Every May, The Master’s Seminary celebrates its graduating class during a commencement ceremony where the men receive their diplomas. This year, Dr. Jesse Johnson addressed the 2025 graduating class. Below is an adapted transcript of his stirring charge.
Thank you, Dr. Chou, Dr. Busenitz, and Pastor MacArthur. I'm so thankful to be here. It is a privilege of my life, really, to open the Word of God with you tonight.
I invite you to open to the Gospel of Matthew. I'll read the story we'll look at tonight, Matthew 14:22–33.
"Immediately he made the disciples get into the boat and go before him to the other side, while he dismissed the crowds. And after he had dismissed the crowds, he went up on the mountain by himself to pray. When evening came, he was there alone, but the boat by this time was a long way from the land, beaten by the waves, for the wind was against them. And in the fourth watch of the night he came to them, walking on the sea. But when the disciples saw him walking on the sea, they were terrified, and said, “It is a ghost!” and they cried out in fear. But immediately Jesus spoke to them, saying, “Take heart; it is I. Do not be afraid.”
And Peter answered him, “Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water.” He said, “Come.” So Peter got out of the boat and walked on the water and came to Jesus. But when he saw the wind, he was afraid, and beginning to sink he cried out, “Lord, save me.” Jesus immediately reached out his hand and took hold of him, saying to him, “O you of little faith, why did you doubt?” And when they got into the boat, the wind ceased. And those in the boat worshiped him, saying, “Truly you are the Son of God.”
This is the Word of God, and I pray that He would encourage you with it.
The scene we just read concludes what is arguably the longest day in Jesus's life. The day began with Jesus receiving news that John the Baptist, perhaps His closest friend and coworker, had been martyred. Messengers traveled to bring Him the news. It happened on the opposite side of the Sea of Galilee. It likely took them a day or two to get there. Jesus heard about the news in the morning, and the gospels tell us He removed himself. According to Matthew’s account, His goal was to go out and be isolated, to find a desolate place so that He could pray.
This is an event that is recorded in all four gospels. When you take all four accounts together, you find that as Jesus was going out to pray, He was intercepted by His disciples returning from their ministry. Two by two, He had sent them out and given them authority, and now they were coming back.
Jesus is perhaps at His lowest point other than the Garden of Gethsemane, and He's encountering disciples who are coming back at their highest point. The disciples were at the zenith. They were filled with joy, so excited to tell Jesus the stories of all they had accomplished. You can imagine the collision of emotions in Jesus's experience—His sadness mingled with the joy of the disciples.
The disciples did not come alone. They came bringing caravans of people with them; people eager to see Jesus, people who had been healed by the disciples and had brought their friends, and the crowd kept growing and growing. By the time the thirteen of them were united, they were in Bethsaida, the top side of the Sea of Galilee. Jesus puts them all in a boat and pushes them out to sea to escape the crowds.
Mark's version of events is somewhat humorous. At this point, they're in the boat and they're trying to go to a desolate place. But the crowd is able to outrun them. And so it's a humorous picture of the boat cutting across the water with the crowd chasing them, watching them the whole way.
Finally, Jesus sees the grief of the crowd. He says they were like sheep without a shepherd. And so He pulls the boat over, so to speak, and dismounts and begins preaching to them, teaching them, healing them, and ministering to them.
Now earlier in Bethsaida, Jesus had strictly told the disciples not to bring any food with them. He banned them from bringing bags. Luke says they didn't even have time to eat. It's growing dark. The disciples ask for Jesus to send everybody home and for food. And Jesus tells them, "You give them something to eat." An impossible task. The disciples come up with a handful of crackers and two fish. Basically, Andrew stole a kid's lunch.
Jesus blessed it, but Jesus didn't feed the crowd directly. If you recall, Jesus gave the food to the Twelve and told them, "You feed the crowd." Now this, of course, is a wonderful picture of the ministry of our Lord and His supernatural ability—Him being, in a sense, the true and better Moses, here cultivating manna in the wilderness.
There are a hundred applications from this, but for pastors, there's a very clear and particular application: Jesus is telling His disciples, "You take care of my sheep... They are so lost. They are like sheep without a shepherd. The Pharisees will not help them, the rabbis will not help them. You help them." And they don't have anything to help them with. All they have is what the Lord gives them. They are to feed the crowds with what they have borrowed from the Lord. They can't make their own food. Even the Lord Himself gives thanks for it.
When it's over, verse 22 says, "Immediately Jesus made the disciples get into the boat." This is an abrupt turn in Matthew. Matthew hardly ever uses the word “immediately.” It's three times in this narrative here. The word for "get into the boat" is also a very unusual Greek word. As far as I know, it's only used in one other place in the New Testament, in the parable in Luke's gospel where the servants are supposed to go on the highways and byways and compel people to come in. That's the word here. It could easily be translated "Jesus compelled them" or "forced them" or "prodded them" or "made them" or "herded them into the boat." And Jesus shoved them away. The crowd goes home. Jesus goes up on the mountain to pray. He pushes them into a storm.
The storm is the collision of winds. They had a name for it. The fisherman called it a shark storm. There are no sharks in the Sea of Galilee, but the hot air from the desert mixes with the cold air from the Mediterranean Sea. It collides over the seas, with the winds pushing against each other. In LA, we call this the Santa Ana winds.
The disciples thought they were with the wind until they reached the halfway point of the sea, and now they're against the wind. It's dark. The Jordan River is emptying out right there into the Sea of Galilee, and they've got currents and wind fighting them. They're straining, agonizing against the oars. They're filled with fear. This is not the kind of storm with lightning and hail. This is a windstorm. There's high visibility, and Jesus can see them straining from the shore, pulling against the oars. They’re stuck. They can't go anywhere.
It's the fourth watch of the night when He comes. That's between 3 a.m. and 6 a.m. And don't view that as a technical time period where it's 3:02. No, it's the time of night when it is dark and quiet. Midnight is long since gone. This is the time of night before the sun rises, but the sun hasn't risen yet. It's that time of the night, and they can feel it in the air. It is like three or four in the morning. They are stuck. They are in agony. And they've been here before.
They were stuck in a storm before. But last time, there were thirteen of them in the boat and they woke Jesus up. Do you remember what they said to Him—"Don't you care? Don't you care that we're perishing?" And Jesus rebukes the wind and the waves and goes back to sleep. And they asked the question, "What kind of man is this that can rebuke the wind and the wind and the waves listen to Him? What kind of person is this?” Well, now they're in a similar kind of storm, only there is no Jesus asleep at the wheel. He's not in the boat.
Jesus sees them. They initially don't see Jesus. What's going through their minds? First of all, does Jesus know we're out here? Jesus didn't have the weather app on His phone, but I'm going to say that He knew the storm was coming. This was a manufactured crisis by Jesus, just like the feeding of the 5,000. He led them out into the wilderness. He chose a desolate place. He told the disciples not to bring food. It was manufactured for Him to teach the disciples, "You feed my sheep with my food."
Now they're in a boat. Crisis number two—in the middle of the night—also manufactured by Jesus to teach them a very similar lesson. Does Jesus see? Does Jesus know? Does Jesus care when He's not in the boat with them? And of course, they get their answer.
Jesus comes walking to them, and they do not say, "Praise God from whom all blessings flow." They had not studied under Archimedes, these disciples, but they understood his principle that when an object's mass has a displacement greater than the counter tension of water, it sinks. They size up the man walking, figure that he is not buoyant, and deduce the most obvious explanation: this has to be a ghost. It is very easy for us to laugh at that, but I would ask you, what would you think? You're there in the middle of the night. You're stuck in a storm after all you've seen today. What would you think?
Jesus approaches and gets close enough to talk to them. He says three things in verse 27.
The first thing He says is "Take heart." Some translations say, "Be of good cheer,” which is a humorous thing to say at that moment. Why so glum? Cheer up! Take heart.
Mark lets you know Jesus's intent was to pass them by. And that is an Old Testament reference to when Moses parted the sea and crossed the sea with the Israelites, and the angel of the Lord was both before them and behind them. He had passed them by, so to speak. Take heart.
The second thing he says is, "It is I." Ego eimi in the Greek, which is not the way you would normally speak. It's an awkward phrase. We don't have a similar kind of phrase in English. But we have enough Spanish graduates with us here tonight. Spanish has a very similar phrase: yo soy yo. You don't speak like that. It is I who is I. Yo soy yo.
It's me, Jesus says. It is me, myself, and I would be the English idiom. It's an unusual phrase. It's the declaration of deity from the Lord's lips. It's used all over John's gospel. When Jesus says this to people in John's gospel, they pick up rocks to stone Him to death. They tell Him, "You being a man keep making yourself out to be equal to God." It is that kind of declaration that does it.
Some commentators would tell you that's stretching it too far: "You know, it's not necessarily a declaration of deity, it's just an awkward Greek phrase. Jesus is trying to solve the ambiguity of who it is exactly on the water, so He's making sure they understand." But we cannot separate His words from His actions here.
He's walking on the water, which is something only God can do. You remember in Job 9, Job saying, "I can't call on the Lord, He's not like me. He has access to power and authority I don't have. He alone can walk on the sea." Or in Isaiah 43, it is God who walks on the waters, “he makes his path through the surging waters." In Job 38, God asks Job, "Have you walked on the waters?" Only Jesus has. “It is I,” Jesus says, declaring Himself to be God.
His third comment to them is "Do not be afraid." Moses was afraid and begged the Lord for a vision of His glory, and the Lord hid him in a cleft of the rock and covered his eyes and let Moses see His back. We know in the New Testament no one has seen God. But the point is, no one has seen God, but we have seen Jesus Christ. This is the declaration of Jesus walking on the water. No one has seen God, but you have seen Jesus, declaring to be God, walking on the water—God incarnate.
In 1 Kings 19, Elijah quits. After the slaughter of the prophets of Baal, he runs back to Egypt and tells God, "Let's start over, you and me. Let's make new people." And God gives Elijah a vision. The earthquake comes that shakes the rocks, the wind comes that breaks the rocks, the fire comes that consumes everything. But the Lord wasn't in the wind. He wasn't in an earthquake. He wasn't in the fire. He was in the whisper Elijah heard.
You have this acted out now, Jesus revealing Himself to the disciples. Jesus is not, in a strict sense, in the storm, although He's walking through it. But the comfort of God in that moment is the words of Christ, "Do not be afraid."
Peter has a remarkable answer in verse 29, "Peter answered him, 'Lord if it is you command me to come to you on the water.'" You maybe can read too much into Peter's bravery. Maybe he just speaks for the Twelve. He is their leader, after all. Maybe he has the right of first refusal. If Peter hadn’t stepped up, maybe John or Andrew would have, and eventually he'd get to Thomas putting on his life vest. I don't know how it would have gone, but Peter comes first and says, "I want to walk with you Lord, command me and I'll be there."
Had Peter just tried it himself, that would not have been wise. Just because Jesus can do something doesn't mean you can do it too. But if Jesus calls you to do something, you have to believe He gives you the grace and the confidence to be faithful in what He's called you to do. And so Peter does not assume that if Jesus can do it, he can do it. Peter assumes that if Jesus commands him to do it, he can do it. And Peter wants to be with Jesus. And so I love his answer here, "Lord. if you want me to, command me to. If you want me to be there with you, tell me to be with you, and I will come out right now." And Jesus says, "Come."
And Peter goes, and for a minute, the disciples see two ghosts. Peter walks on the water and comes to Jesus. But verse 30 says, "When he saw the wind, he was afraid." The wind, of course, had been there all night long. Why the fear? The answer is because Peter, I imagine, had assumed that had he walked on the water in obedience to the Lord's commands, the wind would have stopped. He was signing up for walking on a calm water next to Jesus. That's what he wanted.
But instead, the wind is blowing against him. He is filled with fear. I don't mean to mock Peter at all because he, of course, is the one out of the boat. But it is interesting that he sees the wind, he feels the mist, and he is afraid. He starts to sink.
But this is what is so precious about Peter. Immediately he starts to sink, and immediately he cries out and says, "Lord, save me." Peter understood that being faithful doesn't mean there won't be any storms. And in the storm, he calls on the Lord. The prayer that Peter makes here is the most important prayer for any person to make in their entire life: “Lord, save me. I'm at the end of myself. I'm in a trial, save me, Lord."
Jesus grabs him, and would you be surprised to know that Peter does not pull the Lord underwater? The Lord is strong enough to carry them both. They get into the boat, the two of them together now. School is over. Jesus is back in the boat. The wind ceased like before, only this time the disciples don't ask a question—"What kind of man is this that commands the wind and the waves?" This time, the disciples answer that question from earlier. "Truly you are the Son of God," they declare. The wind is calm, the presence of Jesus turned the shark into a minnow, and He is recognized as the Son of God.
Pastor, I hope you see yourself in this narrative. Jesus is not in the boat with us. He has ascended to heaven. He's told you what He told the Twelve and what He would reiterate three times to Peter: "Feed my sheep." But He is not here with us. We have His Spirit who comforts us. We have the boldness of Peter, who saw the resurrected Lord.
Peter starts out here afraid of the water and the wind. But when he’s arrested in Acts 4, and they say, “If you preach the gospel again, we're going to put you to death." Peter says, "Okay, if you need me, I'll be preaching the gospel." Where did that courage come from? It came from right here. Peter knows the Lord is in heaven, but He still sees. He knows the ministry He's called him to. He knows. He sees. He cares.
Sometimes, pastors going through a trial can repeat what Peter says. And let me just paint a picture for you right now: you're about to graduate, and many of you are about to go into a church that has called you. Many of you may not know where you're going, but you have optimistic desires. You have the kind of church in your mind that you want to go and serve. It's a beautiful church with a beautiful worship center and elders who like you. It's the dream. Everybody's nice to you, and they help you move in, and they play with your kids, and this is amazing. And you start your 27-part series through John 1, and you're excited. And then part 28 comes and you're in a storm, maybe by your own doing, maybe by an elder that wasn't straightforward with you, maybe by a trial—an old saint in the congregation gets sick with cancer, maybe the music leader disqualifies himself and now you're trying to fight that battle with half of the congregation that loves him and doesn't know why you're being so strict. Suddenly, the storm hits, and you think, Lord, I don't see you here. Do you know what I'm going through?
The answer from this story is yes, He does. Lord, do you care what I'm going through? And the answer is yes, He does care. And then you have to cry out to the Lord. It feels so obvious to even say it. When Peter had his eyes on the Lord, he was walking on the water. When he took his eyes off the Lord, he began to sink.
And you might think that kind of application is beneath you. "Just keep your eyes on the Lord." But then that trial comes, and for the first week of that trial, you will think, "My eyes are on Jesus. I'm praying to Jesus. I'm trusting Jesus." And then week two comes and you say the line you've heard other people say and you never thought you would utter it: “I prayed and it didn't work. I prayed to God to help me through this, and I'm still in it. I'm walking on the water. I'm where God commanded me to be. I'm praying to Him, and He doesn't seem to stop the storm.” And you try to rely on your own strength, your own wisdom, your own rhetoric, your own cunning, and your own abilities to get out of this, to navigate through the trial. And you are sinking.
I pray that you would understand that God calls you to ministry not to take you out of the storm. The Master's Seminary is the boat, and you are called to get out of the boat. Except the Th.M. students—you guys stay around. Everybody else, get out of the boat. And yes, you're going to get splashed in the water. Yes, you're going to go through a trial. Yes, the Lord sees. Yes, the Lord knows, and He will care for you every step of the way. I love that Peter prayed before the water got to his kneecaps.
Speaking now to friends and family who are here, I do wonder if you have all prayed this prayer. It is not unique for pastors.
It's Mother's Day. I talked to my mom on the phone today, and I gave her the three-minute summary of my message. And she said, "You know the story with Peter, there's truth in there that applies to every Christian. It's not just for pastors, so make sure you say that." In honor of Mother's Day, I'm saying it right now. Every single human being has to say the prayer that Jesus receives from Peter, "Lord, save me."
We even have an expression that some people need to hit rock bottom before they'll pray this prayer. But I'm telling you the bottom of the Sea of Galilee is littered with the spiritual corpses of people who hit rock bottom and kept bouncing and never prayed. What a shame it would be if you were brought to seminary graduation, perhaps to support your brother or your son, but you have never asked the Lord to save you. It's not a complicated prayer. It's straightforward. "Lord, save me from my sin."
And for the pastors tonight, please don't ever think you graduate from that prayer. In any trial of life, know the Lord sees you. He knows. He cares.