Faltering Faith Forgets

That’s the part, Jesus giving us the things we want to make our life better is the part, and we all enjoy that. I’m not knocking that at all, but really the part that people are not so much interested in is when he starts talking, because that’s when there’s usually it rubs a little bit. Everybody wants to be healed and everybody wants to be successful and have a bunch of stuff, but when Jesus starts talking is when people start to find other things to do sometimes.

Verse 32, And his disciples say unto him, Does that sound familiar to you, to our study in Matthew? Verse 34, And they took up of the broken meat that was left seven baskets full, and they that did eat were four thousand men beside women and children. And he sent away the multitude and took ship and came into the coast of Magdala. Would you pray with me this morning?

And he said unto them, And he sent away the multitude and took ship and came into the coast of Magdala. Would you pray with me this morning? Our Father, we just come to you and want to just once again offer our service to you this morning. Offer the word that we’ve read here and will read further in just a minute. We just want to offer it to you, Lord, that you would bless even as the bread that was given by the disciples to you, and you blessed it and gave it back.

So Lord, we want to offer the bread, the word of God to you. We ask for your blessing as we take it back from your hand that it might help us and bless us, Lord. We need your help and grace this morning. Help us to grow this morning. Help us to know you better. Help us to learn to fellowship and trust you more. As we look at these passages of scripture, Help us, I pray, to see ourselves and our patterns in the disciples that are so clearly spelled out in Matthew here.

So Lord, would you guide our study this morning? We pray in Jesus’ name, Amen. Now this should sound very familiar to all of us. This is the story of the feeding of the 4,000. And the feeding of the 4,000, it’s difficult to pin down exactly how much time had elapsed between the feeding of the 4,000 here and the feeding of the 5,000 in Matthew chapter 14. What we do know, we do know some events that occurred between the two.

In Matthew 14, after Jesus fed the 5,000, he crossed the Sea of Galilee, and then he heals a man. And then later he has a conversation with the scribes and Pharisees regarding tradition. We covered that pretty recently in our study. And then after that there was this Canaanite woman that has a daughter who is healed from a devil. And then we just read verse 29 through verse 31 where Jesus healed people, and the time is not clearly given.

But what we do know is it hasn’t been that long. Well Jesus’ ministry was only a few years to begin with. But we’re talking by a rough estimate, maybe one month to three months period of time. They crossed the Sea of Galilee a few times, going here, going there, teaching. And some of that time, it takes time to do that kind of thing and to teach and such.

And so from one feeding of the 5,000 to the feeding of the 4,000, which has only been a couple of months probably, and the feeding of the 4,000 is when you read verses 33 down to verse number 37, 38, it’s almost exactly the same. The words are almost the same. The activity, the process is exactly the same. The difference is there were 5,000 beside women and children.

Now there’s 4,000 beside women and children. Before there were five loaves and two fish, and they took up 12 baskets full of leftovers. Here there’s seven loaves and some fish, and they take up seven baskets full. But the fact that Jesus had them sit on the ground was the same. The fact that he took it from them, gave thanks, break it, and then gave it to the disciples who then gave it to the multitude is the same.

They were all filled exactly the same. They didn’t let anything go to waste exactly the same. And when I come across passages of Scripture in my own personal Bible study that say the same thing twice, and I know these are two different events, and therefore it’s recorded twice, and it’s two very significant miracles. But when I see that twice and the Lord just puts the same thing again, it makes me wonder, why did you tell us this again?

That’s what I ask myself. And I think the reason is found in chapter 16. So let’s start in chapter 16, verse number 1. The Pharisees also with the desadducees came, tempting him, desired him that he would show them a sign from heaven. And he answered and said unto them, When it is evening, ye say, it will be fair weather, for the sky is red. And in the morning it will be foul weather, for the sky is red and lowering.

O ye hypocrites, can ye discern the face of the sky, but can ye not discern the signs of the times? A wicked and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign, and there shall no sign be given it but the sign of the prophet, Jonas. This is again another portion that is repeated in Matthew 12, from Matthew chapter 12. And he left them and departed, verse 5. And when his disciples were come to the other side, they had forgotten to take bread.

Then Jesus said unto them, Take heed, and beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and of the desadducees. Now the reason he says this in verse number 6 is because they had just come out of a conversation with those two same groups, the Pharisees and the desadducees. So that conversation had just happened, and so that was fresh on their minds. And so when they got back to private, got back private and they got to the other side of the Sea of Galilee, that’s when Jesus brought it up.

Because he’s still thinking about it. He’s still thinking about the fact that these Pharisees and desadducees had asked this tempting question, which was a question with poor motives, but we’ll look at that later. Verse 7. And they reasoned among themselves, saying, It is because we have taken no bread. Which, when Jesus perceived, he said unto them, O ye of little faith, why reason ye among yourselves, because ye have brought no bread?

Now pause a second. If there is anything that the disciples should understand at this moment, given the recent past, is that lack of bread is not a problem. There were 12 and 7, 19 baskets left over beside the 9,000, not counting women and children, that had eaten the bread and the fish. There were 19 baskets full left over. Bread is not a problem for the Lord Jesus. They should have known that.

And here they are fretting over bread. And in the big scheme of things, I think that’s part of the reason the Lord rebukes them, or chides them, if you will, is because their focus was still on just earthly things. And that’s not what he’s talking about here. When he talks about the 11 of the Pharisees and desadducees, and there’s this one feature when you follow the disciples, it’s almost like the disciples are constantly reading into what Jesus is saying. In other words, they think he’s hinting at things.

You see this over and over and over. They always think he’s hinting, like he’s being passive aggressive or something. And they always assume he’s hinting at it when he’s really just speaking openly, and this is the case of that. He brings up 11, and they assume, because 11 is used to make bread, they assume that Jesus is making a passive aggressive statement, like, hey dummies, you left the bread.

He is not concerned about the bread. That is the least of his concern, but it is their concern. In other words, because their focus is on the temporal entirely, they are completely missing the eternal, which is what he’s talking about. He’s talking about the doctrine, down in verse number 12, of the Pharisees and desadducees, which is important. That deals with people’s eternity. That deals with the truth of the word of God and what they’re telling the multitudes and how the disciples are responding to that.

And we covered that in our study of Matthew. But notice, anytime our focus is on the temporal and the material and the carnal, we are going to overlook the lessons the Lord wants us to learn about eternal things, which is really what our focus and where our affection should be set in the first place, is it not? The Lord wants us to lift our eyes up off of just, you know, what we’re going to eat, how we’re going to be clothed.

We’ve already covered that in Matthew chapter 6, the end of Matthew 6. Remember that? This is all the things the Gentiles seek after, and the Lord’s like, there are far more important things. This is trivia. This is minutiae of God. This is not important. He is going to take care of it. So the Lord says, lift up your eyes to the eternal things. Listen to what I’m trying to tell you about this.

This is an eternal matter, not bread, but they’re stuck on bread. They’re stuck on bread. They’re stuck on bread. Verse 9, the Lord says, Now notice all the times you see this. In verse number, if you would look in your Bible, in verse number 8, Why are they reasoning? What does that mean? That means they’re trying to figure it out. Using human effort, they’re trying to figure out what the Lord is saying, they’re trying to figure out what they’re going to do about the bread, because they left the bread, you know, they didn’t bring the bread, so they’re trying to figure it out with human effort. Reason.

But then you go down, verse number 9 uses the word understand. And then the word remember. You see that in verse number 9. Remember. Neither remember. Verse 10, neither remember the seven loaves. Verse 11, how is it you do not understand? All these words, reason, understand, remember. In Mark chapter 8, which is the parallel passage, verses 17 to 21, I’ll read it for you. It says very much the same, but it adds a couple of other words. Listen to it. It says, And when Jesus knew it, he saith unto them, Why reason ye, because ye have no bread? Perceive ye not? And do ye not remember?

Let me reread that, skip the line. Perceive ye not, neither understand? Have ye your heart yet hardened? Having eyes, see ye not? Having ears, hear ye not? And do ye not remember? When I broke, when I break the five loaves among five thousand, how many baskets full of fragments took ye up? And they say unto him, twelve. And when the seven among four thousand, how many baskets full of fragments took ye up?

And they said seven. And he said unto them, How is it that ye do not understand? Now, go back to verse number 8, and you’ll see the key. The Lord is pointing out their reasonings. He’s finding fault with their understanding that’s lacking. He says their heart is hardened. You see that? He says they can’t see, they can’t hear, even though it’s right in front of them. And he says they have a problem with their memory. Why? Verse number 8, he says, Oh, ye of little faith.

You see, their lapse in faith had caused all of these problems that we read here. Their lapse in faith caused a problem with their perception. It caused a problem with their understanding. It caused a problem of the hardening of their heart. And I’ll tell you something, the hardening of the heart is a much bigger problem than the hardening of the arteries. It caused a problem with their memory. It caused a problem with their sight, with their ears.

All went back to the problem of faith because when this whole thing was going on, when they had the problem with their sight, with their ears, all went back to the problem of faith. Because when this whole question comes up with the bread, they don’t have bread, and they’re now worried, what are we going to do about bread? Oh, no, we’re going to do about bread. It’s the same problem they had before.

And the problem is the Lord identifies the reason they are perplexed, they’re distressed, they’re bothered by this as their faith. There are four times in the book of Matthew that the Lord describes the faith of the disciples as little faith. Matthew 6.30, when the Lord’s talking about material provision, oh ye of little faith. Matthew 8.26, on the ship during the storm when they thought they were sinking.

Matthew 14.31, when Peter’s walking on the water and he starts to sink and Jesus grabs him by the hand and says, wherefore didst thou doubt? Oh ye, oh, thou of little faith. And then in this place, the Lord is pointing out faith. Now, let me say something. You find faith so many times in Matthew that the Lord’s always talking about faith. But the problem with faith is I feel like faith is not very well defined in my own mind, much less when I’m trying to explain it to a group of people like you.

The hard part is we think of faith kind of as this just faith, like it’s this kind of feel-good idea. No, but faith has practical implications. When we live by faith, make decisions by faith, respond to circumstances by faith, respond, you know, just take as an example, when the ship was in the storm and they had little faith, how did they respond? What was the practical outworking of their lack of faith? You know what they did?

They were melting down. They were fretting. They were worried. They were concerned. Care is not that we perish. What did that come from? It was a direct result of the weakening of their faith or the loss of their faith. Worrying over material provision, worry in Matthew chapter 6 is in direct proportion to a loss of faith. So when we talk about faith, we’re talking about things that affect our lives in real ways.

In this case, it affected their understanding, their memory, their perception, their reasoning, their sight, their hearing, and the hardness of their heart. That’s a pretty significant effect upon it, wouldn’t you say? All of these were caused by the loss of their faith. Now I don’t mean loss of faith like they didn’t believe that Jesus was the Savior. I don’t mean that at all. I mean I’m talking about practical faith, daily faith.

This is the kind of faith we’re supposed to live by. For we walk by faith and not by...now how are they walking? They’re walking by sight. No bread. They don’t see bread. They’re not walking by faith. But one of the primary reasons that this has happened is because they have forgotten. And how do we know that? Because look at verse number 9. What does the Lord say?

And this is why I think that the feeding of the 5,000 and the feeding of the 4,000 are almost exactly alike. The whole purpose is to double it. That’s the whole lesson. Look at what it says. Verse 9, Do ye not yet understand, neither remember the five loaves of the 5,000 and how many baskets ye took up? Neither the seven loaves of the 4,000 and how many baskets ye took up?

What is the Lord doing? The Lord takes both of those notable miracles and puts them together. That tells me he wanted them together. Because that’s the lesson. That’s the lesson. You see, even though it’s only been maybe a couple of months since the feeding of the 5,000, everybody was awestruck. Wow! 5,000, probably 10,000 to 15,000 people ate. Everybody was full and there were 12 baskets left over and everybody was awestruck.

It’s only been a couple of months and they have already forgotten. Not only that though, the feeding of the 4,000, which happened after that, which is what we just read in chapter 15, that’s why I read it, has just happened like yesterday. And they’ve already forgotten. Jesus says they’ve forgotten. You see what happened is they blinked and forgot all that the Lord Jesus had done. How then did that affect their faith?

Now they come to a point where they don’t have bread, I mean an honest mistake when you say, and now they’re worried. Now they’re fretting. Now they’re concerned. Now they’re reading into what Jesus is saying. Oh no, what are we going to do? What are we going to do? We might ask ourselves this question, how can someone forget the miraculous things that God has done for them so soon?

We’re talking days. A huge miracle they have forgotten in days. Beside the first one, a couple of months ago, let me take you to the next one. I want to read some scripture to you and I want to show you this and illustrate this to you. Because the truth is that we are these disciples. The Lord does things. The Lord has brought us to pure and pure and pure.

The Lord has brought us to the true and the true and the true. We are these disciples. The Lord does things. The Lord has brought us to periods of our lives, every one of us, he’s brought us into periods of our lives where our faith has been tested with difficulty. We’ve come to something that we could not figure out, we could not reason, and we had to lean upon the Lord and trust God.

We didn’t have answers, we didn’t have strength, we didn’t have power, and we had to lean upon God for help. And really we should lean upon God even when we are deluded into thinking that we have strength for it anyway. But knowing our human nature, that’s not what we do. We think if we can do it then we’re not going to bother God with it. Well that’s dumb.

We should be leaning upon God on purpose all the time, even for the easy stuff. But going back, the Lord has brought us through, he’s brought you through. You might have something in your mind that you think, that was a very difficult trial of my faith. That was a very difficult period of my life. I didn’t know what I would, maybe it was a financial issue. Maybe it was a health issue. Maybe it was an issue with a relationship that you had.

Maybe it was, it could be any number of things in our lives where you were put into the fire and your faith, you learned something about the Lord and your faith grew. Can anybody kind of think of a period of your life, maybe a big period, maybe a small period, whatever the case might be. You can have those in your life and almost as soon as you have that you forget.

You know how you know you’ve forgotten? Because in the future, you’re faced with something similar and you’re still fretting and you’re still worried. In other words, you repeat the whole process. You know why? Because you have forgotten what God has done. Your faith has not been built upon prior works of the Lord and demonstrations of his faithfulness to you. Rather, you’re just going back and learning the lesson again.

Look at Exodus 14 verse 26. It says this, This is the apex miracle in the Old Testament. This is it. This is it. There is probably no greater miracle as described in the Old Testament than this.

And Israel saw the Egyptians dead upon the seashore. And Israel saw that great work which the Lord did upon the Egyptians and the people feared the Lord. And what’s the next word? What does it say? Believe the Lord and his servant Moses. Their faith was strengthened. They had seen God come through for them. He had done as he promised.

Chapter 15 verse 22. So Moses brought Israel from the Red Sea. And they went out into the wilderness of Shur. And they went, how long? Three days. How long has it been since they saw the Egyptians on the seashore? Seventy-two hours. Three days. In the wilderness and found no water. And when they came to Marah, they could not drink of the waters of Marah, for they were bitter.

Therefore the name of it is called Marah. And the people murmured against Moses saying, what shall we drink? And he cried unto the Lord, and the Lord showed him a tree, which when he had cast into the waters, the waters were made sweet. There he made for them a statue and an ordinance, and there he proved them. And said, If thou wilt diligently hearken to the voice of the Lord thy God, and wilt do that which is right in his sight, and wilt give ear to his commandments, and keep all his statutes, I will put none of these diseases upon thee which I have brought upon the Egyptians.

For I am the Lord that healed thee. And they came to Elam where there were twelve wells of water, and three score and ten palm trees, and they encamped there by the waters. Three days after the greatest miracle of the Old Testament. Three days. They’re already, they have already forgotten. What’s greater? Water parting the Red Sea. Obviously, providing water for the congregation is much simpler. It’s a much smaller miracle.

And yet, even though they had seen the greatest of all the Old Testament miracles before their very eyes, here they’re concerned with the trivia. Their faith has failed. They have forgotten. What has happened to their understanding? Jesus saying, how is it you don’t understand? To the Israelites, how is it you don’t understand? I just walked you through the sea on dry ground, and you’re now worried about water.

Look forward, if you would, at chapter 16, verse 1. And they took their journey from Elam, and all the congregation of the children of Israel came to the wilderness of sin, which is between Elam and Sinai on the fifteenth day of the second month. How long has it been since they left Egypt? One month. Because they left in the first, remember the Passover, the fifteenth day of the first month.

So, say January 15th. Bring it in modern time. It’s not, but just say that for ease. It’s now February 15th. It’s been one month. And the whole congregation of the children of Israel murmured against Moses and Aaron. What, listen, what has already happened? Red Sea, waters of Marah that he’s provided, and it’s only been a month. Two enormous miracles, and they’ve already forgotten again. And the children of Israel said, they murmured against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness, and the children of Israel said unto them, would the God we had died by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the flesh pots, and when we did eat the bread to the full, for ye have brought us forth into this wilderness to kill this whole assembly with hunger.

Then said the Lord to Moses, behold, I will rain bread from heaven for you, and the people shall go out and gather a certain bread every day, that I may prove them whether they will walk in my law or no. Chapter 17, verse 1. And all the congregation of the children of Israel journeyed from the wilderness of sin after their journeys, according to the commandment of the Lord, and pitched in Rephidim.

And there was no water for the people to drink. The last one in chapter 16 was only a month after the Exodus. So we’re just like a couple months out. Wherefore the people did chide with Moses and said, give us water that we may drink. And Moses said unto them, Why chide ye with me? Wherefore do ye tempt the Lord? And the people thirsted there for water, and the people murmured against Moses, and said, Wherefore is this that thou hast brought us up out of Egypt to kill us and our children and our cattle with thirst?

And Moses cried unto the Lord, saying, What shall I do unto this people? They be almost ready to stone me. And the Lord said unto Moses, Go on before the people, and take with thee of the elders of Israel and thy rod, wherewith thou smote’st the river, take in thine hand, and go. Behold, I will stand before thee there upon the rock in Horeb, and thou shalt smite the rock, and there shall come water out of it, that the people may drink. And Moses did so in the sight of the elders of Israel, and he called the name of the place Massah and Meribah, because of the chiding of the children of Israel, and because they tempted the Lord, saying, Is the Lord among us or not?

Think about that, brothers and sisters. Is the Lord among us or not? How could they think he’s not? You know why? They forgot. They forgot. Go, if you would, with me to Psalm 78. Psalm 78.

Look at verse 5. This is recounting the history of Israel. It says this, For he established a testimony in Jacob and appointed a law in Israel, which he commanded our fathers that they should make known to the Jews, and the Jews were not afraid of him. He commanded our fathers that they should make them known to their children, that the generation to come might know them, even the children which should be born, which should arise and declare them to their children, that they might set their hope in God and forget.

Notice that? Forget. Not forget the works of God. What has God done in your life? What work has God done in your life? The Lord wants you to build upon that. He wants you to take the faith that you have derived from seeing a demonstration of his coming through in faithfulness for you. He wants you to build on that faith, greater faith. But when you and I forget what he has done in the past, and we think, well, but this time it’s different.

No, it’s not. It’s not different. It’s not different. I’ll tell you why in just a minute. But it’s not different. But see, the thought that says this time is different is the very problem of failure of faith that causes us to fret once again. And we start back over. And we can’t build upon our faith so long as we’re repeating the same lesson. You can’t go to lesson two until you’ve finished and successfully completed and remembered lesson one.

Verse eight. And might not be as their fathers a stubborn and rebellious generation, a generation that set not their heart aright and whose spirit was not steadfast with God. Why not? Why wasn’t it? They forgot the works of God. Verse 11.

And they sinned yet more against him by provoking the Most High in the wilderness. And tempted, they tempted God in their heart by asking for meat for their lust. Now stop there, think about it. Think with me very clearly. You have to get the implication of this. Why did they tempt? First of all, how did they tempt God? They tempt God by saying, God, where you at?

Are you among us or not? We’re hungry. We’re thirsty. That tempted God. God was not pleased with that kind of unbelief because they should have believed. And the Bible says, the reason they said that and they spoke against God, the reason they sinned is because they had forgotten. They had forgotten. Verse 19. Yea, they spake against God, they said, Can God furnish a table in the wilderness?

Behold, he smote the rock that the waters gushed out, and the streams overflowed. Can he give bread also? Can he provide flesh for his people? Therefore the Lord heard this and was wrath.

Verse 22, because they, what does it say? Believed not in God and trusted not in his salvation. Why didn’t they? They have plenty of reason to because they forgot.

I could go on and on and on. He gave them angel’s food in verse 25. Verse 30, they were not estranged from their lust. But 31, the wrath of God came upon them. Verse 32, for all this they sinned still and believed, you see it, believed not for his wondrous works. Verse 37, for their heart was not right with him. Neither were they steadfast in his covenant.

He forgave their iniquity, verse 38. Verse 40, how oft did they provoke him in the wilderness and grieve him in the desert. Yea, they turned back and tempted God and limited the Holy One of Israel. They, verse 42, I’m not making this up. There’s a reason why these are all tied together. They remnant. They tied together. They remembered not his hand nor the day when he delivered them from the enemy.

How he had wrought signs in Egypt and his wonders in the field of Zohan. And he goes through all of these miracles that the Lord did upon them to Egypt. Verse 51, and all the firstborn in Egypt, the chief of their strength in the tabernacles of Ham, but made his own people to go forth like sheep and guided them in the wilderness like a flock. He led them to safety, verse 53.

Verse 54, brought them to the border of his sanctuary. Verse 55, cast out the heathen before them. Verse 56, yet they tempted and provoked the most high God and kept not his testimonies.

And go on and on and on. Listen, brothers and sisters, the Lord, the Lord has done great things in your life and he has brought you through difficulty and he has built your faith and he has demonstrated his power in your life in a multitude of ways. And you’ve been brought very low and you’ve been brought to a point of distress where your only place you could turn was to the Lord Jesus and you leaned upon him heavily and he brought you through.

Do not forget it. Because you build upon that for the next time, and I want to tell you something, there’s something even greater than what the Lord has brought you through. There’s something even greater work that the Lord has done and it is found in Romans chapter 8. Here’s what it says, he that spared not his own son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things?

The greatest work that God ever did for us was when he sent his son into the world to save us. There is therefore now no thing. If God gave us the greatest thing, if he provided the greatest need that we had, if he gave us the greatest gift that could be given, everything else is lesser than that. Everything else is less significant than that. So no matter what the thing in the future that you might have to deal with, what perplexity or distress, God has already given you his son upon a cross.

How will he not give you and take care of you and be faithful to you in this other thing that you have to face? He will. God will provide your needs. God will come through when you trust him. God will act on your behalf when you ask him. God will come through when you lean upon him. He will do it. How do you know? Because he has done everything to the most extreme degree that you needed.

He has sent his son. If he has sent his son to be the propitiation for our sins, to bleed and die in our place, there is nothing, there is nothing that he will not do for you in your need. It doesn’t exist.

But will you remember that? You see, the Lord wants the cross of Christ to set everything else in our relationship to God. Is God going to provide for that financial need that you have? Is God going to see you through this illness you have? Is God going to hold you up and keep you strong during this problem with your relationship? You don’t know how that’s going to turn out.

Lean upon him. Trust him. He that spared not his own son will again show himself faithful to you. He will. He will. Do not forget what he has done.

Because the danger is when you forget and I forget because we are prone to forget, we’ll find ourselves back at the same starting point. Having to relearn a lesson the Lord has already taught us with the Lord not being very happy about it and asking us, how is it? And really I think this is where it gets... When the Lord says to the disciples, how is it you do not understand?

I mean, you feel his heart when he says, why don’t you get it? Look at what I’ve done. I have come through for you. How can you not understand that next time I will also be there? Next time I will also carry you. You can trust me. The next financial need you have, the next big bill you have, the next bad news you have, the next difficulty, you have to face the next destruction of some relationship, whatever the case might be, the next thing you have, he will still be there.

How is it you don’t understand that I am this way? I am going to take care of you. I will do it. Trust me. Because when we learn that, when we learn the lesson of the feeding of the 5,000, we get to the feeding of the 4,000 and we’re like, Jesus has this. This is not a problem. Or maybe we stumble at the feeding of the 4,000 too.

By the time you get to the boat and they don’t have any bread because they forgot it, an honest mistake, you think, oh, well, we’re sunk now. I mean, look how stupid I was. Oh, no, no, no. Once you’ve learned those lessons, you get to the next lesson and you say, sorry?

The Lord has this taken care of. You know what you don’t have? Distress, trouble, anxiety, anguish. That’s what you don’t have. Why? Because your heart is resting upon what the Lord has done in the past and you’re trusting he’s going to do it in the future. How many of you can raise a hand as a token of your testimony and say, first, I have absolutely been through the same lesson twice?

Okay. That’s all of us. But how many of you can also say, I have been through a lesson twice, but there have been times that I faced something that was similar and I felt myself trusting God, remembering what he had done. How many of you can say, I know what it’s like to face something and not be troubled. Right? That’s the lesson the Lord wants us to learn and then build so our faith strengthens so that Peter steps out of the boat the second time.

I don’t know if it happened the second time. Peter steps out of the boat and doesn’t sink anymore all upon seeing what the Lord Jesus had done. So the takeaway from this morning is this, simply, you can trust Christ for every single thing. If he gave his son for you and he did, you can trust every other thing in your life to him and he will never fail.

God can do anything, anything, anything. God can do anything but fail. So are you trusting him? Are you leaning upon him? Are you recalling the things he has already done for you?

Because that’s how you build your faith. Let’s pray together.