I've heard a lot of jokes inspired by the story of Jesus walking on the water, but they all pretty much boil down to some comical or frivolous explanation of Jesus' miraculous exploit. These jokes point to the fact that modern folks usually get hung up on questions of "how" and "whether" a story like this one is "true" or "historical." But to me, such hang-ups are passé. What difference would it make to you and your life if this story were proved "true," or conversely, a "myth?" Would we lose our faith in God's power, in God's love, in God's existence? If we would, I'd venture to suggest that perhaps our faith isn't founded on solid rock, whether that rock is just beneath the surface of the Sea of Galilee or not.

When I encounter such stories, I ask: What is it about this story that made it important enough to pass down through the ages? What is meaningful about it? Looked at from this perspective, it becomes pretty clear that this story is meaningful because it has something profoundly important to say about how we relate to each other and to God as we struggle to live faithful lives.

The key to understanding this story is being able to identify with the people in it, whether the frightened disciples who think Jesus is a ghost, or impetuous Peter, who rushes in where angels fear to tread. I smiled when I saw this gospel coming up in the preaching cycle, because I'd already written a little something on it that I'd like to share with you this morning. I think it illustrates well the way that we can all appropriate this story in our own lives, and use it to make sense of how God intends us to live.

Two Sundays ago, I preached on a difficult period in my life and how I found God's faithfulness even in the midst of my suffering. When I emerged from that experience, I still had to struggle with the question of whether God was indeed calling me to ordained ministry. I began to walk the streets of Annapolis with an angry rant in my head, something along the lines of "If you're really calling me, God, why are you making it so hard?" I began digging into what I really believed about God, and I also realized that I was pretty isolated from other people who might be going through similar struggles. So through my friend Christopher, the same guy who preached at my ordination this past May, I put out a call for essays from young people who'd made it through the ordination process and were now serving as priests. I wanted to learn from their faith journeys, and I wanted to find reassurance that whether called to ordained ministry or not, God would stick by me, and I could stick by God.

The result was a book entitled Gathering The NeXt Generation: Essays on the Formation and Ministry of GenX Priests, which Morehouse published in time for General Convention in the year 2000. I edited it, and also contributed an essay about my struggles in an ordination process that seemed to me to be suspicious of young vocations. I entitled my essay, rather tongue-in-cheek, "Trusting the Process." In that essay I wrote:

"No one can trust someone or something they fear. And I fear the process. I'm afraid of it, because I've felt, at times, that it has the power of life and death over me, the power to determine my fate. But when I worship God,…I see that God is the one with the power…I know Jesus will never leave me or forsake me. I realize, at least in my head, that whatever happens to me in the process, I'm not powerless. I just need to trust that God will work as powerfully in my neighbors' lives as God has in mine. But too often, when I look at the process, I feel as if I am lost in a stormy sea, and that I will sink.

"In these moments, I am Peter on the Sea of Galilee. Jesus has said, 'Come!' I have stepped out on the water in faith. I'm exuberant. Exalted. It's the greatest feeling of liberation and fulfillment that I've ever felt. I'm stepping toward my Lord, whose love makes me who I am created to be and who empowers me to share that love with others. But then I look down. I see the whitecaps. I'm suddenly aware of the freezing wind lashing my face, and it's not the 'Spirit of God moving over the surface of the waters,' either. And predictably, I begin to sink-not slowly, but fast. I only have enough time to scream out, 'Lord, save me!' But even before the words are out of my mouth, Jesus is there, reaching out his hands, holding me tightly, bracing me against the wind. We're still out there, standing on the water. And I'm crying like a baby. I want to go back to the boat, where it's safe, but Jesus still whispers in my ear, 'Come.'

"Unlike Peter, this experience hasn't happened to me just once. It's the story of my faith."

I believe if we look deeply enough into our own lives, each of us will find there a story of faith and doubt, not in the historicity of stories such as Jesus walking on the water, but faith and doubt in God's power, through Christ, to keep us from drowning in the stormy seas of daily life. The story of Jesus and Peter on the Sea of Galilee is meaningful and powerful, not because it's a fantastic miracle -- though that it is, indeed -- but because it illustrates that living a life of faith isn't easy, and that we need Jesus' help in order to survive. The story brings into question what the purpose of our lives is. As I wrote elsewhere in my essay: "The purpose of my life is to love God and neighbor…In my experience, I have found that the key to loving God and neighbor has been learning to trust God and neighbor.

"Trust is another word for faith. As mentioned earlier, I have often felt like Peter, sinking beneath the stormy Sea of Galilee. When Jesus stretches out his hand and says to Peter, 'O you of little faith, why did you doubt?' I hear those words directed at me. But as I hear them, I also see the face of Jesus, not angry and scolding, nor disappointed or disapproving, but with a Mona Lisa smile and a faint chuckle in his throat. At those moments, I cry out with tears in the words of another man in the Gospel: 'Lord, I believe; help thou mine unbelief'."

This story has power, because when we find ourselves in such "sink or swim" situations, we can see that they are really sink or trust experiences. "These 'Petrine moments,' as I call them, are for me moments of conversion. Like Peter, I rise and fall like a see-saw in my faith. But Jesus is always there, calling me to 'Come,' urging me to trust him, to love him, and to feed his sheep.

"Each moment of conversion to little things…is also a moment of conversion to that big thing: loving God and neighbor more deeply. Like the servants in another parable, I hope that by being faithful in little things, my Lord will give me the grace to be faithful also in much. Someday, I want to hear not, 'O you of little faith, why did you doubt?' but 'Well done, good and trustworthy servant; you have been trustworthy in a few things, I will put you in charge of many things; enter into the joy of your Lord'."

I offer these reflections, written when I was twenty-four years old and a struggling post-seminarian, not because they are really very wise in and of themselves, but because I hope they illustrate how all of us can take these strange and wonderful gospel stories, and use them to make sense of our lives. We all have times when trusting each other and trusting God is just plain hard to do. But the good news is that, even when we feel we're sinking the fastest, Jesus is there to reach out and catch us. And when we realize that Christ has been present with us in our weakness and suffering all along, we can worship and proclaim with the disciples that "Truly [he is] the Son of God." Amen.