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do know that Jesus was praying and that at three o’clock in the
morning He looked out and He saw them. The Bible says that
He saw them struggling at the oars.
I’m suggesting that Jesus on the mountain praying is
pure faith because you can’t see Him. “We walk by faith and
not by sight.” Jesus was on the mountain praying, very much
like today as He’s in heaven praying and we’re on a stormy sea.
Jesus gave a clear word, Mark 6:45, “And immediately
He made His disciples get into the boat and go ahead of Him to
the other side to Bethsaida, while He Himself was sending the
multitude away.” They had a word that Jesus would meet them
on the other side. Hebrews 11 talks about “faith is the evidence
of things not seen”. In this first scene Jesus is invisible but He
knows everything that is going on. He sees them and He’s
praying and when He sees them struggle, He walks upon the
water.
It’s not easy to trust a God that you can’t see. So, they
failed that part. If they had called upon the Lord, they would
have learned the lesson of the loaves. Let me remind you about
the lesson of the loaves. Though it doesn’t feel like much and
it doesn’t look like much, if I keep coming back to Jesus, at the
end of the day I will see that I had more than enough for me and
thousands like me. That’s the lesson.
They didn’t call on the Lord when they were rowing.
They didn’t talk to one another and say, “We better not fail this
test.” I don’t even think they were thinking about the miracle
of the loaves. They were self-conscious. They were storm
conscious. They were thinking about their circumstance. They
weren’t thinking, “Oh, we’ve got to remember what He taught
us when He fed five thousand people.”
I think when the Bible says, “They are struggling at the
oars,” I think that is more than sore muscles. It’s more than sore
arms. Spiritually speaking, it’s frustrating that you can’t obey
God. They are weary and tired and defeated and maybe they
are even despairing. A Christian attempting to obey God in His