8/9/20 “How to Walk on Water” by Nancy E. Petty
Matthew 14:22-33
I grew up with a mother who feared the water. Her fear was deep, and unlike some fears, this one was squarely rooted in fact – she could not (and cannot) swim. As a child, I watched her almost drown on two different occasions. Once at the beach and another time at a swimming pool when a child pushed her in the water unaware that she couldn’t swim. Because of her fear and having never learned how to swim, she was determined that her two children would learn to swim. Enter into the cast of characters, Dr. Robert “Bob” Blackburn, chairman of the Health and Physical Education Department at Gardner-Webb University. Dr. Blackburn, who died last year at the age of 86, was known as the best swim teacher in Shelby. One line in his obituary read: “While at Gardner-Webb, he was the Chairman of the Health and Physical Education Department and taught thousands of children to swim at the GW pool.” My sister and I were two of those thousands of children he taught to swim.
Our mother started us with lessons at an early age, and every summer we took swimming lesson with Dr. Blackburn until we were well into our teenage years, even progressing to the life-saving classes. Here’s what I remember about those lessons – the early years and the latter years. First, Dr. Blackburn was the first man I ever saw wearing a speedo swimsuit. I’ll leave that there. Second, Dr. Blackburn was a friendly man, and he meant serious business when it came to swimming lessons. He was kind but firm. He could be playful, but was always serious. He was generous, but had very high expectations. He knew just the moment to jump in and help and how long to wait to let a student struggle.
As a child of a parent who couldn’t swim, I had a healthy respect for the water. Swimming, and going swimming, was not a familiar activity to me as a very young child. So when I started swim lessons with Dr. Blackburn I could quickly get myself worked up from a place of fear on the 10 mile drive from my home to the Gardner-Webb pool. Even now, I can recall how scared I felt as I walked into an unfamiliar place, with unfamiliar faces, to learn how to do something that felt even more unfamiliar. All as a young child. As an aside here: back then swim lessons weren’t for parents and children. There were no parents and toddlers classes like today. As a matter of fact, parents weren’t allowed to even watch the swim lessons. Nope, we were on our own with Dr. Blackburn.
I remember the early years of paddling my legs as fast as I could while holding on to that foam board that was used with beginners. I would wait to hear Dr. Blackburn’s voice call out, “Good job, Nancy.” It was what every child longed to hear him say, and he knew it. He was generous with every child, giving each of us the affirmation we longed for so that we would try harder. I remember learning from Dr. Blackburn how to put my face in the water; later progressing to learning how to turn my head to breathe while continuing to swim. And then the back stroke and side stroke and the butterfly stroke. All movements that at first felt so unfamiliar and awkward but seemed so easy for him. I remember vividly the latter years when my class finally progressed to the deep end of the pool and Dr. Blackburn teaching us how to tread water for long periods of time. I remember times when the only thing sticking out of the water were my lips as I struggled to keep my head above water with Dr. Blackburn instructing me to keep treading. It seemed he always knew the exact moment when it was time for him to call me in. And not a second before.
These memories of the fear of water and all of the unfamiliar things associated with swimming pools and swimming lessons came back to me as I reflected on the story of Jesus and the disciples on the water in Matthew 14, especially the part where Jesus walks on the water. From my own experience, I can understand the disciple’s fear of the unfamiliar. The gospel writer describes the scene this way. He writes: “when the disciples saw Jesus walking on the sea (the water), they were terrified…” I know what it is like, even as and especially as a child, to fear the unfamiliar – to be terrified by something you had never seen or done. Nothing about standing on the side of that pool with a blue foam board in my hand and being told to jump into the water was familiar to me. Full of fear, heart pounding, I can hear Dr. Blackburn saying to me, “Jump Nancy, jump!” He might as well have been saying walk on the water Nancy, walk on the water. How long I must have stood with my little toes clinging to the edge, half bent over, clutching that blue foam board scared to death before I finally jumped in. I was terrified.
The unfamiliar has a way of evoking fear within us. I don’t have to go all the way back to my swim lessons as a child to get in touch with this truth. Fearing the unfamiliar or as some would call it fearing the unknown is a human trait that we all carry in one way or another. Fear of dying, fear of flying, fear of certain insects, fear of the future, fear of people, fear of crowds, fear of small places, fear of success, fear of failure, fear of disease, fear of life itself – the list is endless. Have you ever wondered how fear gets instilled in us so early in life – monsters under the bed or hiding in the closet, friends not liking us, starting something new like a new school year, trying new food, swimming lessons. What if, instead of stoking fear in our lives, we cultivated curiosity? Yes, I know what you are thinking. That old adage: curiosity killed the cat. But I think, after a full analysis, we would come to the conclusion that curiosity is healthier than fear. Fear holds us back. Curiosity leans us forward. Fear freezes, paralyzes us. Curiosity releases us and pricks our imagination.
It is my own assessment (and I don’t think I am alone in it) that we are living in a fear-based culture right now. We, like those disciples, are seeing a lot of things that are unfamiliar walking toward us, and we are terrified. We see a new generation of leaders emerging, suggesting ideas and ideals that are unfamiliar, and we fear the future. We are experiencing how a global pandemic can turn our world upside down and inside out leaving us facing so much unfamiliar, and we fear that life will never be “normal” again. We witness TV ads that are created to instill fear in us if someone suggests police reform. Have you seen these ads? President Donald Trump’s campaign released an ad Thursday on what it would be like if the police were defunded. A phone rings and the answering service responds: “You have reached the 911 police emergency line. Due to defunding of the police department, we’re sorry but no one is here to take your call. If you’re calling to report a rape, please press 1. To report a murder, press 2. To report a home invasion, press 3. For all other crimes, leave your name and number and someone will get back to you. Our estimated wait time is currently 5 days. Goodbye.” Fear mongering. It is nothing short of shameful. Creating images that instill fear in the minds and imaginations of those watching. The truth is that very few people are talking about completely “defunding” the police. Many, however, are talking about police “reform.” But when the unfamiliar comes walking across the water there is terror, not curiosity. And that is a crisis we are facing in our nation. Based in fear and based on fear, we are holding on to familiar systems and institutions that are unjust all because we are terrified of the unfamiliar.
As people of faith, we are told, over and over again in our faith narrative, “do not fear.” In its various forms – do not fear, do not be afraid, fear not – it is the most frequent command in the Bible. And here in Matthew 14 we hear Jesus saying it to the disciples: “Take heart, it is I; do not be afraid.” This exchange with Jesus and the disciples made me wonder how many times Jesus comes to us in the unfamiliar and in unfamiliar ways, and we are so fearful and terrified that we fail to recognize him – we miss the embodiment of God because we are blinded by fear rather than awakened to curiosity. What insights might we gain if we started looking at the year 2020 and all that has been unfamiliar about this year through the lens of curiosity rather than fear? What if we became curious about the future of schooling and education rather than fearful? What if we became curious about how we can be the church when we can’t gather all in one place because of a global pandemic instead of fearful about how this time away will erode the gathering of the faithful? What if we became curious about how to achieve economic equality rather than looking with the fearful eye of economic collapse? What if we became curious about how as a nation to achieve racial equity rather than maintaining a culture of white supremacy that is based in fear? What if we became curious about reforming our criminal justice system instead of living in fear and being the nation that incarnates more people than any other civilized nation? It is time, as individuals and as a nation, to open our eyes to the unfamiliar and free ourselves from the fear that has us all locked in our individual prisons. It is time to baptize our fear and wash it anew with curiosity. I wonder how my swim lessons with Dr. Blackburn could have felt different if curiosity rather than fear had been the narrative on which I stood at the edge of the pool and heard Dr. Blackburn call out to me, “Jump Nancy, jump.”
This story in Matthew 14 continues with one brave disciple’s response to Jesus. Peter says to Jesus, “…if it is you [Jesus], command me to come to you on the water.” Peter, out of curiosity, took that first step out of the boat – the safe and familiar – onto the water and started walking on the water toward Jesus. For a moment he sat his fear aside and was free to walk toward Jesus. But it wasn’t long before the wind blew and Peter got afraid again; and in his fear he began to panic and sink. And the story tells us, that at that moment, when the fear returned in Peter Jesus reaches out his hand and catches Peter. And therein lies the lesson on how to walk on water. We have to trust that when we step out of the familiar and face our fears there will be a hand reaching out to us to catch us. But if we never take that first step, if we never move from what is familiar – from our prejudices and biases, our safety and security, our own interest – and walk with curiosity into the unfamiliar we will never experience the hand of God reaching out to us to catch us. Instead, we will stay firmly planted in our fear, terrified all the while missing the embodiment of God’s presence among us.
In those early swim lessons, every time Dr. Blackburn said “jump Nancy, jump” I had to believe that he would be there to catch me if I needed him. I had to let go of my fear and trust that he would catch me. God needs people in the world today who are willing to set their fear aside and in a spirit of curiosity take a risk to walk on water toward what is unfamiliar and unknown and possibly the embodiment of God’s spirit calling to us. And then, like Peter, trust that if we need a hand to catch us God will be there reaching out to us when we get afraid again (because we will). If God can do this for us, can we imagine doing it for one another? Is that not what it means to be the kingdom of God here on this earth? To set our fear aside and to reach out to one another to make this world a better place. I think so. I think God needs more of us to learn how to walk on water.
