The Unexpected Jesus

So today's reading is Matthew 14, verses 13 to 33. When Jesus heard what had happened, He withdrew by boat privately to a solitary place. Hearing of this, the crowds followed Him on foot from the towns. When Jesus landed and saw a large crowd, He had compassion on them and healed their sick.

As evening approached, the disciples came to Him and said, this is a remote place and it is already getting late. Send the crowds away so they can go to the village and buy themselves some food. Jesus replied, they do not need to go away. You give them something to eat. We have here only five loaves of bread and two fish, they answered.

Bring them here to me, He said, and He directed the people to sit down on the grass. Taking the five loaves and the two fish and looking up to heaven, He gave thanks and broke the loaves. Then He gave them to the disciples and the disciples gave them to the people. They all ate and were satisfied and the disciples picked up 12 basketfuls of broken pieces that were left over. The number of those who ate was about 5,000 men besides women and children.

Immediately, Jesus made the disciples get into the boat and go on ahead of Him to the other side while He dismissed the crowd. After He dismissed them, He went up on a mountainside by Himself to pray. Later that night, He was there alone and the boat was already a considerable distance from land, buffeted by the waves because the wind was against it. Shortly before dawn, Jesus went out to them walking on the lake. When the disciples saw Him walking on the lake, they were terrified.

It's a ghost, they said, and cried out in fear. But 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 the water and came toward Jesus. But when he saw the wind, he was afraid and began to sink. He cried out, Lord, save me. Immediately, Jesus reached out His hand and caught him. You have little faith, He said.

Why did you doubt? And when they climbed into the boat, the wind died down. Then those who were in the boat worshipped Him, saying, Truly you are the son of God. And I wanna start off with a big statement this morning. A distorted view of God can hurt and even wreck your life.

A distorted view of God can hurt and even wreck your life. Now, you may not think that what you think of God really has much of an implication for your life, but let me illustrate it with a story from my own life. So growing up, my family was sort of in and out of churches, and so by the time I went to a new high school and entered grade seven, we weren't going to church anymore, but I knew enough to believe in God. I would have called myself a Christian, but I didn't actually have an accurate view of God. I had a distorted view of God.

I believed God was good, I believed He was just, but I didn't know He was merciful or gracious. And I didn't actually understand the gospel, the Christian message. The way I related to God was I had to be good. That was my fundamental way of relating to God, that I had to be good, and if I was good enough, God would be pleased with me and He would bless me. And so this view didn't set me up well for what was a really difficult year in my life.

When I entered into year seven, I was bullied that year, and this distorted view of God actually compounded my pain, because I didn't share what was happening with anyone else. And when I talked to God about it, I was saying to Him, I felt like what He wanted from me was to keep being good, to not fight back, to not insult them back, and if I keep being good, He would bless me, He would deliver me. And so I kept doing that and gritting my teeth until at the end of the year, I was just crushed. I couldn't handle it anymore, and I actually turned away from God. I said to God, I'm sorry, I can't follow you.

This is too hard. And I walked away from Him. See, a distorted view of God can hurt your life. It compounded the pain that I was experiencing as a young fellow in grade seven. What we think about God is so important.

We need to know the real God, and Jesus is the clearest picture that we have of God. John chapter one calls Him the Word, the message. Jesus is God's communication of Himself to us. In fact, Jesus is God in the flesh. So we need the unexpected Jesus to come and to interrupt some of our assumptions, to correct some of our misunderstandings, and to show us what He is like and what God is really like this morning.

And we're gonna let Jesus do just that in Matthew 14, verses 13 to 33. So if you have your Bible, please open it up there. Or if you've got an app on your phone, you can open it up there and we'll be spending some time. I won't read many of the verses again, so just follow along in your Bible there. So we're gonna look at this passage.

We're gonna split it up into three sections. In the first section, we see the compassion of Jesus. The compassion of Jesus. So as it opens up in verse 13, it says, when Jesus heard what had happened. What is this referring to?

Well, just in the previous passage, King Herod had beheaded John the Baptist, and now he's thinking Jesus might be John the Baptist risen from the grave. So this murderous king, his attention is now on Jesus. So Jesus' life is in danger. And secondly, John the Baptist was Jesus' cousin. So can you imagine how He was feeling knowing that His cousin had been violently executed like that?

So our passage opens up and says, and when Jesus heard what had happened, He withdrew privately by boat to a solitary place. He wanted to be alone. He wanted to be with His Father. But the crowds heard that Jesus was going over to the other side of the lake, and so they ran around and they caught Him as He came out on the other side. They wanted more of Jesus.

Now, I don't know how you would respond if you were in His shoes, but imagine you just heard someone that you love has been violently executed. Your life is in danger. You're just trying to get away to be by yourself with God, and people are coming after you, thousands of them saying, we need you, we want you, help us, talk to us, teach us. I'd probably be saying, time out at that point. I need a break.

Leave me alone. But what did Jesus do? Well, our passage tells us that when He saw the crowds, He had compassion on them. He had compassion on them. You really get to know someone's character and their heart when they're put under the squeeze, when they're put under pressure.

In the mornings when my boys were getting them ready for childcare and for school, sometimes they're taking forever to eat their breakfast, and even sometimes I've told my second, Beau, eat your food. We're sort of running late now, so please eat your food. And I come back, and he's still standing there just staring at the wall. I'm like, eat your food. Like, you got one job.

Why aren't you eating your food? Like, what comes out of me when I'm stressed and I'm putting pressure on is exasperation, frustration. When Jesus has thousands of more people being needy and needing His help, what comes out of Him? Compassion. Kindness.

The Greek word for compassion, it refers to this gut level feeling. So this isn't a passing pity that Jesus has. He's actually moved from the inside. When He sees the needs of the crowds, He's moved, and He wants to move towards them and do ministry. It says that He went on to heal them that day.

See, I'm not sure how you view God or if you have really accepted the compassion that is in God's heart and that is in Jesus' heart for you. But maybe you feel that your weakness repels God. Maybe in your weakness, you wish that your life was different and you're upset about that. Maybe you wish you were married by now. Maybe you wish you were retired by now or whatever it might be.

And maybe you think that God's getting a little bit sick of you bringing this to Him. That you should be a bit more content by now. That you should be more spiritual. You should be more joyful. You see, Jesus shows us that God's heart is full of compassion for us in our need and our weakness.

When we bring these things to Him, He doesn't frown on us. He actually is drawn to us. He's drawn to us in our need and in our weakness. He has compassion on you. This is what we see in the first part of our passage, the compassion of Jesus for crowds in their neediness.

In the second part of our passage, we see how Jesus continues to operate out of compassion and to do ministry to the crowds. And I've titled this section, The Provision of Jesus. So we're gonna see the provision of Jesus in this next section. So what happens is it's coming towards the end of the day, it's starting to get dark, and the disciples come up to Jesus, and they say to Him, look, evening's approaching. These crowds are hungry.

Send them away to the small towns to get something to eat. And Jesus says to them, they don't need to leave. You give them something to eat. And the disciples are like, we've only got five loaves here and two fish, and Jesus says, well, bring them here to me. And He takes it, and He looks up to heaven, gives thanks, blesses it, breaks it, and gives it to His disciples.

And they begin to hand it out to the crowd. And they're handing it out to 10 people, to 20, to 50, to 100, and it just keeps multiplying and multiplying and multiplying until He feeds thousands and thousands of people out there in the wilderness. It's an incredible miracle. But you see Jesus is really intentional about the things that He does. This isn't just a random miracle or a fun party trick.

This story is meant to remind us about something from Israel's past, which is recorded for us in the Old Testament. Think about it with me for a moment. If you grew up in church or if you know your Bible well, it might trigger some memories for you. So where are they? Well, they're out in this desolate place.

They're out in the wilderness. Who's there? Well, it's Israel. At least a portion of Israel are there. What's happening?

They're being miraculously fed. How many basketfuls were taken up at the end? Twelve, which is probably a hint at the 12 tribes of Israel. This story is meant to remind us about something that happened thousands of years earlier. When Israel was saved from Egypt in the Exodus, they were brought into the wilderness, and they grumbled, and God provided them miraculously food, bread from heaven called manna for the 12 tribes.

You see, Jesus, what He seems to be doing here in this passage is He is reenacting a story from Israel's history. And the fact that He is the one providing bread shows us something about Jesus. It tells us something about who He is. Matthew, the one who wrote this gospel, he wants us to see that Jesus is the God of Israel. He is the God of Israel.

Just as Israel's God, Yahweh, fed them in the wilderness in the Old Testament, here is Jesus, this human, feeding Israel in the wilderness. He is Yahweh in the flesh. He is God in the flesh. Jesus does not just have compassion on the crowds, He has provision for the crowds. He is able to provide for them.

And Jesus doesn't just he's not just able to provide. He's able to provide for the work that the disciples needed to do. I mean, you remember how he said to the disciples when they said, send them away to the towns? He said to them, they don't need to go anywhere. You give them something to eat.

It's as if Jesus was trying to teach His followers, hey, I want you to take responsibility for the needs of God's people. This is your work. Now they had five loaves and two fish. It was like not enough to feed thousands of people. But Jesus was unintimidated by that.

He just said, bring it to me. I'll multiply it, but I want you to give yourself to this work. So for you, for us today as Open House Church, God has called you to a work. And maybe sometimes you might feel like you've only got five loaves and two fish. You've been through a difficult season as a church, and there might be lots of work to do, and you might feel intimidated by that.

But this passage reminds us that Jesus is the one who provides for the work that God calls us to. He, you can take your five loaves and two fish to Him and say to Him, Lord, please multiply this. This is all we have. And He can multiply it. He can enable you and empower you for the work that He's called you to do. Maybe you feel weak or inadequate or not trained well enough.

Jesus doesn't care if you have one fish and one loaf. Even if you've just got this little bit, you bring it to Jesus, and He is able to provide for the work that He is calling you to do. We've all got work outside of our church as well. Maybe you're a father or a mother or you've got a career. As a father or as a mother, you're called to do God's work by discipling and loving your children, and sometimes that can be a difficult work.

You can get frustrated like me. You can get overwhelmed. You can get exasperated. In that overwhelm, in your exhaustion, bring your five loaves and two fish to Jesus. Ask Him to multiply it.

Ask Him to give you what you need, and then give yourself to the work. Maybe in your career, you feel bored, maybe you feel like you're in a dead end job, and you struggle to really bring your best each day. Bring your five loaves and two fish to Jesus. Ask Him to give you the joy that you need. Ask Him to help you to work heartily as to the Lord and not for men, and then give yourself to the work.

You see, in these opening two sections, we are shown that Jesus, His heart is full of compassion, and His hands are full of provision. He can give us what we need for the work that God calls us to give ourselves to. This is what we learn in these first two sections. But we need something more from Jesus. We don't just need compassion in our weakness.

We don't just need provision in our finitude, in our limitedness, but we also need someone who can deliver us from evil. We look around ourselves and we see wars going on in the world. We see our society going in all sorts of odd directions. We're tempted by sin. We need someone who can deliver us, who can protect us.

And this is what we will see at our final section together, the authority of Jesus. So we've looked at the compassion of Jesus, the provision of Jesus, and now we'll finish with the authority of Jesus. So after Jesus has spent the day ministering to the crowds and feeding them, He dismisses them, and He sends His disciples out in a boat, out into the lake. And Jesus is finally now alone, and He goes up in this mountain, and He prays to His Father. And He has this incredible prayer life because He's there like all night long.

In some translations, I think it says in the third watch of the night, you might correct me, but it's about three between three and six AM when Jesus stops praying, and He goes down the mountain and walks on the water. And at this stage, these winds have risen, this great storm has risen, these waves are battering against the boat, the disciples are afraid, and so when they see Jesus walking in the water towards them, they think it's a ghost. They cry out in fear. But Jesus immediately reassures them. He says, take courage.

It is I. Don't be afraid. And Peter, the ever bold disciple says to Jesus, Lord, if it's you, tell me to come to you on the water. And Jesus says, come. And so Peter gets out of the boat, and he stands on this water, and he begins to walk towards Jesus.

But as he takes his eyes off Jesus and he looks at the wind around him, he's filled with fear again, and he begins to sink. And he cries out, Lord, save me. And Jesus immediately takes him by the hand and says to him, you of little faith. Why did you doubt? And they get back into the boat, and the wind comes down.

And after witnessing this, the disciples fall on their knees and worship Jesus and say, Truly, you are the son of God. In this story, we see the authority of Jesus. This is, again, it's not a random party trick. Jesus is showing us something. He is doing something by walking on water.

Yes, in our eyes in the twenty first century, we're like, wow, that's supernatural. But it's even more amazing in Jewish eyes who knew the Old Testament. Because in the Old Testament, it was God alone who walked on water. So we see in Job 9, verse 8, it says, God alone stretches out the heavens and treads on the waves of the sea. In Psalm 77, it says, the waters saw you, God.

The waters saw you and writhed. The very depths were convulsed. Your path led through the sea, your way through the mighty waters, though your footprints were not seen. You see, this story again is another important clue about Jesus' divinity. He walked on water like the God of the Old Testament.

Matthew was trying to get his readers to understand that Jesus is God incarnate. Remember how Jesus said on the water, take courage, it is I, don't be afraid? Well, in the original Greek of the New Testament, it is I, or in other words, ego eimi. And you can literally translate that as I am. So Jesus says, take courage.

I am. Don't be afraid. That sounds like a weird phrase for us, a weird sort of grammar in English, but Jesus is being very intentional. You remember when God said I am in the Old Testament? When Moses was speaking to the burning bush and God was revealing Himself to him and Moses said, what is your name?

And God said, I am who I am. So when Jesus is walking on waters like the God of the Old Testament, and He's saying, take courage, I am. Don't be afraid. It's so clear here that He wants His disciples, He wants us to know that He's not just a human Messiah. He is the son of God.

He is divine, and He has all authority over these waters that were scaring them. Jesus was standing on the water and claiming the name of God for Himself. No wonder after He got in the boat, these people worshipped Him and said, Truly, you are the son of God. In fact, when they said, you are the son of God, this is the first time in Matthew's gospel that any human being has called Jesus the son of God. This is a climactic moment in this gospel.

This scene reveals Jesus' authority as the divine son of God. But it's not just a general authority that's in view here. Jesus does have authority over everything generally, but the whole scene is telling us about His authority over something in particular, His authority over the waters that He's standing on. Now we gotta think a little bit about what waters symbolise in the Old Testament. The first time we hear about waters in Genesis one, the spirit is hovering over these dark and chaotic waters.

Some of the Psalms that I read for you earlier, in Psalm 77, it said that the waters writhed and convulsed. It's like the waters are personified like this serpent or something like that. The waters sometimes in the Bible symbolise evil and chaos. And so when Jesus is standing on the waters, He's unintimidated by them. He has all authority over them.

It's showing us His authority over evil in particular. Now maybe you look around the world and you see the wars that are going on in the Ukraine and in places like Gaza and Israel and the tensions with China, and you look around at the darkness and you think, we're headed for World War three. This is horrible. You feel anxious. Take heart.

Jesus walks on the waters. He has authority over all the darkness and the chaos that we face. Maybe for you, you're facing the evil of sin. Maybe you're a parent like me, and you're constantly ashamed that you're getting frustrated more than you'd like to be. Or maybe you're struggling secretly with an addiction, and you think, I'm not sure I can get a handle on this?

And the evil one, Satan, is whispering in your ear, condemning you saying, how can you? You're not a Christian. You're still struggling with this. You're guilty. Why are you even bothering? You're never gonna get past this.

Jesus has authority over the evil of sin and Satan. He defeated sin and Satan at the cross. Jesus is unintimidated by what you're facing. He has the power to forgive you for your sins. He has the power to help free you from your sin.

Jesus has authority over evil and over chaos. The question is, are we, like Peter, gonna look at the wind and fear and start to sink, or are we gonna keep our eyes on Jesus and know that He can multiply bread, He can walk on waters, He can give us everything that we need to follow Him in this life. See, Matthew 14, verses 13 to 33 presents us with an unexpected Jesus, but a Jesus that is better than anyone we could have ever cooked up. We've seen that Jesus is divine. He reveals God to us.

And as the divine son of God, His heart is full of compassion. His hands are full of provision, and His reign is full of authority. Now I said at the beginning that a distorted view of God can hurt and even wreck your life, but the opposite is also true. An accurate view of God can heal your life. It can give you life.

And that was my experience later on when I actually heard the gospel. So year eight, I walked away from God, but later on, year 11, I went to a conference, and I heard the good news, the gospel about Jesus, that God is not just just and good, but that His heart is actually full of compassion for me. That He actually took, He actually took my sin and made it His own in His son Jesus. Jesus took my sin. He had the provision in His hands for everything that I couldn't do for myself.

He died in my place for my sins. When I understood this, that God actually was offering me a gift of grace, that in Christ, I didn't have to be good enough for God anymore because Jesus was good enough for me. That I could become a beloved son, that I could be secure in Christ. When I understood that, it filled my heart with joy. It healed my heart.

It gave life to me. I began to follow Jesus from that time on. Imperfectly, lots of ups and downs, but it transformed my direction. It changed my life. A distorted view of God can hurt your life, but an accurate view of God given to us in Jesus and in His gospel can bring healing and life to your soul.

So we've heard about, we've witnessed the unexpected Jesus this morning. Let's follow Him together. Let me pray for us. Father in heaven, we thank you for who you are, that you are better than we could have ever imagined. We thank you for your compassion.

We thank you for your provision. We thank you for your authority. Father, we just give ourselves to you. We thank you for how Jesus has just revealed you to us. We thank you for your son who ultimately confronted evil and sin at the cross, who took the judgment that we deserved and has set us free.

Help us not to move on from your gospel, Lord. Help us not to shrink back and to forget the power that you have to provide. Help us not to hide and forget the gospel that declares our forgiveness. Help us to follow you, Jesus, to put our trust in you. We just commit this church to you and its future.

Be glorified in this place. We ask this in Jesus' name. Amen.