The Great Gospel of John
Volume 2
Jesus' Precepts and Deeds through His Three Years of Teaching
Second Journey of the Lord: Nazareth - Cave at Bethabara (First Feeding of the People) - Mountain of Prayer - Walking on the Sea of Galilee (Peter's test of faith) - By ship to Genneseret in the bay with the same name
- Chapter 100 -
The distressed disciples upon the sea.
Says Peter: "This would be about the third night watch already (about one hour past midnight) yet there still is no vessel to be detected upon the sea."
2
Says Andrew, who has very sharp eyes: "I cannot discover anything either for all my looking!"
3
Says the tax collector Matthew: "If only the strong headwind would settle. The boatmen are exhausted from heavy rowing, even though we have pitched in with them several times. Only with heaviest strain can we maintain ourselves upon the high sea. If only it started dawning! The morning is bound to bring us a change of wind!"
4
Says Nathanael: "I would wish for little else if only the Lord caught up with us, otherwise it would be advisable to go back and look for Him should He in the end has fallen into the Herodian's hands?"
5
Says Simon: "Oh, tell me another! He to Whom all the heavens and elements are subject - and the miserable Herodian henchmen! He said that He would catch up with us when He has dismissed all the people, and that we should sail over ahead of Him. Whatever He says is holy and hence more than true. Long before we shall have reached the other shore with this wind He shall be with us. For He Who commands the winds can easily and rapidly negotiate the sea."
6
Says John: "I fully agree with you. Hence let us all just trust nicely in Him for He shall not leave us in all eternity. Behold, with this wind that has tormented us these five hours already, our oars would have been of miserable effect against the wind, if His might over the elements had not maintained us upon the high sea. Without His influence we would have been back where we started long since. Because, if I see correctly, our ship is standing still as if bricked in on one spot, and I think that with firm faith in Him we could drop our ruderring, which has already completely exhausted our shipmates, for the ship shall not move from this spot regardless, and the Lord shall probably intend catching up with us here, otherwise we would with this storm, have already been God knows where!"
7
Says Peter: "Yes, yes, you are completely right indeed! I feel it too that this hefty wind shall have no effect upon us, and our oars would not be mastering this storm if His divine power were not obviously helping us. I shall also tell the bosuns now not to bother too much with the oars. "
8
Peter then went over to the boatmen to tell them to take it easy with the oars.
9
But the shipmates say: "We can see the shore along the desert foaming white; the surge there must be stupendous. If we don't hold out upon the high till morning we all perish!"
10
Says Peter to the bosuns: "If we were not disciples of the almighty Lord Jesus! Since we are however His disciples, the storm shall have little or no effect on us, even without the fruitless rowing. It is not long to go till morning, and we shall all fare better in daytime."
11
In response to these words of Peter, the oarsmen gradually cease their oaring, discovering that the ship is also staying upon the high without their ruddering. And so the shipmates too gradually begin to believe that the ship is being maintained on the high by My power.