Category: Matthew

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Re:Verse passage – Matthew 14:22-33 (day five)  After He had sent the crowds away, He went up on the mountain by Himself to pray; and when it was evening, He was there alone.

Jesus must have been exhausted. News of John’s death, quickly followed by crowds of people pressing around Him- nonstop healing and interaction. Then, the miracle of the fish and loaves. Jesus meets their needs yet again. Finally, time to process and work through grief. Finally time to unwind from the intensity of the day. Jesus has to be physically and emotionally spent.  So He retreats by Himself. Not to just relax and unwind, but to engage and interact with His Father (pray). If we pay attention to the rhythms of Jesus’ life, we can learn what He believed- His priorities- His “non- negotiables”.  He believed that God’s Word was true.  He believed that gathered worship was important. He believed that prayer was invaluable for direction, encouragement, peace, and wisdom.

What do the rhythms of our lives reveal about our faith, priorities, and “non- negotiables”?

Re:Verse passage – Matthew 14:22-33 (day four)

For Peter, it was the wind and the waves.  They distracted his eyes and he quit looking at Jesus and looked at the wind and waves.  He gets an A+ for enthusiasm and he gets an A+ for faith to get out of the boat, but he got distracted.  When you are ‘walking on water’ and you begin ‘not walking on water’, you realize it very quickly.  At least Peter knew who to turn to in his wet emergency!

What about you?  What is it that distracts you from looking at and trusting Jesus?  Is it self-reliance, or pride, or practical thinking, or just plain impatience?  Have you ever jumped out of the boat and then realized later that things are out of your control?  Jesus had given Peter the command to come, but have you jumped out on your own initiative without consulting the Lord?  Learning to move at Jesus’ command and learning to focus solely and completely on Him is a mark of mature discipleship.  It’s also a lesson we have to learn over and over!

Re:Verse passage – Matthew 14:22-33 (day three)

“Lord, if it is You, command me to come to you on the water.”

Peter’s insistence on getting a positive ID on the Lord gave rise to his willingness to involve himself in a heretofore unthinkable endeavor. He reasoned that if this person could lead him to do the otherwise impossible, he would know the person was the Lord. It’s hard to walk on water, but Christ guided Peter to do it. It’s hard to forgive someone seventy-seven times, but Christ taught Peter to do it. It’s hard to leave the comfort of your own kind and bring others into the fellowship, but Christ enlightened Peter’s heart. It’s hard to value anything more than your own life, but Christ mentored Peter into such fearlessness. When you insist on discovering if it’s really God you’re seeing, that’s what happens.

Re:Verse passage – Matthew 14:22-33 (day two) 

But seeing the wind, he became frightened, and beginning to sink, he cried out, “Lord, save me!”

What are some of the obvious takeaways from this familiar story? 1)When you trust Jesus he will enable you to do things you never dreamed possible. 2)If you take your eyes off of Jesus you will fall.

I was actually drawn to something in the middle of these two. When you step out and follow Jesus you can expect the winds to come up around you to blow you off course. When Peter stepped out of the boat the seas were already disturbed, but that didn’t stop him from trying to get to Jesus. It is one of the most pure acts of Peter’s ministry. He saw Jesus and he knew he had to be near him. It didn’t take long, however, that the winds and waves reminded him that he wasn’t on solid ground.

All of these statements are true. What we must pray is that when we are in the midst of where Jesus has called us to be, we will not take our eyes off of him, or let ourselves be distracted by the noise of the wind.

Re:Verse passage – Matthew 14:14-21 (day seven)

Thousands upon thousands of Israelites are seen wandering in the desert, hungry and asking for food. Have you heard this story before? What happened then? God provided. What happens here? God provided.

Jesus is clearly making a BOLD statement. He is the one they have been waiting for. He is their provider! He even leaves 12 baskets of leftovers; the same amount as the number tribes of Israel. God has provided in abundance once again for Israel.

The people still miss something. Jesus is not just the provider, He is the provision. “I am the bread that came down from heaven.” This provision was so much greater than anything God had ever done before. He provided Himself to us! It was more than physical; it was spiritual!

“What is the deepest root of your joy? What God gives to you? Or what God is to you?” -John Piper

Re:Verse passage – Matthew 14:14-21 (day six)

Man does not live by bread alone, but by every Word that comes out of God’s mouth. Deuteronomy 8:3

Bread is good and needed, but it can’t sustain you. That’s the lesson they would learn a little later. Jesus would say in the days following the miracle with the loaves and fishes, “I am the bread from heaven…whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood will have eternal life.” Striking words. Most were bothered by them, but Jesus’ message was clear. In the same way that bread sustains your physical body, so you must be sustained by me to have eternal life.

Real sustaining life (or a whole life, both physical and spiritual) can only be had by consuming the Word, believing in and following Jesus. This is why Jesus told Martha, “I am the resurrection and the life.” He wasn’t only talking about his own physical resurrection, but Martha’s too, and ours.

So the truest life, whether physical or spiritual (they aren’t separate) can only be known in Jesus. He is our sustenance in the truest sense of the word.

Re:Verse passage – Matthew 14:14-21 (day five)

The disciples surveyed the crowd and then the resources. They came to the conclusion that there wasn’t enough to feed all the people. Then Jesus presses them, “You give them something to eat!”  Two great lessons are working in concert here. The first is that in spiritual and supernatural matters we can do nothing without the power and help of Jesus. Remember Jesus’ teaching in John 15, “apart from me you can do nothing.”  Just as true is the fact that God had given them something, and when placed in His hands was all that was necessary to accomplish His purpose. Be careful of a subtle difference.  Nothing really means nothing. Sometimes in our pride and arrogance we tend to think we can at least do something and that all we need is some specialized help from Jesus.

“What can you do for Jesus?  You know the answer to that as well as I do: nothing at all. But God has given you something that can be used effectively if you place it in Jesus’ hands.” JM Boice

Re:Verse passage – Matthew 14:14-21 (day four)

This miracle must be a very important lesson!  It is the only one included in all four Gospels.  When the disciples came to Jesus with the need to feed the people, Jesus must have felt some sadness.  The disciples had been with Him for about two years now and they did not think about the fact that Jesus could provide the solution Himself.  The ‘truth’ of the situation to the disciples was that there was not enough food to feed the multitudes (possibly as many as 25,000).  Just like the storm at sea appeared to them to be their death until Jesus spoke, the truth of the miraculous provision was not evident until Jesus spoke.  The ‘Truth’ was that Jesus was the Bread of Life.

How much time have you spent with Jesus?  Have you walked with Him just a short time or has it been a lifetime?  Do you recognize that the Truth is not known until Jesus weighs in?  It is not just what Jesus can provide for you…it is who He is and the salvation we have through Him!

Re:Verse passage – Matthew 14:14-21 (day three)

“Looking up toward heaven, he blessed the food.”

Sometimes geography gets in the way. When one reads “up toward heaven,” one might suppose that Matthew was referring to some kind of primitive cosmology which located heaven way above our heads. He wasn’t. The unseen dwelling of God is not “up” as in “somewhere in the stratosphere,” but “up” as in greater and higher than the physical realm. When you speak of a higher grade in school, you don’t mean the second floor, you mean “advanced.” Likewise, when the Bible speaks of the spiritual realm in such terms, it refers to the fundamental wellspring of existence. It is the spiritual side of reality—and God in particular—that undergirds and upholds all that is. It is in this sense that Jesus was looking “up” to the source of all provision.