There was rebellion in the air, and Jesus sought to defuse it, first by leaving the growing multitude at Capernaum, while he took his disciples across the Sea of Galilee to a deserted place near Bethsaida. John the Baptizer’s disciples had come to Jesus to tell him Herod had slain John (Matthew 14:10-12). If Jesus were the Messiah, he’d do something. After all, didn’t John point to Jesus and say he was the Messiah (John 1:32-34)? What was a Messiah for, if not to destroy the enemies of the righteous? It was into this kind of wilderness, a wilderness of ignorant but thirsty people (cp. Ezekiel 20:34), Jesus was driven and was tempted almost constantly throughout his public ministry (cp. Matthew 4:8-9). Everyone had an idea of what the Messiah was to be like, and all wished to have Jesus become that Messiah. No one looked for a Savior who preached love for one’s enemies (Matthew 5:44). No one looked for a Messiah who came into the world to unveil the love God has for mankind—all men. When Jesus was born, there was no room for him (Luke 2:7), and when he grew up there continued to be no place for him or his Gospel (Luke 9:58).
The Kingdom of the Messiah was not of this world (John 18:36), a world of chaos, a world of division, a world that shut out the righteous. The world the Father loved, and into which he sent Jesus to save, was the world he created (Genesis 1:31), a world where there was enough for all, a world in which everyone had a place to rest (John 3:16). There was rebellion in the air,[1] and the multitude wanted to make Jesus their king, their messiah, whom they’d follow (John 6:15), so Jesus took steps to defuse it by sending his disciples away (Matthew 14:22-23), while he dismissed the multitude. For, if word of such a thing were to get back to Herod, Jesus didn’t want his disciples to be seen as participants in this debacle. It would have been catastrophic if Jesus’ disciples had been caught up in this growing rebellious fiasco (cp. John 18:36). Therefore, Jesus sent them away without him (John 6:16-17).
While Jesus was in the mountain praying, his disciples were in the boat, which was tossed by the great waves that had come on the sea. The text says: “the sea arose by reason of a great wind that blew” (John 6:18), and I believe what John gives us is a physical picture of a spiritual reality. Daniel points to the four ancient empires that came up out of the sea (Daniel 7:2-3), and, no doubt, it was something like this the multitude sought to produce, through their effort to make Jesus king (John 6:15). Jesus’ disciples weren’t so uninformed that they failed to understand what the multitude sought to do, but they struggled with this idea and the understanding that it was not what Jesus desired (John 6:16; cp. Matthew 14:22-23). Their struggle is typified in the contrary winds (Matthew 14:24), causing the great waves that hindered them, as they sought to obey Jesus (John 6:16-18).
It is a tragedy, indeed, that most folks who have read the account of Jesus walking on water that it was a trick of some kind, a myth about a magician who simply sought to awe his audience, and Christians, especially modern Christians, are naïve enough to believe it. Sadder still, is the fact that Christianity has done little to deny it. What am I saying, that Jesus didn’t walk on water? No, but I do believe folks, even many Christians look upon the event more like something a magician would do to wow his audience.
It was the fourth watch when Jesus came to his disciples, as they struggled in the waters (Mark 6:48). This puts the event to about 4 AM to 6 AM as we measure time today. What we need to understand about this is, that Jesus isn’t caught up in every wind of doctrine or what might be in the air that controls the masses (cp. Ephesians 2:2). Jesus’ disciples struggled with such ideas, but Jesus is above it all, and cannot be tempted to be a part of it. In other words, we simply aren’t able to control him. Judas, one of the Twelve and a zealot, sought to force Jesus to accept the reins of leadership of the Jews by betraying him (Matthew 26:14-16), but when he saw the way the winds blew (Matthew 27:4), he repented and sought in vain to undo the harm he’d done.
In their struggle the disciples saw Jesus approaching their boat, but they feared he was a spirit (John 6:19; cp. Matthew 14:25-26). Obedience (viz. Jesus’ command to sail to Capernaum – Mark 6:45) requires faith, but fear casts out faith. Therefore, Jesus came to them, and they received him (John 6:20-21). The controlling air is often more real and more inviting than what is truly real, vis-à-vis what we know Jesus wants. The will of God at times seems like a spirit, a kind of ‘pie in the sky’ thing that seems so ridiculous that it couldn’t be real. Yet, it is, and when Jesus draws near, and we receive him once more, our confidence and faith in him grows.
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[1] See my earlier study in the Apocalypse: The Seventh Bowl and the Air.
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