“Faith + Focus = Courage”

Matthew 14:22-33

Questions and concerns about the mission trip have been at the forefront of my thoughts in recent days. Will we travel to and fro safely? Will the gifts and abilities we bring to our assigned tasks be adequate? What will folks from Grace think of my old stomping grounds in West Virginia, and vice-verse? Is this mission trip really about mission, or is it simply a varied combination of fun, fellowship, and acts of Christian service?

If our definition of mission is limited to traditional efforts to evangelize and witness, it will not be mission. Yes, there will be some fun. There will be some very healthy and needed Christian fellowship. But in the midst of the fun and fellowship, people in need will be served in the name of Jesus Christ. A vital ecumenical Christian ministry in Randolph County, West Virginia will be strengthened by our presence. Our work, our words, and our demeanor will be valid forms of Christian witness. Lives will be touched. Gospel seeds will be planted. So, yes, some Christian mission will indeed be accomplished this week. This will be a mission trip.

It will also be an act of faith. We won’t be like Peter and the other disciples caught up in a stormy sea. There is nothing life threatening about where we’re going and what we’re going to do. Bug bites, bee stings, skinned knees, sunburned noses, stubbed toes, and bruised thumbs will be the greatest dangers we will face.

But still, we will be stepping out on faith. Grace has never before done an intergenerational mission trip such as this. This pastor has never been on a mission trip, period! To some extent Sheila Stager and I are the blind leading the blind. We have no choice but to trust that the folks at the end of our journey will know what they are doing as they direct us in our appointed tasks. Whatever, the time has arrived and soon we will go, knowing more or less where we’re going, with some idea of what we’ll be doing.

There’s some risk in that. To a small extent it will be an adventure in Christian craziness. But it’s not like we’ll be stepping out onto a stormy sea with intentions of walking on water. We might be a little crazy. We are not stupid. There is a difference. Nor are we, like Peter, impulsively jumping out into the unknown. There has been some planning – lots of planning. Whatever our risks might be, they are of the informed variety. We go forth armed with as much information as can be gathered.

Back to Peter. He was impulsive, and maybe at the moment a tad on the crazy side. He had allowed his good intentions to overwhelm his good sense. But we have to give him credit. He trusted Jesus enough to at least try to walk on water. More than that, for a moment or two he succeeded. And even when he took his eyes off Jesus and looked down at the water – even at that moment when he abandoned his primary focus, Jesus, and allowed himself to be distracted by the fearsome waves – even as his faith and courage dissipated and he started sinking into the sea – he still entrusted Jesus with his life. Doubts and all, he reached out to the only One who could save him. Maybe he was crazy, but he definitely wasn’t stupid.

If we’re going to be disciples of Jesus, then ultimately we have to trust him. He calls; we answer. He beckons; we respond. He lays a mission opportunity or challenge at our feet; we pick it up and run with it. Often, as it is with our upcoming mission trip, there is no line item in the budget for this mission. There is no money set aside. There is no funding at all. Often, as is the case with our mission trip, the folks doing the planning don’t have a clue, or at least not very much of one. Sometimes there is no nearby precedent to follow. Sometimes the one with the God-given vision has no guarantee that anyone else will see the light. Sometimes it’s simply a matter of being willing to get our feet wet, and maybe even risk a thorough dunking. Usually there are no guarantees of success.

But in Christ and through Christ’s church there are always resources: people who have been there and done that, folks who know how to find or raise money, fellow Christians of means and generosity who are willing to provide financial and other necessary resources. The same God who creates within us hearts for mission also provides us with minds to plan and carry it out.

Again, this week’s mission trip cannot be fully equated with walking on water. There are greatly differing levels of risk involved. But some things are the same. There are risks to be taken, different levels of which to be sure, but still risks. There are leaps of faith to be made. The focus must remain on Jesus. Doubt, fear, and distractions cannot be allowed to compromise our mission. But when they do and the bottom starts to drop out – when our most faithful impulses get us in over our heads – when even our most careful planning doesn’t account for all the possible disasters that might await us – Jesus is still there.

The One who said, “It is I.” to those first disciples as they huddled trembling in their fragile little boat in the midst of an angry sea – the One who is THE GREAT I AM – is only a prayer, a cry, a desperate plea away. He will save us in spite of ourselves: in spite of our doubts, our fears, our foolish impulses, even our stupidity. And in ways we cannot even begin to comprehend he will graciously redeem our most flawed efforts. He, who at Creation brought something wonderful out of an awful nothingness, can reach down into the chaos of our lives and the wreckage of our ministries and bring forth something good.

Odds are that this upcoming mission trip will end up being a mixed bag of successes and failures. We’ll do some things very well. Some of our work will be deemed barely passable. On occasion we may fall flat on our collective face. But a week from today, when we’re standing around during the coffee hour sharing our experiences, you will hear from people who are glad they went. Whatever happens we will leave the ultimate results in the hands of God. We will trust Jesus to bless even our failures. Maybe our missionary impulses will have been less than rational. Maybe our planning will prove to be less than perfect. Still we will have answered the call of Jesus.

That, my friends, is ultimately what it’s all about. This church, this congregation called Grace, is a church that answers the call of Jesus. A mission trip here. A Warm Nights there. Community Café over there. Financial support of missionaries and ministries somewhere else.

A willingness to share our building for a nominal fee with a Korean Presbyterian New Church Development. An openness to being a multi-cultural congregation. A place that welcomes and helps gain asylum for those persecuted in other places. An intentional attempt to be a missionary church at a time when many congregations are focused only on survival. An intentional effort to stand firm on the rock of historical and orthodox Christianity when many are selling out to moral relativism, watered down theology, and culturally approved interpretations of Scripture.

We’re not perfect. Sometimes we impulsively mistake ecclesiastical busy work for God’s work. Like all Christians of every age we are sometimes tempted to believe that our own particular brand of orthodoxy or biblical interpretation is the only brand acceptable to God. Occasionally we confuse our own sinfully neurotic and irrational impulses with truly Spirit-inspired craziness. We make mistakes and lose our focus. Still we make a faithful effort to stay afloat in a world that would like nothing more than to capsize us.

Looking ahead, our Lord is going to call us again and again to step out on faith. There will be many more mission opportunities laid at our feet. We will be challenged many more times to take on ministries for which we are not yet prepared and to find faithful and creative ways to finance them. There will be times when we will feel as if God really is asking us to walk on water.

We can be like the eleven disciples who could only sit trembling in the boat, feeling helpless, overwhelmed, and afraid. We can be like Peter, impulsively jumping out of the boat and running across the water to Jesus, only to start sinking when the energy of the impulse runs out. Or we can join together in prayerfully focusing our faith on the will of God, and then spurred on by the resulting courage, going forth to do great things for Jesus. Always keeping our focus on him. Amen.