Christ on the mountain, on the sea, in the boat

Now it's good to be at the Blue River Conference over there in Scotland when the conference has been on. As other conferences we have prayed for God's blessing upon the gathering of his saints and we have had a long-standing exercise to be at the Blue River Conference and we're so glad to have the privilege. We're thankful for the ministry last night and for the ministry this morning.

I do trust by God's help we'll not be too long occupying this platform, although we have come a long way. It's very important to give ministry to, that is from the Lord. A brother I know of who gave some ministry.

What the ministry was I don't know, but at the end of the meeting a brother came out to him and said, boys that ministry was very far-fetched tonight. Yes, he says, I know it was all the way from heaven. So we'd love to have days of heaven upon earth and we'd love to have ministry that flows down all the way from heaven.

The gospel of Mark please in chapter 6. I want to encourage the Lord's people. Mark chapter 6, just for connection verse number 45, and straightway he constrained his disciples to get into the ship and to go to the other side before unto Bethsaida, while he sent away the people. And when he had sent them away, he departed into a mountain to pray.

And when even was come, the ship was in the midst of the sea and he alone on the land. And he saw them toiling in rowing, for the wind was contrary unto them. And about the fourth watch of the night, he cometh unto them walking upon the sea and would have passed by them.

But when they saw him walking upon the sea, they supposed it had been a spirit and cried out. For they all saw him and were troubled, and immediately he talked with them and saith unto them, be of good cheer. It is I, be not afraid.

And he went up unto them into the ship, and the wind ceased. And they were so amazed in themselves, beyond measure, and wondered. For, it's a sad comment this, isn't it? For they considered not the miracle of the loaves, for their heart was hardened.

And do trust that God will bless his precious word. I want to speak, as the Lord might enable me, on this incident of the storm on the lake, and to bring before you some lovely views and aspects of our Lord Jesus Christ. I can see three things here in this story concerning the Lord Jesus.

There's much more than three things. But first of all, I will suggest, we have the Lord Jesus on the mountain. That's a picture to me of his priestliness.

What's he doing on the mountain? Exactly what he is doing for us in heaven right now. He's not passive at the right hand of God. He's not inactive.

It's tremendously uplifting to know that there is representing us a great high priest in heaven. He's interceding for us. He's praying for us.

What a comfort. Christ on the mountain, his priestliness. Then we have Christ on the sea, his providence.

How wonderful that our blessed Lord Jesus Christ walked on the sea, the turbulent stormy waters. He didn't say to the sea, before he walked on the sea, be calm, peace, be still. If he had done that, it would have been miracle enough.

But the element of the miraculous has greatly increased. As we think of the Lord Jesus, making those stormy waters the pavement of his feet, his sovereign, providential control. He's on the mountain, his priestliness.

He's on the sea, his providence. He's in the boat, his presence. What a presence, what a joy, what a delight, what a relief.

The arrival and presence of the Lord Jesus was to the terrified, distressed, struggling disciples there in the stormy waters in the middle of the lake. You know, his absence on the mountain tested them, but his presence gave them great joy. I want you to think, share a few thoughts that I've enjoyed at this conference with you.

I want you to think, beloved, this afternoon of the praying lips, the praying lips. He's praying on the mountain. He must have included in those prayers and intercessions before God, his own disciples.

He knew where they were. He knew their present distress and danger. He had instructed them to go to the other side.

Amazing to think, isn't it? They were struggling in the boat on the stormy sea. He was supplicating on the mountain, praying with upturned face towards the Father. Oh, if only those disciples had known, he knew.

He cared. He was praying for them. Wouldn't it have delivered them from all their fears, anxiety and worry? They may not have been able to say, well, why has the Lord not come? Does he not know about our present plight? It should have been enough for them to think wherever he is, whatever he's doing, he knows.

He's interested in us. He cares for us. My dear brother and sister in our present trials, very often we forget this, don't we? That there is one at God's right hand who cares for us, who's interceding for us, and he's there as our great High Priest.

I wonder, fellow believer, are we genuinely, spiritually in the good this afternoon of the priestly ministry of the Lord Jesus Christ? You say to me, how can a Christian be in the good of the priestly ministry of Christ just the same way as any other truth of the Word of God by faith as we heard this morning? The more we read the Word of God and trust in our Lord Jesus Christ. Many years ago, there was a little boy flying a kite. I imagine you know what those things are over here, flying a kite.

On a foggy day, I wouldn't have thought there was much wind around with fog, but this was in London. Somebody said to me this morning that the mist was like the London fog. Well, I assure you it was far worse in London.

I've experienced the London fog and I don't know, and smog as they call it, I don't know how my father yet walked the three or four miles with me with him and found direction and got right to the hall, but somehow he did. But you know, this boy was flying a kite and a gentleman came along and said, what are you doing, son? He said, I'm flying a kite. Well, I can't see a kite and you can't see it.

How do you know there's a kite up there? I like the reply of the boy. He said, please, sir, I know there's a kite up there because I can feel the pull on the string. I want to use that this afternoon in the ministry.

How do we know that there is a great high priest in heaven, that he loves us, that he cares for us and we're precious to him? Because we feel the pull on the heartstrings. As we read the word of God concerning our blessed Lord Jesus Christ, we begin to experience in communion with him the blessed reality of his succoring and sustaining priesthood. No, he hadn't forgotten his disciples.

God says in Isaiah 49 and verse 15, a woman may forget her second child and not have compassion on the son of a womb, but I will never forget. Isn't that lovely? I know it's simple, but it's very reassuring. Thank God for the picture of the Lord on the mountain, a picture of the present priestly ministry of our Lord Jesus Christ, his praying lips.

I want you to think next very simply. These are the thoughts that I have enjoyed and I hope these cleanings will be an uplift and a comfort and an encouragement and a blessing to dear believers this afternoon, not only the praying lips, but think with me of the watching eye, the watching eye. There the disciples were in all their danger and distress.

It was night for Jesus didn't come unto them until the fourth watch of the day, the very last watch of the day. Oh, they were tested to the limits. Why doesn't the Lord do something about it? Why hasn't he come? What's happening? Where is he? He has sent us in this boat to go to the other side and we're in danger of sinking and going down.

How wonderful. Though they were in the midst of the sea, though it was dark and though there was the distance, we read scripture very often quickly. Do you notice what it says here? Verse 48, and he saw them.

Tremendous. This is deity. How could the Lord Jesus see them? They in the middle of the lake and the darkness in the distance and his face upturned towards heaven, his father in prayer, and yet Mark tells us he saw them.

Wonderful. Wonderful. My brother, my sister, young and old, those of you who are passing through trial, he sees you.

He may not act immediately or respond to your cries. The trial that you're going through has been allowed of him just to test you, mold your character, and to reveal himself in all his preciousness further to you. Like one man came home having a terrible trial in the day and he was really at an end of himself and he came home and went into his bedroom and he cried to God as he threw himself on his knees beside his bed.

He meant to say, Oh God, when am I going to get out of my trials without thinking? He blurted out, Oh God, what am I going to get out of my trial? That's what he says. I'm thinking and I want God to move and to get me out of my trials now. I want relief now.

I really shouldn't be praying when, I should be praying what. What lessons have I got to learn in this trial that the Lord has allowed in my life? If you don't take much else away from the ministry now, will you take this little phrase away, he saw them. How wonderful.

You know in chapter 9, he saw and heard the disciples as they were journeying to Capernaum and you remember they wrangled and argued one with another, who should be the greater in the kingdom of God? They likely thought he was out of his shot and his back was towards them. I reverently say, would they think that the Lord didn't have eyes in the back of his head if he used that language? But you know the end of the journey when the house was reached and he went into the house, he turned round with a very pointed searching face to face question. What was it that he discreeted among himself by the way? He hadn't missed it.

They may have been a few yards behind him as he led the way and his back was towards them, but he hadn't missed it. He had observed it. He knew all about it.

My brethren, the Lord misses nothing in our lives. The Lord misses nothing in assembly testimony. That hurtful word, that rough attitude, that loss of temper as we heard.

He observes it all and it grieves him. I want to tell you to me in some respects that little scene in Mark 9 is like a picture of the judgment seat. When the house was reached, the question was asked.

When heaven was reached after the rapture, at the judgment seat of Christ, what was it that you did? And we will go down memory lane. Little acts we've quite forgotten, he will show were done for him. Deeds of merit, we had thought them, he will show us were but sin.

Little incidents we've long since forgotten, even in our behavior towards others. I want to say this, if we really were gripped by the fact and conscious of the fact and lived in the song good of the fact, the eye of Christ is always upon us, what a change. Why there are things that we do before the Lord we would never dare to do in front of our brethren? How real we must be.

Doesn't Proverbs 15 tell us and doesn't it illustrate there in verse 1, just the ministry, his watching eye. The eyes of the Lord go to and fro through the earth, beholding the evil and the good. That hasn't changed.

It is still true today as ever it was. You know when I go to chapter 10, here parents are bringing little children to the Lord that he might touch them and bless them. You remember the story.

And the disciples rebuked them and there the Lord was in the midst, busy preaching, teaching the multitude. But it says he saw them. What did he see? He saw their inconsideration, lack of sympathy.

He saw how they were putting off these dear anxious parents that the Lord might bless them. He saw their behavior and he grieved them, says Mark. Oh may these things challenge us.

When I go to Mark 11, he beheld how they were putting the money into the treasury and he saw that woman. Just before that incident at the end of Mark 11, you have the scribes and love to be in marketplaces with long flowing garments. That's for sure.

And then following the incident of the woman casting in her two mites, chapter 13 of Mark, prophecy. They said, the Lord said first of all, not one stone of this temple will be left upon another. When shall these things be, they asked Peter and Andrew and others.

My, they were impressed by the beauty, the outward show as it were, of this great temple. Sandwiching between those things we see what the Lord values. Not the outward show, the way we appear to men.

Not the impressive buildings, things that we can be proud about. But what impresses and deeply praises the Lord is our exercise, our spiritual exercise, our burden. Oh, we could elaborate a little bit about giving as far as that dear woman was concerned, that widow.

But I'm just pointing out these passages in Mark 9, in Mark 10, in Mark 11. As well as this one here, he saw them. It lets us see he's the divine observer.

Nothing escapes his attention. He knows everything through and through. His eye is always upon us.

Oh, what a difference our lives would be. What a difference the assembly testimony in our behavior one to one another would be if we could just be controlled by this very searching thought. It's so real, we forget it.

Curb our behavior. I read in a missionary magazine, comes to mind a long time ago, about a work among the Zulus. And this missionary told of a certain Zulu that worked in one of the mines, and he wasn't very industrious.

He was rather lazy, didn't do much work at all. And the boss, the white man, European boss, was going away for a couple of weeks. And he was a bit troubled about this, leaving the work.

And especially this particular Zulu, he might be worse. So he hit upon a brilliant idea. He had a glass eye.

He took it out, went into this room where the Zulu was, put the eye on the table, the false eye on the table. Look, he says, I'm going away for two weeks, and I'll be watching you all the time. My eye will be upon you.

When he came back, they said he'd never worked as hard. While he was working, he would just cast a kind of a, you know, curious eye, looking at that false eye. It redoubled his efforts.

We may smile at that, it's but an illustration, but I hope it emphasizes to you, the eyes of the Lord are upon us. Thank God for his praying lips. Thank God this afternoon for his watching eye.

And thank God for his controlling feet. I say again, pay attention well. You're going through a storm, hard to bear, no relief, no light in the long dark tunnel, no answer to your prayer.

And you're in distress, and you're low, and you're discouraged, and you've come in that kind of spirit this afternoon. I want to lift your heart. I want to encourage you.

I want to point to the Lord Jesus. See, the Lord Jesus, I said, didn't say peace be still to the waters. No, no.

He walked upon those stormy waters, and he made them the pavement of his feet. What do I learn from that? He wants to make our storms the pavement of his feet. He wants to bring them, dear child of God, under his providential control.

He can and he will. He may not immediately deliver you out of it, but he'll give you grace and reveal himself to you, and you'll discover precious things of the Lord Jesus that hitherto you never have just experienced or discovered before. The Lord will be more real to you.

What a wonderful thing for the Lord to walk on the water. Peter tried it. Matthew is the only one that tells about Peter.

There's a reason for that. He's the dispensational gospel, and I think Peter is a picture of the remnant who will cry out to the Lord at the end time, Lord, save us. Inviting as it is to talk about that, I want to keep the ministry simple, and I want to apply it practically to encourage our hearts.

Peter went over the side of the boat, began to walk on the water. Don't criticize if no man has ever tried to do that before. And then, of course, our brethren and pastors rightly said, he got his eyes of the Lord.

Now, his eyes are upon us, but if we get our eyes of the Lord, there's no telling how far we will go, and how far away from God, and how worldly we can become, and how low we may sink. We must keep our eyes on Christ. He must be the object for us to live, says Paul.

It must be Christ. He must be the goal, the object, the ambition, the aim of our lives. Is He? If He isn't, there's something wrong.

And then as he began to sink, what did he do? Turn around and say to those in the boat, Brethren, brethren, save me. Well, if you had done that, you would have gone down. You would have gone down.

No, he cried to the man on top of the water and said, Lord, save me. I know people talk about Peter as the rock, but in Matthew 14, he's a sinking rock, isn't he? He's a sinking rock. You couldn't depend upon him.

Impetuous and unreliable. Thank God, he was a tower of strength to the Lord's people. Wonderful.

John, in his Gospel, Chapter 6, recalls the same storm, but he doesn't tell us about the mountain and praying. No. He tells us they were going to Capernaum, and it was now dark, and Jesus was not yet come.

That's where we are. It's dark in this world. It's the night of Christ's rejection.

Jesus has not yet come, though I believe, yes, we're on the threshold of His coming. Do you believe that? In the imminent truth of the event of the rapture, I'm one of those who believe it could happen at any moment. Yes.

And then it says, Jesus was drawing nigh to the ship. Why, that's a spiritual picture of the present age, of this church age. That's just exactly, positionally, where we are.

In a dark world, Jesus has not yet come, but He's coming. See the distinctiveness of John's Gospel. And he alone emphasizes, the Lord, with His omnipotent feet, walked upon the waters.

I remember going somewhere and looking at this beautiful building, historic building, and it was fronted by marble, and the dogs had been washing it, and there was a big notice just as you approach, please don't walk on the water. Please don't walk. I couldn't help but think, you know, of this wonderful incident.

Thank God, the praying lips, the watching eye, the controlling feet, what about the saving hand? Back to Matthew 14 for a moment. Wonderful illustration of the Gospel. Good to bring the Gospel in, in the conference, isn't it? Not out of place, never out of place, the Gospel, thank God.

Jesus, when He cried, Peter cried, Lord save me, He stretched forth His hand and took hold of Peter and delivered him from going down to a watery grave. That word, stretched forth His hand, is exactly the same, allow me to tell you, Hebrews 2 verse 16, Hebrews 2 verse 16 is not talking about the incarnation, please. If you want further light and the proper interpretation, I'll talk to you afterwards.

It's redemption. He taketh not hold on the nature of angels, He taketh hold of you, my brethren, of the seed of Abraham. That word taketh hold speaks of dynamic power, speaks of salvation and deliverance.

Isn't it great that what the Lord Jesus did for Peter there recorded by Matthew in Matthew's Gospel chapter 14, the Lord Jesus has done for us. He has stretched forth His hand and delivered us, thank God, from going down to hell. Do we appreciate it? Are we grateful for it? Do we show it in our lives? You can see counter in Matthew's record, we need all these three records, not mentioning Luke.

Maybe a reason for that, some brethren have an idea, I'm all ears. It's recorded in Matthew, recorded in Mark, recorded in John, but not in Luke. But you need all those three Gospels, Matthew, Mark and John to give us these different pictures.

Thank God for the saving hand of the Lord Jesus. And what about the comforting voice? I know these are simple things. Sometimes these simple things that are comforting stay with us and help us and encourage us and challenge us.

The cheering voice. I love this, don't you? They've been tested for so long, it's the fourth watch of the night, the last watch of the night. But at the end of verse 50, it says, be of good cheer, it is I being unafraid.

Be of good cheer. I thought, here's the man of sorrows, acquainted with grief, much to occupy his mind with the cross before him, and yet he's saying, be of good cheer. How can he do that? Blessed Savior, how He loves us, how precious we are to Him.

There's the cheer of cancellation in the Gospels. Be of good cheer. Thy sins are cancelled, forgive me.

There's the cheer of conquest in the Lord's ministry. At the end of John 14, or the end of John 16, be of good cheer. I have overcome the world.

Isn't that great? The cheer of conquest. Here is the cheer of comfort. After all, dear brothers and sisters, I'll finish in three or four minutes.

After all, what is the ground of our comfort? It's Christ. Do you have joy? Spiritual joy? Spiritual joy is still possible in the midst of adverse circumstances? Oh, yes. Can co-exist together with trial, contrary to human thinking, natural feeling? I know, but very true in experience.

Be of good cheer. Be of good cheer. It is I. Doesn't the Lord often draw near to us and whisper into our innermost soul, thank God for these precious cheering words coming from the one who was the man of sorrows here, now exalted in heaven.

Be of good cheer. It is I. Have you ever thought about the sequel of this storm? The sequel in Matthew, Matthew tells us in Matthew 14, have you noticed this? Maybe you've noticed it long ago. I just recently, and I enjoyed that too.

Watch that. When the Lord arrived and the storm ceased, they were so over-ordered. And what happened? When he was in the boat, the disciples came to him and said, certainly thou art the Son of God.

So in the storm, his deity was revealed. What's the sequel that Mark gives us of the storm in Mark 6? Doubts are rebuked. Why were they so feeble, even though the Lord wasn't there, physically was absent, there in the distant place on the top of the mountain, praying for them? They had had enough experience of the feeding of the 5,000 in the previous incident, earlier verses of Mark 6, not to doubt the Lord's provision.

They should never have doubted the Lord after that. Nothing was too hard for him. Why? He could feed a multitude of 5,000 beside women and children.

Great. They considered not the merit of the Lord. The doubts were rebuked.

How often are doubts are rebuked? We say the Lord has delivered us. He has shown us His power. I'm never going to mistrust Him again.

Any other difficult situation, I'm just going to lean on Him. You know, we go through another trial and we're just the same. We fret and we worry and we're filled with doubts.

But when we come to the record in John 6, what's the sequel that John mentions of the storm there? Parallel account, he tells us this. When the Lord arrived and was in the boat, they were so filled with the joy of His presence. Remember the comment? Immediately they were at the land where they went.

John, what do you mean? Well, we were so taken up with the arrival and presence of our Master and Savior before we realized that we were there. We were in the harbour or in the port. Great, isn't it? I don't think you know this.

We must be careful. I don't think the little ship was lifted up and skimmed over on top of the water. No, no, no.

Maybe it could have happened. But it lets us see to John as he remembers it so vividly. They were immediately at the land where they went.

You see, the presence of Christ shortens the journey, lightens the load, brings us nearer to Him, casts us upon Him, teaches us lessons. Isn't that right? Any situation which casts us upon the Lord is all for our blessing. As I sit down, I'll say this.

With Christ in the vessel, yes, we can smile at the storm. But listen, with Christ in the vessel, we are sure of three things. Storms, not immune from them, His presence and a safe arrival.

God bless you.