The Kitchen Sink
An occasional piece of paper
August 10, 2008
Vol. 11 no. 31

Everything But...
           Wouldn’t you know the Lectionary guys made certain that the story of Jesus walking on water comes up in the middle of the Saskatchewan summer, rather than in the winter when anyone could walk across a frozen lake! Then again, the Holy Land never has known winters like ours.
           I do not intend to abandon Joseph’s technicolour coat, but walking on water just can’t be ignored. In many ways this story has been clung to stubbornly or ridiculed mercilessly in a similar fashion to the resurrection of Jesus Christ on Easter morning. All too many want to make it either a test case of one’s Christian orthodoxy or to prove how silly and un-modern this whole Christianity business is anyway. Both the walking on water and resurrection stories describe actions outside generally recognized physical laws. Some insist on halting rational thought as necessary for faith; and some insist there is no other kind of thinking other than rational logic. Both are, in fact, fundamentalists. God’s creation is not one-dimensional and the truth that makes us free is seldom spoken the same way twice.
           Back to the boat on the lake. What happened was not about performing a nature-defying miracle, but about the power of faith which can propel us to do just about anything. That few of us have ever walked on water, except in mid-winter on the ice road, does not mean we are faith-less. It does show that fear inhibits you and me from doing most things, and when we are above fear there is little we cannot do. Most of our mental and spiritual energy goes into thinking what we cannot do.
           Joseph talked too much which found him into a lot of trouble and a deep hole. Something kept him going and it wasn’t thinking only one way. He was afraid, mind you, but faith made him capable of really thinking.