mention

And think about this while you turn.

Have you ever had a time in your life where maybe God seemed very mysterious to you, confusing, maybe even terrifying?

And not so much in the sense of, oh, God felt close and I felt worshipful in my heart.

Those times are wonderful, but more of a time where you felt like there was something about God that was a little scary to you, frightening to you.

Maybe you might even say off-putting at times.

And I wonder what the circumstances were going on in your life when you felt that way about God.

My guess is it probably was not rosy and sunshiny and hanging out on the beach with your best friend.

It was probably some very hard time, metaphorically, a stormy time in your life when the deck seemed stacked against you.

Maybe it was a time in your life where you felt like you were doing your best to obey God, to walk with God, and things were not going well.

You ever had that experience?

I have a friend of mine, and he told me a story one time when he was growing up.

He was a wrestler, and he has this very distinct memory of being in a wrestling match and losing, almost about to get pinned, and his coach was kind of looking at him and screaming at him, Do your best.

And he says, I had this very vivid memory that the thought went through my mind.

I am doing my best, and it's not working.

You ever feel that way in life?

Christian life?

We're going to look at a passage this morning that I think addresses that very well.

Let me set the context for us.

Jesus Christ, walking the earth, chose twelve men to be his disciples, his apostles, and essentially they represented the 12 tribes of Israel.

He was starting the New Testament version of Israel, the local church.

They've been out ministering and it's gone really well.

He's been training them to minister once he's gone, to preach, to teach, to heal, to cast out demons.

It's gone wonderfully, but they're exhausted.

And he tries to take them away for a little retreat, but the people chase them down.

They don't even have time to eat.

Now, after this, this is where we're going to pick up.

He's fed 20,000 people.

They're standing there holding baskets of leftovers when he'd started with a couple of fish sandwiches, if you remember the story.

Okay.

And you got to get a little bit of this context from John chapter 6 tells us that the crowd of probably 20,000 or more were so in awe of this miracle.

John 6 · chapter mention

They realized what was going on.

Jesus is the new Moses.

Jesus is the new David.

Jesus is the Messiah.

They get it.

And a large part of the crowd decide we're going to go make him king by force right now.

And we don't know for sure, a little bit of speculation, but I think it's safe speculation.

Almost certainly, some, if not all, of the 12 are like, that sounds like a great idea to us.

Right?

Jesus is king, he lives in a palace.

We get to live in the palace too.

So Jesus tells them, hey, you guys get in the boat, go across the lake, I'll catch up.

And they obey.

Jesus dismisses the crowd.

And that's where we're going to kind of pick up.

So Mark chapter 6, verse 45.

Mark 6:45

Immediately he made his disciples get into the boat and go before him to the other side, to Bethsaida, while he dismissed the crowd.

And after he had taken leave of them, he went up on the mountain to pray.

And when evening came, the boat was out on the sea, and he was alone on the land, and he saw that they were making headway painfully, for the wind was against them, and about the fourth watch of the night.

But when they saw him walking on the sea, they thought it was a ghost and cried out, for they all saw him and were terrified.

But immediately he spoke to them and said, Take heart, it is I.

Do not be afraid.

And he got into the boat with them, and the wind ceased, and they were utterly astonished, for they did not understand about the loaves, but their hearts were hardened.

When they had crossed over, they came to the land at Gedner set and moored to the shore.

And when they got out of the boat, the people immediately recognized him and ran about the whole region and began to bring the sick on their beds to wherever they heard he was.

And wherever he came in villages, cities, or countryside, they laid the sick in the marketplace and implored him that they might touch even the fringe of his garment, and as many as touched it were made well.

So Jesus puts the disciples in the boat, sends them across, gets rid of the crowd, and what does he do?

He goes up on the mountain to pray.

And we don't know for sure, but he's probably alone in prayer for hours.

Because when did he put them in the lake to go across?

It would have been right after dinner.

So maybe it's sunset.

We don't know exactly.

But hours later, the fourth watch, which would have been 3 a.m.

to 6 a.m.

So sometime in that time frame, he's up there praying, and he can see it.

Maybe the sun is already starting to rise.

He can see them.

They have not made much progress.

A couple, three miles at most.

And remember, many of these men were professional fishermen.

But the wind is so bad.

Literally, you could translate one of the words, it was like it was torturous.

They are just out there physically exhausted, trying to row across the lake and basically making no progress.

So Jesus decides, I'm going to walk across the lake, and what it tells us is he intends to pass them by, which seems very strange.

They see him, again, maybe there was full moon, so there was some light, or maybe the sun has already started to come up just a little bit.

And they see what looks like in this terrible wind, a human form just walking past the bone of the sea, and they think it's a ghost.

That's a pretty good guess, right?

What would you think?

And they scream out, probably like a bunch of little middle school girls, all right?

They cry out.

Middle school boys, middle school, anybody.

They're terrified.

And Jesus very calmly says, Hey, take courage.

It's me.

Don't be afraid.

He decides then to get in the boat.

And instantly the wind stops.

And it says, you know, they're astonished.

And then Mark gives his little comments like part of what's going on here is they didn't really understand what had happened with the loaves.

Their hearts are blind, their hearts are hard.

They get to the other side, everybody recognizes him, people are coming to him.

He's healing people everywhere he goes.

About five things I think that we should take away from this passage.

The first is this prioritize your personal prayer life.

Prioritize personal prayer.

I think for most people it is great to have kind of a set time, a set place to get up.

For many of us, it's first thing in the morning.

Doesn't have to be that way.

But what I want you to see about this text is this the God man.

Fully God, fully man.

Right, tempted in every way as we are, yet without sin.

His 33 years walking around on planet Earth, he prioritized time to pray.

If he needed it, how much more than we?

Again, remember the context, guys.

The disciples come back from their mission, and now he has got mega fame.

So the people are coming so much it says they literally can't eat.

So it was Jesus' idea.

We need a retreat.

Retreats aren't bad ideas.

Sometimes they're great ideas.

Jesus was a fan of retreats.

Let's get in the boat, let's get away to a desolate place.

The crowd comes there again, and he's so moved with compassion.

He keeps teaching them and then he has to feed them and he's training the disciples.

He finally gets a moment alone.

What does he do?

Does he get a snack?

Does he take a nap?

He prays for hours.

So, guys, listen.

Um, I've had people ask me this question before.

So, dude, do I have to pray?

You know, do I have to pray?

If I'm a Christian, do I have to pray?

Well, it depends on how you mean that.

It's a little bit like asking the question, do I have to breathe?

Well, no, you can quit breathing and die.

And if you're a Christian, God will still love you, right?

Quit breathing, you'll die, you'll go to heaven, God'll still love you.

So if you ask the question, do I have to pray for God to love me?

Of course not.

God loves you based on what Christ has done, not on what you do.

So this is no type of legalistic mantra, you need to do more to earn faith.

Not that.

But if you say, Do I have to pray to survive in this spiritual life?

And in order to survive and to thrive, then absolutely you have to pray.

You have to be talking to your Father.

Now, exactly when, exactly how long, the Bible doesn't specify.

Lots of freedom there.

But the bottom line is it needs to be a high priority.

And I'd ask you this question.

If somebody was following you around, they were going to be an eyewitness to your life, and write like a little biography of your life, 16 chapters later.

How much would prayer show up in your biography?

How much would they mention, hey, this guy, this girl often like to get alone and pray.

They had to.

It was a priority, even when they were exhausted.

The priority of prayer.

Second thing would be this.

Obedience to God sometimes makes life harder.

I have mentioned this exact point before in Mark, but Mark keeps showing us this.

The whole Bible shows us this.

And again, guys, I see it on my own heart, and I'm pretty sure it's a temptation for most of us.

There's what I like to call the soft, subconscious, evangelical prosperity gospel.

Okay?

Not the really extreme kind of prosperity gospel.

Name it and claim it.

If I have enough faith, God will instantly heal me and give me the brand new Ferrari, right?

When I walk out, most of us just, we're just not that dumb to believe that.

But here is what I will confess, I am dumb enough to be tempted to believe at times.

If I'm a full-time minister, I'm a Christian, and I'm getting up early and I'm spending time praying and I'm loving people and I'm serving and I'm working hard as unto the Lord, then by golly, I kind of feel like God owes me a good life.

And things should go my way.

And I should stay healthy and I don't need to be rich, but I need at least enough money in the bank account, and people need to like me and respect me and be my friend.

You understand?

And that guys, that's just sometimes obeying Christ makes life practically harder.

Jesus said, Hey guys, get in the boat and I'll catch up.

I mean, if they Jesus, that didn't make sense.

What do you mean you'll catch up?

But they obeyed.

I mean, they just said, Yes, sir, you're you're Lord, we got it.

They obeyed.

And what happened?

Literally, it's like they got tortured.

For hours, they're just out there rowing, making no progress.

Right?

It's like the old football coach that says, Hey, I'm gonna sit in the shade.

Y'all start running until I get tired.

Sometimes you start obeying Christ and you lose friends.

Life gets harder.

Don't be shocked.

And oftentimes I am, but we need to persevere in obedience, even when it's hard.

Okay.

Here's John Calvin.

We do not truly and perfectly obey God unless we implicitly follow whatever He commands, though our feelings may be opposed to it.

Listen to this, this is so good.

There is always the best reason for everything that God does.

I love that.

Because we often say, well, God always has a good reason.

That's true.

And it's kind of like Calvin says, let me clarify for you.

It's not just God has a good reason.

God always has the best reason.

He's not arbitrary, he's not random.

There is always the best reason for everything that God does.

But he often conceals it from us for a time in order to instruct us not to be wise in ourselves, but to depend entirely on the expression of his will.

You understand what he's saying there?

God always has a great reason, but sometimes he says, hey, do this, and it will be in complete opposition to our feelings.

And we will not understand it, but he's just wanting you to say, I love you so much, I trust you so much, I will obey you, even if it kills me.

You know, there's a verse in Job, I love, when Job is suffering and he feels like he's about to die, and he keeps praying to God, and at some point he says, Though he slay me, yet will I trust him.

That's real faith.

God, I trust you so much, even if you don't answer any of my prayers and you kill me, I'm still gonna trust you.

That's real faith.

Calvin later says, very similar, he says, Listen, sometimes God lets us be tossed around by life so that when the help finally comes, we really appreciate it.

And we fix our attention on him.

We praise and worship him.

Have you never had that experience in your life?

My wife and I had somebody that we were praying for, a lost person to come to Christ for a long time.

And my wife, I mean, this this person seemed about as far from God as you could be.

And I remember my wife and I one point talking, and we said, We really believe God's gonna answer this prayer, but it might be about 80 years from now and we're both dead.

We were just kind of resolved, like, we're gonna just keep praying.

And the person got saved a lot faster than we thought, and a lot more kind of radically and gloriously than we thought.

And still, she and I kind of it's like, Tom, it's the biggest miracle we've ever seen.

It looks so dark.

And then when it happens, it's so bright.

And all you can say is that was God.

I didn't do anything.

Right?

Just happy to get to witness it.

Third point God drawing near can sometimes confuse and terrify us.

We see it here in this story.

You remember the Old Testament story where God says, Hey, I'm gonna get my people who were slaves in Egypt out of slavery.

Bring them into the promised land, flow of milk and honey.

It's gonna be awesome.

And a few days later, they got the Red Sea in front of them, and they got Pharaoh and all his army, the superpower of the day, behind them, bearing down to kill them.

And they panicked, they freaked out, and so would we.

This seems like a terrible plan, God.

Right?

I'd rather be a living slave than a dead free person.

But what was God doing?

God was setting it up to more greatly honor and magnify himself.

And this just is calling card, guys.

This is the way God likes to do things.

Fourth, God is always acting to bless and help his people.

That's always what he's doing.

Again, so even when it looks like God, it looks like you're torturing me, it looks like you're killing me, it looks like you're trying to ruin my life, and you're doing a pretty good job of it.

Trust him.

If you're in Christ, he is always orchestrating every single molecule of the universe to turn out in the long run for your best.

That's the promise of the Bible, guys.

Listen to John Newton, guy that wrote Amazing Grace.

This is such a powerful quote.

If this gets into the basement of our hearts, I think it changes everything.

Everything is necessary that he sends.

Nothing can be needful that he withholds.

He is the perfect doctor.

Trust him.

Okay.

Matthew Henry.

No difficulties can obstruct Christ's gracious appearance for his people.

He will either find or force a way through the most tempestuous sea for their deliverance.

Providence is acting on purpose and directly for the help of God's people.

Yet sometimes it seems as if it was ignoring them.

Again, do we not have experiences in our life where it seems like God is asleep at the wheel?

It seems like God is ignoring us.

But he says, No, no, no.

The Lord Jesus Christ loves his people so much he will do whatever it takes to get close to you and bring grace.

Fifth, we must make time to meditate on God's work to gain insight.

I mean, verse 52, look back at it.

For they did not understand about the loaves, and their hearts were hardened.

Mark's telling us something here.

He's like, listen, they would not have been freaked out by Jesus walking on the water if they had taken the time to meditate on what the loaves actually meant.

I mean, they were standing there, they saw the miracle.

Five loaves, two fish, 20,000 people fed, and 12 baskets left over.

I mean, they saw it, they they at some level got it, but they didn't get the deeper meaning.

I remember teaching a Sunday school class at uh Briarwood years ago, and I think I was actually teaching the Sunday school class on meditation.

You know, it's a Sunday school class, so I said, I'm gonna give you a homework assignment.

Like I said, I want you to take this verse and I want you to this afternoon spend five minutes kind of maybe praying, meditating, thinking, journaling.

And after the class, I was talking to one of the elders in the class, and he was standing great guy, and I really appreciated his humility and honesty.

He said, You know what?

He said, Man, I've been coming to this church for years.

And he said, There are so many times in the sermon up front, in a Sunday school lesson, in a men's Bible study, Wednesday, whatever it is, he said, I hear something good, and I'm like, that's great.

I need to make time later today to slow down and think more deeply about what I've just heard.

He said, I've probably said that to myself at least a hundred times, maybe a thousand times.

And he said, You know what?

I've never done it.

Because, guys, why?

Because he's a terrible, wicked, evil, Hitler-like sinner?

No.

He's just a normal sinner like me and you.

And we got stuff going on.

Good stuff, important stuff, like work and marriage and kids and baseball.

And it's easy for prayer and meditation to just keep getting knocked down the list, is it not?

We got to make the time, guys.

They should have started to realize he's the Messiah.

He's the second David, but he's even something bigger and better than that.

Again, Calvin, they were not directing their mind to the contemplation of Christ's divinity.

This appears to have been added, talking about verse 52, as a warning to us respecting the corruption of our understanding that we may seek from the Lord new eyes.

So let me give you a really, really, really practical application.

John Piper has four verses, I think they're all from the Psalms, that he prays every morning.

At least that's what I've heard him say, and I'm believing him, before he reads his Bible.

And I've tried to do this myself.

And one of them, just gonna give you one, okay?

Psalm 119, 18, open my eyes to behold wondrous things out of your law.

Because again, guys, haven't we all had the experience of we did set the alarm clock, we did wake up early, I did drink my coffee, I did throw cold water on my face, took a shot.

I did sit down with Bible, pen, and journal.

And then if I'm just being really honest, sometimes it's like blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Boring, boring, boring, boring, boring.

I got stuff to do, right?

What's next on the to-do list?

I got, man, I got real stuff to do.

I'm busy.

This is ancient, this doesn't apply.

I don't even know what they're talking about.

That happens to all of us.

So part of it, to pray, God, if you by the Holy Spirit don't open the eyes of my heart today, this morning, to help me see something here, I'm not gonna taste and see your goodness, and I want to taste and see your goodness.

So, what is it?

Here's what I want us to kind of think about for just a second, God.

What is it that they should have been realizing that they missed?

Is Jesus is clearly the Messiah.

The second David, the second Moses.

Just think about this context with me.

He's appointed the 12 men to be the leaders of the church after he leaves.

Just kind of like Moses was appointed over the 12 tribes of Israel in the Old Testament.

Guys, and some of these guys were very devout Jews before they met Jesus, right?

Some of them were fishermen that had taken a sabbatical to follow this radical, crazy prophet John the Baptist.

They knew the Old Testament.

They would have known the great saving event of the Old Testament was the Exodus.

God using Moses to get his people.

Out of Egypt and into the promised land.

Took them through the sea, fed them with supernatural manna in the wilderness.

Everybody flip back to Exodus chapter 33 for just a second.

Exodus 33 · chapter mention

Exodus chapter 33, second book in the Old Testament.

Exodus 33 · chapter mention

We're just going to look very, very briefly at an interaction that God and Moses had that I think is very instructive.

The best way to interpret Scripture is with more scripture.

Exodus chapter 33.

Exodus 33 · chapter mention

They're out of Egypt, they're through the Red Sea, they're going through the wilderness, but they're not home yet.

They're not to the promised land.

And look at what God and Moses, this little conversation they're going to have.

Exodus chapter 33, look at verse 5.

Exodus 33 · chapter mention

For the Lord had said to Moses, say to the people of Israel, you are a stiff knocked, stiff-necked people.

If for a single moment I should go up among you, I would consume you.

See, now take off your ornaments that I may know what to do with you.

You see what God's saying?

You keep doing the same stuff.

If I try to really live among you close and personal, I'm going to end up killing everybody because that's how holy I am.

Skip down to verse 12.

Moses said to the Lord, See, you say to me, Bring up this people, but you have not let me know whom you will send with me, yet you have said, I know you by name, and you also have found favor in my sight.

Guys, this is a great little expression of how to pray.

I mean, Moses, like, hey God, you give me a big deal, a pretty big job here.

About three million people I'm supposed to take across the desert into the promised land, and then you tell me you're not gonna go with us?

This sounds like a bad plan to me.

I need help.

Verse 14.

And he said, This is God, my presence will go with you and I will give you rest.

Ask and you shall receive.

He said, I need help.

God said, Okay, I'll go with you.

Now, do you see the problem that presents?

Just a few sentences ago, God's saying, I'm not sure I can go with you, I'll kill everybody.

And Moses says, Help! And he says, Okay, I'll go.

Okay, verse 18.

Moses said, Please show me your glory.

And you know what Moses is asking there?

He's not just saying, Hey, God, I want to see like a light show.

I want to see like a cool vision.

He's saying this, God, I don't get you.

How can you simultaneously be so holy, so just, so hating of evil, but so gracious, so compassionate?

So I don't get it.

That's glorious that you can do both at the same time, but I don't get it.

You said you couldn't go, and then I just said, please, and you said, Okay, I help.

How can you be that glorious?

Show me your glory, help me understand.

Verse 19.

And he said, I will make all my goodness pass before you, and will proclaim before you my name, the Lord, and I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy.

Skip down to verse 22.

And while my glory passes by, I will put you in a cleft of the rock, and I will cover you with my hand until I have passed by.

And then look into chapter 34, verse 6.

The Lord passed before him and proclaimed, The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin.

But who will by no means clear the guilty?

Visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children's children to the third and the fourth generation.

And Moses quickly bowed his head toward the earth and worshiped.

Now, what in the world does Mark chapter 6, verse 48 mean when it says Jesus intended to pass them by?

Mark 6:48

It means this.

Is there these 12 guys and he's trying to train them?

Hey, I am trying to train you to lead the church that's coming, to be ready, to feed them, to minister to them, even when it's hard, even when you're tired.

And it's like they don't get it.

They're just like, that was cool, boss made some bread.

Then he said, get in the boat.

And he's trying to say, I'm gonna pass by.

I'm gonna show you my glory.

I'm gonna show you I'm with you even in the storm.

You don't need to worry, you don't need to fret.

I am.

When he says, it is I, literally, in the Greek, he says, I am.

It's the divine name.

And he's saying, I'm not just David number two, I'm not just a human Messiah.

I am God, I am your Savior, and I'm with you.

And he loves us so much, he forced his way even through the storm of hell of God's wrath, to get to us.

See, Moses, Moses got it.

God is 100% just and God is 100% forgiving.

How does that work?

I don't know.

I just take it on faith.

And that led him to deep worship.

And sometimes, guys, I don't know if you ever thought this.

I know I have.

Hey, God, if you're still handing out experiences like you did in the Old Testament, hide me in a rock and get to hear your audible voice, it's like sign me up, I'll take it.

But biblically speaking, we get something better.

Because Moses never really understood how can God's justice and love be totally sympatico.

But we get it because it's through the beaten and bruised and bloodied body of his son on the cross, paying for our sins.

Justice, holiness, and wrath fully satisfied.

Love, forgiveness, mercy, fully expressed.

And then he's risen from the dead.

And what is it that he is doing today?

You ever think about that?

What is the Lord Jesus Christ doing in heaven, seated on his throne, ruling?

We know at least one thing that he's doing because the Bible mentions it.

Hebrews chapter 7, verse 25.

Hebrews 7:25

Just listen to this verse.

Consequently, he is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them.

He is up there, guys, on the heavenly mountain, while we are down here in the storm of life, being tortured, trying to get through.

And he's like, I'm praying for you.

I see you.

I'm with you in the storm.

Last thought.

Because some of us may be thinking, Owen, that's a nice sermon for people in full-time ministry.

Good for you.

You preached a sermon for yourself.

You got to serve people, God's with you.

But guys, here's the thing if if you're in Christ, if you're a mom or you're a dad, you're ministering to kids, if you're a single person leading that Bible study, you're ministering to them.

Wherever you're trying to minister to others and you feel overwhelmed, the Lord is with you.

The Lord is with you.

So even in the hardest moments, even when you're trying your best and you feel like you're failing, trust Him, trust His grace, even when the circumstances make no sense.

Let's pray.

Lord Jesus Christ, we love you so much and we are so thankful and grateful for you.

Although, even as we say this in our hearts and our minds, we we know we're convicted.

We don't love you enough, we don't appreciate you enough, we don't worship you enough.

So I pray, even in these last moments of this service, would you draw near?

Would you open the eyes of our heart to behold wondrous things through the bread and through the wine, Lord, through the songs, through the fellowship together.

We pray all this in Christ's name.

Amen.