“Do not be afraid! I am with you.”

08-13-2023Weekly ReflectionFr. Joseph Zwosta

This Sunday occurs (in the Northern Hemisphere) during the middle of summer. Many families and groups of friends are spending recreational time together near oceans, lakes, and rivers. As human beings, there is something that draws us to such bodies of water, even though we understand the dangers that are also inherent in them.

The geography of the Holy Land is marked by several important bodies of water. The modern State of Israel has a coastline of 170 miles on the Mediterranean Sea. The surface of the Dead Sea lies more than 1,400 feet below sea level, making it the lowest body of water in the world. The Jordan River flows from north to south and terminates at the Dead Sea. In the northern part of Israel lies the Sea of Galilee. So many of the events that we hear about in the Gospels took place around this body of water, sometimes also called Lake Tiberias or the Lake of Gennesaret.

Few of Christ’s miracles capture imaginations more than His walking upon the Sea of Galilee. This event is a dramatic manifestation of our Blessed Lord’s identity and power. It demonstrates both the shortcomings and the potential of the apostles, especially St. Peter. It contains a powerful lesson for all of us about confronting our fears and placing our trust in God.

First, we consider what today’s Gospel teaches us about Christ Himself. Notice the context in which this miracle occurs. St. Matthew tells us that it took place after our Blessed Lord had miraculously fed the 5,000. He instructed the disciples to go by boat from the “deserted place” where the feeding took place to the town of Gennesaret. As He often did during His public ministry, Christ took time to pray in solitude. When we think of the three years of the Lord’s public life, we tend to focus on his dramatic miracles and His powerful words. Yet He always sought time for private prayer, for contemplation.

After this time of solitude, the Lord proceeded to join His disciples in an unforgettable manner, by walking on the surging Sea of Galilee. Some theologians say that at this moment Christ’s Body possessed the quality of “agility.” This anticipated one of the qualities that Christ’s body would have permanently after His Resurrection, much as the Transfiguration anticipated the quality of “clarity.” St. Thomas Aquinas tells us that when one possesses the gift of agility, one’s body “is subject to the soul as its mover, so that it is prompt and apt to obey the spirit in all the movements and actions of the soul.” (Summa Theologiae, Supplement Q. 84, a.1) This means that those obstacles that make it difficult for us in this life to travel from one place to another will not affect glorified bodies. In this instance, the will of Christ’s soul to join His disciples on the boat meant that He could walk on water.

What was the state of the disciples as Christ approached them? In short, they were tired and they were terrified. We know that they were tired because St. Matthew tells us that they encountered the Lord during the “fourth watch of the night.” (Mt 14:25) This period of time lasted from 3 a.m. until 6 a.m. They had set out in the evening and therefore had been rowing for hours in rough seas. Amid this state of chaos and pitch darkness, they suddenly saw a figure coming toward them. St. Matthew tells us: “‘It is a ghost,’ they said, and they cried out in fear.” (Mt 14:26) The laws of nature, as the disciples understood them, could lead to no other conclusion. Even after the Lord told them, “It is I,” the disciples remained skeptical.

Thus, St. Peter devised a test: “Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water.” (Mt 14:28) As usual, Simon Peter was the first to speak and the first to act. He made an act of faith that if it really was the Lord, He would be able to empower him to walk on water as well. And so it happened. Christ gave to him miraculously that same gift of agility that He Himself experienced at that moment. Unfortunately, the flaws of St. Peter would again surface. Even as he walked on the sea, fear and doubt overtook him and he began to sink.

How sad those words are: “O you of little faith, why did you doubt?” (Mt 14:31) If St. Peter had only remained steadfast in his trust in the Lord, he could have walked across the entire Sea of Galilee. Instead, he let his natural fear of the wind and the water override the supernatural faith he had in Christ. For a brief moment, Peter received miraculously a gift proper only to glorified bodies. Yet he squandered this gift out of fear.

It is almost a cliché to point out how often the Bible contains the phrase “do not be afraid,” or something like it. By some counts, there are 365 such verses, one for every day of the year. Fear as a passion or emotion is part of the human condition. It is an aversion to some future evil that seems to us unavoidable or difficult to prevent. Like all of the passions within us, fear must be properly regulated by human reason. The virtue that allows us to do so is called courage. The courageous man is able to discern when it is reasonable to take a risk of incurring some evil in order to pursue some good. Thus, for example, a courageous fireman has a natural aversion toward the possibility of his own death; yet he is willing to risk death by entering a burning building to pursue the good of rescuing others.

Though courage is a human virtue that we can acquire by our own effort, God’s grace also strengthens this virtue within us. Moreover, the theological virtue of hope equips us in a supernatural way to confront future evils, especially natural death, properly. The hopeful person trusts that God, in His infinite goodness and power, will lead him to eternal life in spite of all of the evils that confront him in this world.

Like St. Peter, we tend to waver between trusting in God and living in fear. We so often ignore that simple, oft-repeated advice from Holy Scripture: fear not. We allow our emotions to take control rather than utilizing our reason and the many supernatural gifts that we have received to confront dangers material and spiritual. When faced with difficulties, we must listen again to that “tiny whispering sound,” that voice of the Lord saying to us once more: “Do not be afraid! I am with you.”