After dismissing the crowds, "he went up on the mountain by himself to pray" (Matthew 14:23). "But he would withdraw to desolate places and pray" (Luke 5:16). Very early, while it was still dark, "he departed and went out to a desolate place, and there he prayed" (Mark 1:35). "all night he continued in prayer to God" (Luke 6:12).

Notice that Jesus often prayed alone and for considerable lengths of time. Jesus is the Son of God. Why would He need to pray? Why would He need to express such dependence on God? Consider this witness from the writer of Hebrews: in the days of His flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to Him who was able to save Him from death, and He was heard because of His reverence; although He was a son, He learned obedience through what He suffered (a paraphrase of Hebrews 5:7–8).

Jesus humbled Himself and depended on God even though He was the Son of God. He did not simply pray; He prayed fervently, with cries and tears. He did not only pray for others; He prayed for Himself. And God the Father heard Him — not simply because He was the Son, but "because of his reverence."

Friends, if Jesus prayed often, alone, and sometimes for extended periods, what ought we to do? Has He not left us an example, that we should follow in His steps (cf. 1 Peter 2:21)?

I have been encouraging you, my readers, to meditate on God's Word daily. I still believe it is vital to our spiritual health and effectiveness. But if you do this and do not also pray daily, I believe your spiritual discipline is incomplete. In fact, your meditation on the Bible should move you to pray, just as your prayers should move you to meditate on the Bible.

Although meditation and prayer are connected, I have found it necessary to build them into my life as two separate disciplines. While I practice both, building each into a daily habit required me to focus on one, even for a number of years, and then the other. Only in the last couple of years can I say that prayer morning and evening has been as regular in my life as daily meditation on the Bible. God has helped me in this discipline by bringing situations, crises, and His own presence.

If you are considering the next spiritual discipline to add to your daily walk with Christ, may I encourage you to consider daily prayer?

AI-Expanded Reflection

Luke's Gospel in particular shows Jesus praying at every turning point: at His baptism (3:21), before choosing the Twelve (6:12), before Peter's confession (9:18), at the Transfiguration (9:28–29), before teaching the Lord's Prayer (11:1), in Gethsemane (22:41–44), and on the cross (23:34, 46). His disciples, watching Him, asked, "Lord, teach us to pray" (11:1). They did not ask Him to teach them to preach or heal, but to pray — perhaps because they saw that His prayer life was the source of everything else.

The comment's honesty about building prayer and Scripture reading as separate habits over many years is encouraging and realistic. Spiritual disciplines rarely come all at once. The two also belong together, as the comment says: Scripture shapes our prayers, and prayer opens our hearts to Scripture. Many believers find it helpful to pray the Psalms or to turn a passage just read into prayer. Jesus' own practice of withdrawing to "desolate places" is a reminder that prayer often requires deliberately stepping away from noise and activity — something as necessary in a busy modern life as it was amid the crowds of Galilee.

"And those in the boat worshiped him, saying, 'Truly you are the Son of God'" (Matthew 14:33).

Peter was not the first or only one to declare that Jesus was the Son of God. Nathanael was perhaps the first among the disciples to declare it: "Rabbi, you are the Son of God! You are the King of Israel!" (John 1:49).

Then, in our present reading in Matthew 14, we find the disciples in the boat worshiping Jesus as the Son of God (see above). Only after this do we find Peter's famous confession: "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God" (Matthew 16:16). And later still, Martha: "Yes, Lord; I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God" (John 11:27).

I cite all of these not to undermine Peter's confession but to put it in perspective. While these declarations were significant, they did not confer holiness or special honor. Peter, Martha, and the disciples, even after making such profound declarations, all showed failures of faith — and in Peter's case, even denial of his Lord.

So it is not what these disciples acknowledged that ultimately matters, but what Christ accomplished for them. It is not what we declare that ultimately matters, but what Christ has accomplished for us. Let us praise God today for His unfailing grace!

AI-Expanded Reflection

Matthew 14:22–33 is a remarkable scene. After walking on the water, Jesus called Peter to come to Him, and Peter walked on the water too — until he saw the wind and began to sink. Jesus immediately reached out and caught him, saying, "O you of little faith, why did you doubt?" (14:31). Then, when they got into the boat and the wind ceased, the disciples worshiped Him. Their confession came not from a moment of strength but right after a demonstration of weakness and rescue. That fits the comment's point perfectly: the confession was precious because of who Jesus is, not because of the confessors' steadiness.

It is worth noting that the disciples' worship here is the first time in Matthew that a group of disciples worships Jesus, and Matthew's Gospel ends the same way, with the disciples worshiping the risen Christ — "but some doubted" (28:17). Even at the end, faith and doubt coexist in the church. Jesus' response in both places is the same: He comes near. In 14:31 He reaches out His hand; in 28:18–20 He gives the Great Commission and promises, "I am with you always." Our confidence rests not in the strength of our confession but in the faithfulness of the One we confess.

Peter said to Him, “Lord, if it is You, command me to come to You on the water.” And He said, “Come!” And Peter got out of the boat, and walked on the water and came toward Jesus. But seeing the wind, he became frightened, and beginning to sink, he cried out, “Lord, save me!” (Matthew 14:28–30).

Peter was the bold one among the disciples of Jesus. He often spoke and acted before thinking things through. As a result, you have instances like the one we read about today. Jesus comes to the disciples walking on the water. The disciples are terrified, but Peter takes a leap of faith by going to Jesus on the water. So far so good.

But somehow the strong winds and waves that are thrashing him from all sides make it difficult for him to know whether he is above the water or in the water. He becomes frightened and then begins to sink. Then he realizes that he was walking on the water, but now he is sinking. As he is sinking, he calls out to the Lord to save him. Later Paul would write, "Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved" (Romans 10:13). Jesus reaches out His hand and saves him.

Friends, as I read this account, I feel that this could be the testimony of many of us. Didn't we also take a bold step of faith in trusting Jesus as our Lord and Savior. We did this without all the information ahead of time. In fact, we are still discovering more about Jesus all the time from His Word. Yet, we stepped out of the boat, where the rest of humanity was, and chose to believe in Jesus.

Yet, at least for some of us, we soon realized the weakness of our faith. We had acted somewhat irrationally and impetuously to believe. We may have also thought for a moment that the strength of our faith was our own. But then, when we experienced the strong winds and fierce waves of difficult circumstances and our sinful natures, our weak excuse for faith was battered and we too began to sink. We doubted God's power.

But prompted by some power within us, we had the wherewithal to call upon the Lord. And just as Jesus stretched out His hand and took hold of Peter, the Lord stretched out His hand and took hold of us.

In this way we are reminded that we are not strong enough to believe as we ought, but God's grace strengthens our faith with the faith of Christ, whose arm continually lifts us up from the depths that daily threaten to consume us.

Friends, this is the walk of faith. Our sinful natures are a constant reminder of our depravity, which is simply our inherent inability to trust and obey God. We must never forget this, for to do so would cause us to boast and think too highly of ourselves as we ought. Jesus has indeed saved us. He has removed the condemnation for sin, but our sinful natures remain intact, so that we are always conflicted within, and we don't live as we ought (cf. Galatians 5:17). Paul writes about himself,

Here is a trustworthy saying that deserves full acceptance: Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners—of whom I am the worst (1 Timothy 1:15).

Notice, Paul does not say "I was the worst of sinners," which would suggest this is something he thought of himself just in the past because now he is a holy and faithful saint. No, he says, "I am the worst," which suggests a present and abiding condition. This is consistent with Paul's famous passage of self-reflection:

So I find this law at work: Although I want to do good, evil is right there with me. For in my inner being I delight in God’s law; but I see another law at work in me, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within me. What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death? Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself in my mind am a slave to God’s law, but in my sinful nature a slave to the law of sin (Romans 7:21–25).

Again, Paul writes about his inner battle as a present and abiding reality. This is probably also why he writes in Philippians that he has not yet taken hold of the righteousness of Christ in himself:

Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already arrived at my goal, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it (Philippians 3:12–13).

Friends, it is true that we are called "saints" in the Bible. So were the Jews of old. They were called God's holy people. Yet, they were far from holy, and neither are we in our present state. The Jews were to always remember that they were stubborn ("stiff-necked" in OT jargon) and rebellious, but they were called God's holy people only because God chose them over the nations. So Moses declared,

It is not because of your righteousness or your integrity that you are going in to take possession of their land; but on account of the wickedness of these nations, the Lord your God will drive them out before you, to accomplish what he swore to your fathers, to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Understand, then, that it is not because of your righteousness that the Lord your God is giving you this good land to possess, for you are a stiff-necked people (Deuteronomy 9:5–6).

In the same way, we must always acknowledge both our total depravity and His wonderful grace. In this way, we will boast only in the Lord. This depravity is not fully removed at salvation. It is only removed when we are glorified. That is why Paul also writes that we groan in our present condition:

Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption to sonship, the redemption of our bodies (Romans 8:23).

Therefore, friends, we do not pursue holiness because we are already holy through and through. We pursue it because God has called us to be holy. Even though we fall short, and even though we will not attain perfection in this life, we strive for it simply in obedience to the One who has called us to be holy because He is holy (cf. 1 Peter 1:15).

AI-Expanded Reflection

Peter’s movement onto the water begins with Jesus’ permission, not simply with an impulsive attempt to prove courage (Matthew 14:28–29). That detail matters for application. Faith is not equivalent to taking an extraordinary risk and expecting God to make it succeed. Peter responds to a word from Jesus within a unique encounter. The narrative’s final focus is the disciples’ worship and recognition of Jesus as God’s Son (Matthew 14:32–33), not the production of a general method for accomplishing impossible projects.

The sinking does nevertheless give a powerful picture of divided attention and dependence. Peter sees the wind, becomes afraid, and cries for rescue; Jesus immediately takes hold of him (Matthew 14:30–31). The rescue does not wait for a perfectly composed confession. Jesus both saves and questions Peter’s doubt. Grace therefore does not mean doubt is irrelevant, but neither does doubt make a distressed disciple unreachable.

The original extends the scene into an account of continuing sin. Galatians 5:16–25 certainly describes conflict, but it also describes the Spirit’s real activity and fruit. The believer is not merely an unchanged person with a different legal label. Romans 6 speaks of a decisive break with sin’s dominion while commanding an ongoing refusal to serve it (Romans 6:1–14). Christian traditions describe this relation differently, but the New Testament holds together remaining struggle and genuine renewal.

The present tense in 1 Timothy 1:15 expresses Paul’s continuing identification as a sinner who has received mercy. It need not mean that he is currently committing more evil than every other person. The surrounding verses recall his former persecution and celebrate Christ’s patience as an example to others (1 Timothy 1:12–16). Likewise, Romans 7 has been read as the experience of a regenerate believer, of a person under law, or as a representative portrayal of humanity’s inability. The passage should not be asked to settle the entire doctrine of sanctification without Romans 6 and 8.

Philippians 3:9–14 makes a particularly helpful distinction. Paul already speaks of righteousness through faith, yet has not reached the final goal of resurrection and complete conformity to Christ. He presses on because Christ has taken hold of him. Assurance and effort belong together: the pursuit does not create Christ’s grasp, but Christ’s grasp gives the pursuit its confidence. Correcting the reference from Philippians 2 to Philippians 3 brings that context into view.

The practical lesson is to respond to failure with neither boasting nor fatalism. Confess the actual sin, seek help, and take the next obedient step rather than concluding that change is impossible. The Lord who rescues Peter also continues to teach him. A believer may be weak without being abandoned, and may depend wholly on grace without denying the growth grace produces. The hand that saves is not an excuse to remain in danger; it is the beginning of renewed trust and a life increasingly shaped by the Savior’s call.

One time I heard a pastor giving his sermon on the parable in 13:1 through 9. He said that the seed is planted in the same soil but the condition of the soil determines the outcome. But here there is a clear difference in kind of soil that the seed is planted. Only the seed sown in good soil produces its fruit. Whether a soil is good or bad is not dependent on the degree of our virtues. The Holy Spirit's work of regeneration can only transform the condition of our soil!

AI-Expanded Reflection

The parable in Matthew 13 gives the same seed very different receptions. Some is exposed on the path, some encounters shallow rocky ground, some grows among thorns, and some falls on good soil. Stephen’s concern is that an explanation should not flatten these differences or make fruitful reception simply the reward for superior natural virtue. The parable presents more than small variations in effort. It describes responses in which the word is rejected, briefly welcomed without endurance, crowded out by rival concerns, or understood and made fruitful.

Jesus’ explanation identifies the seed with the word of the kingdom and relates the soils to hearing (13:18–23). That emphasis should govern the interpretation of the agricultural picture. Whether two patches could physically be parts of the same field is not the theological issue. The issue is the reception of the message. A disagreement about whether the soil is “the same” may therefore conceal agreement about the need for a changed condition. Before rejecting the sermon’s point, it is worth distinguishing its wording from the actual explanation it intended.

The conviction that regeneration is God’s work can be developed from the wider New Testament, including John 3 and Titus 3:5. Matthew’s parable itself does not provide a complete account of the order of salvation or explicitly explain how one soil becomes another. It portrays the different results of hearing and calls the hearer to attention. We can relate those observations to a theology of grace while acknowledging that the relation is a synthesis across passages, rather than claiming every detail is directly stated in the parable.

This distinction preserves both dependence and responsibility. We ask God to open hearts because fruitfulness is not manufactured by boasting in our moral quality. We also heed the warnings about shallow enthusiasm, fear under pressure, anxiety, and the deceitfulness of wealth. Divine transformation does not make those warnings unnecessary; it gives us reason to receive them as instruments of care. A person troubled by the thorns should not conclude that examination is futile because soil cannot move itself. The appropriate response is to bring that concern to God and attend to the word’s call.

The final picture includes differing measures of fruitfulness, not one uniform yield. This encourages patience toward believers whose growth is real but less visible or abundant than another’s. The parable calls us away from self-congratulation and toward receptive hearing. We sow faithfully, pray for God’s life-giving work, and examine the loyalties that compete for the heart, trusting that the word is meant to produce a harvest rather than merely a moment of interest.

A dear brother asked me recently a very thoughtful question on Matthew 13:58. Here it is:

And he did not do many miracles there because of their lack of faith.

Yujin, in light of our previous discussions on faith healing, verse 58 in chapter 13 seems to support the idea that our faith is what keeps these types of miracles from happening today. In light of the self-proclaimed faith healers of today, I wonder how much our faith in God healing us in this way has to do with the healing itself. Some of the commentary I've read seems to support this as well.

COMMENTARY:

We are not to suppose that his power was limited by the belief or unbelief of people; but they were so "prejudiced," so set against him, that they were not in a condition to "judge of evidence" and to be convinced. They would have charged it to derangement, or sorcery, or the agency of the devil. Compare John 10:20. These words in Mark are joined with this expression, "he marvelled"; showing, that their continued unbelief in him, notwithstanding his ministry and miracles among them, was matter of surprise to him; but here they are given as a reason why he did no more mighty works among them: and which Mark says he could not do, not for want of power, or as if their unbelief was too mighty for him to overcome; but he would not, because he judged them unworthy, and that it was not fit and convenient to perform any more, since they were offended with what was done; and that their condemnation might not be increased. “Take heart, daughter,” he said, “your faith has healed [literally “saved”] you” (Matthew 9:22).

In fact most of the miracles of healing in the NT were based on someone's faith. Just in the book of Matthew there are several miracles performed by Jesus, each of which faith is mentioned as the reason for the healing the Centurion (Mt. 8:10,13); the paralyzed man (Mt. 9:2); the bleeding woman (Mt. 9:22); the two blind men (Mt. 9:29); the demon possessed girl (Mt. 15:28)). I was hoping you might share your thoughts on these passages that talk about faith healing, the commentary and your understanding of faith's role in faith healing.

AI-Expanded Reflection

The question brings together passages that should indeed be considered alongside one another. Matthew sometimes explicitly associates healing with faith, and the Nazareth account links the relative absence of mighty works with unbelief. A reader should not be asked to ignore those statements in order to preserve a prior position about contemporary healing. The proper task is to determine what the narratives mean by faith, whose faith is in view, and how that faith relates to Jesus’ authority.

The examples already show variety. The centurion trusts Jesus on behalf of a servant; the people bringing the paralyzed man display faith; the woman approaches Jesus herself; the Canaanite mother pleads for her daughter. Matthew 9:29 concerns two blind men, rather than the separate mute man described afterward. Correcting that reference helps keep the evidence precise. The stories do not all describe one identical transaction in which a patient generates enough inward certainty to activate a cure.

The commentary excerpts supplied with the question propose that the problem at Nazareth concerns hardened rejection rather than a limit on Jesus’ power. They are attempts to explain the relationship between the wording and the narrative’s portrait of Jesus. Their explanations should be weighed, not simply treated as the text itself. Mark 6:5 notably includes a few healings within the account of what Jesus could not do there. The passage therefore resists a crude formula that unbelief makes every healing impossible.

The phrase about faith saving or healing in Matthew 9:22 also requires context. A verb can carry related senses, and the narrative concerns the woman’s restoration through Jesus. We should not assume that a lexical range by itself proves either that physical healing and eternal salvation are identical or that every believer must receive the same physical result. The action’s source remains the person and authority of Christ. Faith is directed toward him; it is not portrayed as an independent substance with power of its own.

The question has a pastoral importance beyond the classification of miracles. If a teacher tells a suffering person that an unchanged condition proves deficient faith, that claim needs scriptural warrant rather than the teacher’s assertion. The narratives should be read in a way that lets Jesus remain sovereign and lets sufferers speak honestly. Asking these questions carefully is an act of care for both truth and people. It prepares the discussion to move beyond competing slogans toward a fuller account of trust, prayer, divine freedom, and the limits of what a human minister may promise.

Christ tells a number of parables; the one that jumped out at me tonight was the parable of the sower. He explains that when someone hears the message of the kingdom without understanding it, the evil one snatches away what was sown — that is the seed on the path. Seed on rocky ground is the one who receives the word with immediate joy but has no root, and falls away when trouble or persecution comes. Seed among thorns is the one who hears, but the worries of life and the deceitfulness of wealth choke the word. Seed on good soil is the one who hears and understands, and produces a crop many times over (a paraphrase of Matthew 13:19–23).

This testifies to the importance of growing in God and becoming rooted in Him. Only the seed that takes root grows fruitfully. If someone merely hears God's word without understanding it — or without taking the time to understand it — they can easily be led away. I've seen someone beginning to grow in Christ encounter personal difficulty just as the seed was being planted. I believe young or early Christians reaching out to God are especially vulnerable, because they have not yet rooted in Christ.

AI-Expanded Reflection

The detail this comment lands on — understanding as the distinguishing mark of the fruitful soil — is precisely what Matthew's version of the parable emphasizes, and it's worth noticing what that implies about the other three soils. None of them fails at the point of hearing; all four hear. The path fails at comprehension, the rocky ground at depth, the thorns at competing priorities. That makes the parable less a sorting of people into fixed categories than a description of the specific places the process breaks down, which is more useful pastorally: the remedies for shallow root, choking anxiety, and simple incomprehension are not the same remedy, and the parable is careful to distinguish them.

Jesus explains why He spoke in parables: because the disciples had been given the privilege of knowing the kingdom's mysteries, but the crowds hadn't — whoever has will be given more, but whoever doesn't have will lose even what they have; He spoke in parables because, seeing, they don't see, and hearing, they don't hear or understand (a paraphrase of Matthew 13:10–13). Did that mean the disciples had some special innate ability to understand parables? No — they had to keep asking Jesus what each one meant, and we learn from Mark that Jesus explained everything privately to them afterward (a paraphrase of Mark 4:33–34). The crowds received only parables without explanation; the disciples received the explanation in private. Those "on the outside" weren't given access to the kingdom's mysteries — connected to the audience Isaiah addressed, whose hearts had grown dull and unwilling to hear (see Isaiah 6). So the parables functioned as both judgment on their stubborn hearts and protection for Jesus during His later trial: His accusers could only point to stories, and their interpretations never agreed, since none of them had been given Jesus's private explanations. Contrary to how parables are often taught, then — as simple illustrative tools meant to make truth more accessible — Jesus's parables often concealed truth from the unbelieving, especially from those planning to have Him killed. One further lesson: we should be cautious about confidently asserting the meaning of parables Jesus never explained. If even the disciples, walking with Jesus daily, needed His explanations, it's presumptuous to assume we can perfectly decode every detail on our own without one. I'd caution against building major doctrine primarily on unexplained parables — the Parable of the Prodigal Son, for instance, has generated real ministries and countless conflicting interpretations precisely because Jesus never explained it directly. It can certainly be taught, but probably works better as supporting material than as the primary foundation for a major point.

AI-Expanded Reflection

The specific reversal this comment identifies — parables functioning to conceal truth from an already-resistant audience, rather than simply to illustrate truth for easier understanding — runs against how parables are usually described in popular teaching, and it makes sense in context: Jesus wasn't speaking to a neutral audience fairly weighing evidence, but to crowds and religious leaders who had already, repeatedly, rejected both clear teaching and undeniable signs. Given that prior rejection, a story requiring active engagement to unpack functions differently than it would for a genuinely open hearer — for the resistant, it becomes one more opportunity to walk away unchanged; for the genuinely seeking, the same story becomes an invitation to keep asking, which is precisely what the disciples kept doing.