Saturday, June 30, 2007

Weathering the storm

That day when evening came, he said to his disciples, "Let us go over to the other side." Leaving the crowd behind, they took him along, just as he was, in the boat. There were also other boats with him. A furious squall came up, and the waves broke over the boat, so that it was nearly swamped. Jesus was in the stern, sleeping on a cushion. The disciples woke him and said to him, "Teacher, don't you care if we drown?"

He got up, rebuked the wind and said to the waves, "Quiet! Be still!" Then the wind died down and it was completely calm. He said to his disciples, "Why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith?"

They were terrified and asked each other, "Who is this? Even the wind and the waves obey him!" (Mark 4:35-41)

I suspect that almost everyone has been through a terrible storm at some time in his life. Perhaps it was a hailstorm; maybe it was a downpour that resulted in flooding. You might have lived through a terrible blizzard that stopped all travel and took down the power lines; maybe you’ve even had a near brush with a tornado or a hurricane.

Think back on how you felt during that storm. Did you doze peacefully in bed, or did you clutch the covers, wondering if the windows were going to shatter? Did you curl up comfortably with a book, or did you hurry downstairs to make sure that the basement wasn’t filling with water? Did you put on some favorite music to listen to, or did you call others to be reassured that they were doing okay?

One of the most frightening things about a storm is that it makes us feel completely powerless. When flood water washes out a bridge, when snow is falling at an inch an hour in 45 mph winds, when you see a funnel cloud approaching, you realize that there is nothing that you can do. You can’t stop the storm. You can’t flee from the storm. You can’t protect yourself or your property from being damaged by the storm. All you can do is sit and wait for it to end.

A severe storm can be a religious experience. People who rarely go to church and hardly ever give God a thought suddenly become God-fearing Christians when they hear the shingles coming off the roof. And even regular church-goers find themselves reassessing the quality of their Christian life when the tornado sirens start blowing. Severe weather reminds us that it is not we who are in charge, it is God.

The disciples experienced such a storm. After a long day of preaching, Jesus needed some privacy and rest—His human body was exhausted. So Jesus had the disciples take Him in a boat across the Sea of Galilee during the night, while He slept in the stern of the boat. This should not have been a risky trip—usually the winds died down at night over the Sea of Galilee, which is why most fisherman did their work between dusk and dawn. Since the sea was usually calm at night, many of those who were interested in Jesus’ teachings got into other boats and followed Jesus and the disciples.

But when storms blow up on the Sea of Galilee at night, they are vicious storms. Jesus was in a boat with many disciples who were experienced fishermen, yet even these hardened sailors panicked as waves started filling the boat with water.

For the disciples, this storm was a religious experience. They had done everything they knew how to do, but their situation was only worsening. In desperation, they turned to Jesus—a man who was raised a carpenter, not a sailor. But they knew that Jesus had a special connection with God—perhaps He could be of some help. After all, they had tried everything else—what was left except to turn to God in some way? So they woke Jesus up with the accusatory words, "Teacher, don't you care if we drown?"

It seems amazing that Jesus could have continued sleeping peacefully through all this, yet he did. But at his disciples’ urging, Jesus woke up, got up, rebuked the wind and said to the waves, "Quiet! Be still!" Then the wind died down and it was completely calm.

Try to imagine it: in the middle of a ferocious storm, the wind howling, everything completely soaked. Then this one man stands up and says "Quiet! Be still!" Just like that, the storm subsides. The wind is gone, the waters are smooth as glass. Where there had been deafening noise, now there is an amazing quiet. All this at the simple command of a trusted friend and teacher, who now turns to His disciples and says, "Why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith?"

Jesus was disappointed. The disciples had been with him for quite a while now. They had heard His teachings and had left their careers to dedicate themselves completely to being His students. They had entrusted themselves to His care. They had seen Him turn water into wine at Cana, cure lepers and paralytics, and drive out demons from those who were possessed. Yet after all this, when the storm came they were afraid. They didn’t trust in God’s protection or they would not have been afraid. They did not trust in Jesus’ love for them or they would not have accused Him of failing to care about their situation. They had not fully embraced Jesus’ teachings about God’s mercy and the promise of heaven or they would not have feared dying. After all this time with Jesus, the disciples’ faith had only taken the smallest baby steps towards maturity.

In the end, the disciples’ problem is summed up with their own words: They were terrified and asked each other, "Who is this? Even the wind and the waves obey him!" The disciples had not yet figured out that Jesus is God. They did not realize that Jesus was the Son of God manifest in human flesh, the same Son of God who made the earth and sustains it as Paul tells us in Colossians chapter 1: "He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For by him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together." As God’s creating Hand, our Lord Jesus has absolute authority over all created things, even over the forces of nature; it is no hard thing for Him to put an end to storms, no hard thing to cure diseases. No, the most difficult thing Jesus ever faced was His Father’s anger over our sins. The only time that Jesus was ever intimidated by a task was when He faced the prospect of suffering the hell that each of us has earned as punishment for our evil thoughts, words and deeds. That awful night in Gethsemane, Jesus sweated blood as He prepared for the ordeal to come on the cross of our sins. On that cross, out of love for us, Jesus endured all the punishment of God for every human act of disrespect, anger, lust, and greed. Jesus suffered insults, torture and death itself so that we can be spared from God’s righteous anger through three little words: "Jesus, forgive me."

The disciples asked Jesus, "Teacher, don't you care if we drown?" Oh yes, Jesus cares—the cross shows us just how much He cares!

The disciples’ experience in the storm serves as an object lesson for us. When the storm came, they did not immediately go to Jesus for advice or help—it was only when the storm reduced them to panic that they turned to their Master. We tend to behave the same way. When problems enter our lives, whether they be hurricanes or blizzards or economic problems or family discord, we don’t usually turn to God for advice or help until we have exhausted all other avenues open to us. We often think of God as a last resort, forgetting that God said, "call upon me in the day of trouble; I will deliver you, and you will honor me" (Psalm 50:15).

During the worst of the storm, the disciples accused Jesus of not caring about them. We tend to do the same thing. When things are going well, we don’t give Jesus too much thought—we are preoccupied with other things. But when troubles complicate our lives, we get impatient—why doesn’t God fix this for me right now? Is God sleeping? Doesn’t He care that I’m going through something terrible? I find it interesting that we expect God to be looking out for us 24/7, while most of us find it hard to give Him an hour or two of our time each week.

Of course, God is on duty 24/7. Jesus said, "My Father is always at his work to this very day, and I, too, am working" (John 5:17). Without God’s constant attention and care, sin would completely destroy everything good and comforting in the world. Jesus slept peacefully in the boat that night because He had complete confidence that His Father had everything in hand. The fact that Jesus slept peacefully should have reassured the disciples! Jesus had several boats of people who had put their lives under His leadership—if He could sleep during the storm, it should have been evident that this man of God was confident that everyone on the lake would be cared for. If Jesus, the Son of God, was unafraid, certainly His followers should have nothing to fear.

God is in charge, and He has power over storms. Sometimes He uses storms to get our attention, to give us a religious experience. When He got fed up with Job’s whining, God spoke to him from out of a storm to make sure that He had Job’s undivided attention. Jonah would not listen to God until a huge fish swallowed him in the midst of a storm. Many times when we begin taking Him for granted, God allows storms of one kind or another to enter our lives so that we will start paying better attention to Him through regular prayer and worship.

God has power over every storm, but sometimes He is not quick to send that storm away. The single most important gift that Jesus gives us is the gift of faith in Him. Without faith in Jesus as our Savior, heaven is closed to us—Jesus said, "No one comes to the Father except through me" (John 14:6). Jesus loves us—but any miracle He performs in our lives is pointless if we end our lives in unbelief and hell. So Jesus only performs miracles when they serve to give us greater faith in Him. That is what Jesus did that night on the Sea of Galilee. Jesus did not end the storm to save the lives of His disciples—He ended the storm to increase their faith in His love and His power to save. Jesus only acts miraculously in our lives when it is a way to strengthen our faith in Him as our Lord and Savior.

As Christians, the only thing that we should fear is a soul going to hell. Paul wrote, to live is Christ and to die is gain (Philippians 1:21). While we live, we have the opportunity to speak of Jesus’ sacrifice of love on the cross with those who do not believe; we do this because we fear that they will end life in unbelief and hell, and our love for them as fellow creations of God moves us to spare them from that wretched end. But when our time to die comes, we do not fear death as the disciples in the boat did because we have Jesus’ promise, "I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies" (John 11:25). For we who trust in Jesus, to die is to gain permanent freedom from self-destructive behaviors, poisonous relationships, and deteriorating health. To die is to gain unending peace and joy with our Lord in a place where no storm ever tempts us to fear again.

Blog Top Sites
Blog Directory & Search engine
Blog Directory