Jesus and Peter walk on water. ~ TXAB: The Christ Almighty Blog

CHRIST ALMIGHTY: What Jesus teaches… as opposed to what popular Christian culture claims he taught.

Mark 6.46-52, Matthew 14.23-33, John 6.16-21.

After Jesus had his students feed 5,000-plus listeners, while he was handling the crowd who wanted to king him, he sent the kids to the far side of Lake Tiberias (i.e. “the Sea of Galilee,” though it’s not as big as a sea. The Great Lakes are way bigger.) So as Jesus left the crowd to go pray, the students rowed their way south. Wasn’t easy, ’cause the weather didn’t cooperate.

Mark 6.46-47 KWL: 46 Saying goodbye,; Jesus goes off to a hill to pray.; 47Later, the boat is in the middle of the lake,; and Jesus is alone on land.
Matthew 14.23-24 KWL: 23Saying goodbye to the crowds,; Jesus goes up a hill by himself to pray.; Later he is alone there.; 24The boat is already many stadia away from land,; tortured by the waves,; for the wind is against it.
John 6.16-18 KWL: 16When it becomes later,; Jesus’s students go down to the lake,; 17get into a boat,; and go to the far side of the lake, to Capharnaum.; It became dark,; and Jesus hasn’t yet come to them.; 18The lake’s wind increased,; blowing greatly.

The title of this piece shoulda tipped you off what comes next: Jesus will walk to them on the surface of Lake Tiberias. You’ve heard the story before. Heck, everybody’s heard it before; walking on water is one of the most famous stunts Jesus ever pulled.

But not everybody knows it in context. Don’t know what happened before it; don’t know its consequences. In fact it didn’t really have any. It should have had a massive impact on the students—it’s meant after all to teach them the Holy Spirit makes the impossible doable. But like Mark points out at the end of the story, these kids were mighty dense.

Let’s start with the context.

Though I brought up feeding the 5,000 up top, I should also bring up what happened before that. This whole saga began when Jesus sent the Twelve out to go round the Galilee. They were to preach the gospel, and while they were at it, cure the sick and throw out demons. In other words, they were to personally do what they regularly saw Jesus do.

Day before yesterday, they got back. Then Jesus had ’em take a boat to the far side of Tiberias to rest… but the people saw them leave, ran to the far side to meet them, and Jesus wound up teaching and feeding them instead of resting.

Jesus sent the students back across the lake, dismissed the crowd, then went off to pray as the sun went down. In ancient Hebrew timekeeping, sundown starts the new day. Nighttime wasn’t measured in hours, but in watches. Ancient Hebrews had three watches, but the Romans had four, and since Mark says these events took place around the fourth watch, Mk 6.48 they were following Roman time. John says these events took place around Passover, Jn 6.4 so near the spring equinox, which meant night and day were nearly equal in length—about 12 hours long—and the fourth watch would therefore be from 3 to 6AM.

So Jesus had been on that hill from a little after sundown, to at least 3AM. Nine hours. Christians tend to respond, “Wow, that was a mighty long conversation he had with his Father.” But I point out the gospels don’t say he spent the entire time praying. I wouldn’t be at all surprised if he didn’t get a few hours’ sleep on that hill.

Then he went to see how the kids were doing.

Mark 6.48-50 KWL: 48Seeing his students tortured by the rowing,; for the wind is against them,; around the fourth nightwatch Jesus comes to them,; walking on the lake.; He wants to come near them.; 49But seeing him walking on the lake,; the students think Jesus is a phantasm,; and scream,; 50for everyone sees Jesus; and is aghast.; Quickly he speaks with them and tells them,; “Courage! It’s me. No fear!”
Matthew 14.25-27 KWL: 25In the fourth nightwatch Jesus comes to them,; walking on the lake.; 26The students, seeing Jesus walking on the lake,; are aghast, saying this: “It’s a phantasm!”; They shouted out in fear.; 27 Quickly Jesus speaks to them,; saying, “Courage! It’s me. No fear.”
John 6.19-20 KWL: 19So, having rowed 25 or 30 stadia,; the students see Jesus walking on the lake,; coming near the boat, and they’re afraid.; 20Jesus tells them, “It’s me. No fear.”

John says they were about 25 to 30 stadia from Beit Sayid. A στάδιον/stádion (KJV “furlong”) is a Greek measurment that, yes, is based on the length of an athletic stadium. Roughly 200 yards—a football field. If you wanna get exact, they were between 4.625 to 5.55 klicks from land. But I seriously doubt John did anything more than guesstimate the distance. Certainly it felt like they rowed 25 to 30 stadia.

Various translations say Jesus meant to walk past them. Which is one way to translate ἤθελεν παρελθεῖν αὐτούς/íthelen pareltheín aftús, “he’s wanting to go beside them,” Mk 6.48 but it doesn’t make a lot of sense. Jesus was hoping to sneak past them in the dark? Maybe reach the far side ahead of them? Should’ve walked more of a direct route then. But no; there’s no reason whatsoever to assume Jesus didn’t mean to come right to them.

Every once in a while you get some yutz who insists Jesus must’ve walked along some secret sandbar or something. I’m pretty sure the fishers among the students knew Tiberias had no such sandbars where they were. That’s why they screamed. There was no way anyone could’ve been walking towards them.

Bibles tend to translate the students’ response, “It’s a ghost!” Mt 14.26 NLT but the word they used wasn’t πνεῦμα/névma, “ghost,” but φάντασμά/fádasma, “phantasm.” In ancient thinking a phantasm is not a ghost or spirit; it’s a vision. The students thought God was showing ’em something. Or an angel was making an appearance. Which is also kinda scary when you’re not used to such things.

But nope; turned out to be their rabbi, who just wanted to board. And according to John, that was just fine. “Oh it’s you? Come on board!”

John 6.21 KWL: So they want to take him into the boat.; The boat quickly comes to the land where they were going.

The other gospels tell it just a bit differently.

Mark: The students don’t get it.

In Mark Jesus comes alongside the boat, gets in, the wind stops, and the students are a little dumbstruck. Or at least that’s how people tend to interpret it, following the thinking we see in the NLT:

Mark 6.51-52 NLT: 51Then he climbed into the boat, and the wind stopped. They were totally amazed, 52for they still didn’t understand the significance of the miracle of the loaves. Their hearts were too hard to take it in.

See, Christians are awfully fond of bashing the students for being dense. Just a few days ago they were traveling the Galilee doing miracles. Then they fed 5,000 people. Now they saw Jesus walk on water. And they still can’t believe it. Man, what does it take to convince these stupid fishermen Jesus is the real deal?

Except that’s not what’s going on. They did know Jesus is the real deal. The problem they had, had to do with application. Okay, Jesus is Lord and Messiah and Son of God and all that. So… now what? What’s this mean?

If you’re wondering where I’m getting this idea, it comes from the text. What the NLT renders “they still didn’t understand the significance of the miracle of the loaves” is literally οὐ συνῆκαν ἐπὶ τοῖς ἄρτοις/u syníkan epí tis ártis, “they don’t come together about the breads.” In other words they didn’t yet agree about what multiplying the bread meant. Oh, they agreed it, and Jesus himself, is a big deal. But why’s it a big deal? Why’d Jesus do it? And like your typical over-analyzing academics, it wasn’t enough to say, “Well, people were hungry.” This has to mean something. Something huge, ’cause it’s a freaking huge miracle!

Well, till they saw Jesus walk on water. That’s an even huger miracle.

But before the Lord showed up, the students had nine hours to row, debate, get exhausted… and come to no conclusion. In fact, come to a stalemate: Ἦν αὐτῶν ἡ καρδία πεπωρωμένη/in aftón i kardía peporoméni, “in them, the heart was hardened.” Those who took up one position or another weren’t budging. Their hearts—really their minds—were closed.

Hence my translation:

Mark 6.51-52 KWL: 51Once Jesus gets into the boat with his students,; the wind stops.; They’re out of their wits among themselves,; 52for they didn’t agree what the bread means.; Instead their minds became hardened.

Walking on water had probably thrown the students into even more confusion. Like I said, their big-deal miracle had just been topped by a bigger-deal miracle. Likely some of them saw the feeding of the 5,000 as a public declaration of God’s kingdom—’cause that’s certainly how many in the crowd saw it. But now it turns out Jesus is doing the impossible simply because he can.

Totally gratuitous miracles.

How many times do we tell one another, whenever we overhear another Christian pray for something which sounds “small” to us: “You’re asking for that? Don’t waste God’s time. God wants you to do that yourself. He’s not your shortcut.” And we point to the bit where Satan tempted Jesus to turn rocks into bread, and point out Jesus didn’t take a shortcut.

But in both these miracles, Jesus took shortcuts. He performed totally gratuitous miracles. He did ’em because he can.

The students—and we Christians—regularly have the wrong idea about miracles. We think every single one of them has to be meaningful and significant and important and weighty. Plenty of Christians have insisted there’s gotta be some deeper, more necessary motive for Jesus to walk on water. Like proving how anything is possible with God. Which sounds like a good, impressive explanation… till you realize every miracle of Jesus does this. Curing leprosy, emptying thousands of evil spirits from a guy, stopping the weather, raising the dead—Jesus always demonstrates anything is possible with God. He doesn’t need to prove this by walking on water too.

So why’d he do this? To demonstrate, not just that God can do anything, but God can do everything.

For the most part, Christians only call upon God as a last resort. Which is wrong. God wants us to call on him for little things too. Regularly, not rarely, not on special occasions. In God’s kingdom, in a Christian’s life, the supernatural is meant to be commonplace. We should expect stuff like this to happen all the time. They’re not supposed to weird us out. They’re the fruit of any Christian life where the Holy Spirit is sought and followed.

Every so often, we hear of weird miracles among certain Christians. Fr’instance revivals where feathers fall from the ceiling, where people’s ceramic dental fillings are replaced with gold, where people start laughing in the Spirit, where people can leap over several pews in order to reach the front of the room. And when cessationists react to these stories, they sound exactly like atheists: “Oh, come on. You seriously believe those tall tales? Nonsense.” Or they try to argue God can’t be behind them, because only Satan does miracles anymore, or God’s awfully stingy with the miracles: He’s only got so much divine power, and only does ’em for pragmatic reasons.

Okay then, explain how pragmatic it is to walk on water.

“That’s entirely different. It’s in the bible.”

Yes it is, but that doesn’t answer my question. How pragmatic is it? Who’d it convert?—the Eleven believed already, and Judas Iscariot fell away regardless. Whose faith did it grow?—the students still needed various experiences, plus the baptism of the Holy Spirit, before they became unshakable. What did it accomplish, other than demonstrating yet another wondrous thing God can empower?

Well that is what it accomplished: Another demonstration of how God’s miracles aren’t meant to be special, rare occasions. They’re for every single day we follow God in this dark world.

In our lives today, Christians should expect to see the supernatural. Period. Both the legitimate stuff and the fake stuff—for wherever there’s the real stuff, you’ll get con artists trying to convince us they can do it too, and you’ll get the devil trying to sow confusion. We gotta be prepared. But when the Holy Spirit is truly empowering our lives, the supernatural will be commonplace. If it’s not—if you’re even arguing it shouldn’t happen—I’m sorry, but your mind is as closed as those of Jesus’s students. And it needs opening.

Matthew: Simon Peter gets it.

For a few minutes Peter got it, anyway.

Just as Christians knock the students for being dense, Christians are also in the bad habit of mocking Simon for being a doofus. In so doing, they’re projecting their own bad attitudes upon him. Simon wasn’t foolhardy; he was bold. He went further than the other students dared. It’s what made him Jesus’s best student. It also made him fail more often—but if you never try, of course you never fail!

’Cause the other students didn’t try this—and probably never thought to try it:

Matthew 14.28-29 KWL: 28In reply Simon Peter tells him, “Master,; if it’s you, order me to come to you on the water.”; 29Jesus says, “Come!”; and Peter comes down from the boat.; He walks on the water,; and comes to Jesus.

True, it didn’t last. But even so: Simon walked on water. Because he trusted Jesus. And Jesus didn’t even tell anyone, “Hey, if you trust me, you can walk on water too!” Didn’t need to: Simon had been paying attention in Jesus’s classes. He knew full well everything Jesus did was to demonstrate what Jesus’s followers are also meant to do. So if Jesus can walk on water, so should he. So should we.

Yeah, sometimes it feels like God is calling us to do the impossible. Well, as Simon demonstrated, God empowers the impossible.

Provided we keep our eyes on him, and not on our circumstances. In Simon’s case, those circumstances were some scary-looking waves.

Matthew 14.30-31 KWL: 30Seeing the wind, Peter fears.; He calls out as he begins to fall in,; saying, “Master, save me!”; 31Jesus quickly extends a hand, grabs him, and tells him,; “Little-faith, you doubt for what reason?”

Occasionally Jesus called his students ὀλιγόπισοι/oligópisi, “little-faiths.” They had some faith; they weren’t unbelievers. They just needed more. He was growing faith in them by showing ’em stuff, by making ’em act in faith more often, by teaching them what to believe and what not to. If his students believed his miracle of multiplying bread meant one thing, this was meant to show ’em they were wrong. (As we are.) They were thinking too small.

Mark ended the story with the students’ agitation, but Matthew and John ended the story more positively. Not that the students’ debate hadn’t been fruitless and useless, but they didn’t feel the need to point it out like Mark does.

Matthew 14.32-33 KWL: 32As Jesus and Peter get into the boat with them,; the wind stops.; 33Those in the boat fall to worship Jesus,; saying, “You’re truly God’s son.”

The students might not have known what to think about Jesus, or about the bread, but in Matthew they did fall back on what’s most important: Jesus is Lord. Follow him.

17 October 2025