“Come”
By Father Frank Hernandez
Jesus and God our Father want us to come to them with faith and prayer, so we can have a personal relationship with Him. But we as human beings struggle to come to the Lord in faith because of this humanity He has given to us. We are given an example of our lack of faith in the gospel of Matthew (14:22-33) with Jesus walking on water and Peter sinking into the sea.
Jesus continues His ministry and sends His disciples ahead of Him, but we read that during the night, as a storm comes against the disciples; fear enters their hearts. Jesus walks on the water to reach them. During this moment He calms their fear, but Peter wants to come to Jesus and Jesus lets him. We know as Peter walks on the water, it is too much for him, fear and doubt enter his hearts and he loses faith in Jesus. But Jesus is there to save him as He extends His hand.
Peter lost faith in Jesus because the storm was too much for him. How many times do we do the same in our lives? When life gets difficult, when the storms of our struggles or a problem become too much for us, what is the first thing that we do? We give up. Fear, doubt takes over in our lives and we lose faith in others, ourselves and the Lord. We stop praying to the Lord, we question if He is really present and our faith is shaken. Yet, Jesus and God always stretch out their hand to us, we are the ones who fail to take their hand or see the hand stretched out to us. How can we change that? How can we see the Lord when He calls us? How can we trust in the Lord during the storms in our lives?
We need to trust in the Lord and have faith in Him every moment of our lives. How can we come to Jesus always and not only search for Him during the storms of our lives? Jesus and God want that personal relationship, but how can we cultivate that relationship every day. During the good and bad times of our lives, always holding on to the hand of the Lord. Life is not easy and we need help to overcome those obstacles, but how does the Lord help us in our daily life? Do we really trust in Him?
The word to Peter “Come,” is the same word Jesus told us as well. How do we come to the Lord in our daily lives and do we trust Jesus is there to help us? Jesus never loses faith in us, we are the one who lose faith in Him. How can this gospel of Matthew inspire us to always trust more in the Lord in our lives?
