Undoctrinated Daughter

…Jesus immediately said to them, “Take courage! It is I. Don’t be afraid.” “Lord, if it’s you,” Peter replied, “tell me to come to you on the water.” “Come,” he said. Then Peter got down out of the boat, walked on water and came toward Jesus.” – Matthew 14:25-29

Imagine if our faith looked like this image. Some people working their way in, some people looking with doubt, some pulling others (kicking, screaming, holding on for dear life) and then others just jumping right in ready to make the biggest splash of their life.

This was also the faith of the disciples thousands of years ago as they waited in fear and trepidation on their little boat in the middle of the sea watching a “ghostly” figure coming towards them wondering what would happen next on this crazy adventure with this man proclaiming the good news, bringing miracles and joy, a lot of trouble (most of the time), and now walking on water?! Scripture says they were terrified. But Jesus tells them to take courage. And one disciple says, call me to come to you. And Jesus does.

For the last few weeks, all around me, I have heard many people talk about a leap of faith and when you do it, it relies on you, but when God does it, it relies on Him. Those leaps of faith often look impossible, feel impossible, are impossible, but with God, all things are possible. As lovers of Christ, we tend to overuse these truths sometimes to the point of overdoing without the direction needed from the Holy Spirit. Sometimes in our own comfort and confidence of success, we do things without the “GO!” And then there are other times we don’t answer the call because it is just too much, too big, and quite frankly, we’re not enough. We allow the opportunity to “jump in” pass us by because of our pride, fears, and inadequacy instead of trusting the One who says, “Come.”

But instead of worrying about the too much, too little, and the not enough, what if we just listened to the command and JUMPED! I look at the image of my youngest jumping in, hands extended, arms open wide, and think, wow – that is exactly what I want to look like every day in this faith walk with you, Lord. I want to jump in like this in every part of my life as soon as I wake up. I want to love better, serve better, be better, and be more present with all those around me and look just like that: excited, joyful, filled with all the fruit of the Spirit. But right there it is “look”. Superficially and full of ugly pride, I want to “look” just like that, but that will never be enough. I WANT to BE all of that. I want to be like Peter and get out of the boat. Yes, Peter failed the mission to walk the whole way to Jesus and some would argue he failed. But Peter did what none of the others in the boat did, he got out of the boat of comfort, ease, complacency, fear, pride, regret, worry, doubt – he got out of the boat.

We often measure our successes by our lack of failure. God measures our success by obedience. We may fail, but we didn’t fail Him. We forget that Jesus extended his hand to Peter as soon as Peter lost his way. As soon as Peter’s eyes drifted from the Savior and he was engulfed in the worry of his surroundings, Jesus was there. But still, Peter got out of the boat fully confident in Jesus’ command to “Come.”

The waves of worry have kept me in the boat. At times, I am way too concerned with how everything “looks” instead of just being present in the obedience regardless of the success or failure. I’m giving it all to Him today. I’m giving Him all of my “Yes” today. I’m jumping in – someone hand me the goggles.

XOXO, Loni