June 22/23, 2024 on Mark 4:35-44
“How Do I Know God Cares and is in Charge in my Crisis?”
Rev. Michael J. Zehnder, Ascension Lutheran Church, Littleton, CO
Grace, mercy and peace…
I don’t know about you but when I hear the words “Sea of Galilee” I tend to picture this charming, peaceful lake, maybe with a few ducks taking off and landing, birds chirping happily in the background, perhaps a seagull going “caw, caw, caw,” maybe a few tall weeds near the shore and a few dragonflies buzzing about. After all, the Sea of Galilee is where Jesus walked the water, where he taught the sermon on the mount, gave his Beatitudes, taught the Lord’s Prayer, so I picture it as a calm, idyllic body of water. This is also where his disciples frequently went fishing. Aren’t fishing lakes always peaceful?
But in today’s Gospel lesson from Mark 4, the Sea of Galilee is anything but calm; it was totally ferocious. You’ve heard the saying “tempest in a teacup”? Picture the top rim of the cup as the mountains and the tea down inside as the Sea of Galilee. Not much has changed about the Sea of Galilee in 2,000 years. Still today, it holds a profound and imminent danger of sudden storms that can arise without warning. The Sea is actually 600 feet below sea level surrounded by mountains. Cool air from the Mediterranean Sea on the west is drawn across the Sea through the narrow mountain passes to the east. The air, which rushes through the passes, clashes with the hot, humid air over the Sea of Galilee and the result can be a swift, unexpected and very violent storm, which is why you usually read in the Bible that the disciples were fishing at night because the worst storms were usually during the heat of the day.
In the chapters prior to today’s Gospel from Mark, you see Jesus teaching the multitudes and speaking in parables about the Kingdom and healing people. He must have been utterly exhausted from all these activities – believe it or not, ministry, teaching and caring for people is tiring work – so Jesus told the disciples he wanted to leave the crowds behind and cross the Sea of Galilee by boat. As they did, the storm mentioned in Mark 4 starts up, the wind begins to blow and the waves begin to churn up and sweep over the sides of the boat, nearly filling it, and Jesus remains sound asleep on a cushion in the stern, which is the back of the boat for all you land lubbers.
Suddenly the disciples find themselves in danger of being capsized and maybe even drowned. Our text says, “A furious squall came up, and the waves broke OVER the boat so that it was nearly swamped.” What’s Jesus doing while the winds and waves are whipping up? He’s just sleeping away in the midst of all this commotion which shows how tired he must have been from his work. Remember? Fully human!
I want to pause for just a second to talk about the humanity of Jesus. We know and confess in the Nicene Creed that He is God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God. We sometimes forget that He was also fully human. The Word became FLESH – flesh like we have. Even though he was also fully God – and I like the phrase I learned at the seminary explaining his twin natures of humanity and divinity – “Jesus did not always or fully use his divine prerogatives as God.” Money didn’t grow on trees for Him. He worked for a living, doing carpentry like his father, Joseph had. When he was hungry, he didn’t turn stones into loaves of bread, which is one of the temptations that the devil threw at him after 40 days of fasting and praying in the wilderness. When it was time to choose his 12 disciples’ he stayed up all night praying for direction – fully human – asking God the Father to reveal his will and the hearts of those he was considering, in other words, “not always or fully using his divine prerogatives as God.” After an all-night prayer vigil, he chose his disciples in the morning.
His humanity means he would get tired and need to sleep, he had to eat, I’m sure he knew about cramped muscles and sore feet and callouses after a day of walking, Scripture even records that he cried when things were sad such as when his good friend Lazarus died even though he knew that minutes later he was going to raise him from the dead because he was also truly God.
Let’s not forget that he knows what it is like to be a human and subject to all the things WE face like hunger, thirst, being tired, being sad. Fully human. Hebrews 4:14, speaking specifically about Jesus says, “Our high priest [meaning Jesus] is able to understand our weaknesses. He was tempted in every way that we are, but he did not sin.” I’m sure those kind of details were inspirational to the person who wrote the hymn, “What a Friend we have in Jesus” which has this line, “Jesus knows our every weakness” – nothing can surprise or shock Him when we do as the songwriter encouraged, “Take it to the Lord in prayer.”
Anyway, so Jesus was sleeping which reminds me about the grandpa who always fell asleep the minute the pastor started preaching. Grandpa and his little grandson sat together in a pew near the front of the church because the kid’s mom sang in the choir which was in the back balcony, just like here at Ascension. Unfortunately, grandpa didn’t just fall asleep during the sermon, he had a habit of suddenly snorting or snooting at just the worst times and it was so loud the mom could hear it clear up in the balcony. She was very embarrassed by her dad so she promised her son 50 cents a week if he would occasionally give grandpa a nudge during the sermon and keep him awake. All went well for a number of weeks without any snorting from grandpa, until one Sunday – Easter morning of all times – just when the pastor had made one of his most important points and paused for effect, out came a great big snort from Grandpa. After the service, the embarrassed mom said to her son, what’s the deal? I thought we agreed that I’d give you 50 cents a week to keep grandpa awake. The little boy said, “Yea, mom, I know, but Grandfather offered me a dollar to let him sleep.” ????
OK, we don’t know if Jesus snored when he slept but in our text he sure was tired. Out like a light even though the winds were howling, and water was coming up into the boat and it seemed to the disciples they could capsize. Mark calls it a “furious squall.” The disciples were more than just a little concerned; they were scared. There seems to be a hint in the text that they might have even been a little angry that Jesus was just calmly sleeping. There were not just afraid of the storm but also a little peeved because when they woke Jesus up in a panic, they didn’t just say something like “Jesus, we’re in trouble and we need your help.” No, they accused Him of not caring. Mark describes the disciples as both afraid AND angry. Specifically, they said, “Teacher, don’t you care if we drown?” Harrumph!
Ah, there it is. The corruption of the human heart. When trouble comes – and in this world, trouble always comes – sooner or later. And just like the sudden furious squall on the Sea of Galilee, sometimes trouble comes unexpectedly and with savage force. The spouse says unexpectedly, “I want a divorce.” The doctor says, “You have cancer” or a routine medical procedure blows up into a life threatening situation. The boss says, “You’re fired.” The phone call comes, “There’s been a terrible accident.” You see flames in a neighborhood and realize they are coming from your mother’s house! Even when we are serving the Lord, there are times when we incur the wrath of harm in an evil world. I’ve heard our missionary to Haiti, Pastor Mike Paulison say, that his very life has been threatened at least six times and all he’s trying to do is bring the Gospel to children and people who desperately need it! When I took a preaching and teaching mission trip to Nigeria in 1995, my life was threatened twice and once the car in which I was a passenger was stopped by men with machine guns – we didn’t know whether we would be robbed or killed or both! About 2 years ago Pastor Larson was driving home on the freeway and a car jumped the median, plowing into his car head-on in a collision that broke his ribs, his nose, his sternum, punctured his small intestine and almost took his life. Doing the Lord’s work buys no one a free pass from sudden calamity. Not even for Jesus’ 12 disciples and in our humanity we might also cry out “Lord, don’t you care?”
As the waves swept over the sides of the boats, the disciples panicked, fearing for their lives. They faced the full impact of nature’s fury. They had seen Jesus perform miracles of healing, surely there was something He could do and they turned to Him and found Him asleep in the back of the boat with His head on a cushion! Wow!
How many times have we found ourselves in the midst of a crisis and wondered whether or not God really cares about us? How like the creature to rebuke the Creator! Sure, we have wonderful, comforting words in Scripture like, “The Lord is my Shepherd; I shall not want.” But when we are really scared for our well-being or someone we love, our first reaction might be to think God is sleeping on the job. Who’s in charge around here, anyway? I’ll be honest, I’ve actually prayed, “Where are you Lord?” I’ve said to Him, “Don’t you care what’s happening to me? Are you going to help me or what?”
Mark explains that the disciples likewise interpreted Jesus’ sleep as a sign of apathy, “Teacher, don’t you CARE if we drown!?”
Of course he cares. Our Lord always cares. Let me tell you how much He cares. “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us.” God who is worshiped and glorified by all the angels in heaven stooped down to earth and became man. He took on our flesh in all its weakness and moved into our neighborhood. He cared all the way to a cross and just thinking about suffering God’s wrath for sin in our place he sweat great drops of blood in the Garden of Gethsemane. On the cross, he experienced separation from God – hell – crying out, “My God, my God why have you forsaken me?” You and I have never spent one second of our lives when God did not care for us but Jesus had to endure God’s abandonment in our place.
1 Peter 5:7 says, “Cast your cares upon Him because He cares for you.” Matt 6:31 reminds us not to worry because the Father knows your every need. Psalm 34:18 says, “He close to the brokenhearted and those who are crushed in spirit.”
So what did Jesus end up doing when the disciples’ panicked, woke him up and said, “Don’t you care?” Scripture says, “He got up, rebuked the wind and said to the waves, ‘Quiet! Be still!’” As soon as the command came out of Christ the sea was like glass. Not the slightest zephyr to be felt in the air. Everything was now calm except the disciples. They remained agitated, which I find fascinating.
After being saved from drowning you might expect them to say, “Oh, thank you, thank you, Jesus for saving our lives!” You might expect Mark to tell us, “Then the disciples finally calmed down.” But no! It seems they were now more afraid of Jesus than they were of the storm. Verse 41 states, “They were terrified and asked each other, ‘Who is this? Even the wind and the waves obey him!” In other words, they went from fearing a storm, to being terrified by the person in the boat with them. They realized they were in the presence of almighty God, not just some do-gooder, miracle-worker teacher. Who but God can say to a hurricane Katrina, “That’s enough now; stop and be still?!”
By calming the stormy sea, Jesus proved Himself to be God and the disciples knew themselves to be unholy in the presence of a holy God, which explains their fright. Just like the time there was a miraculous catch of fish instead of thanking Jesus, Peter said, “Get away from me, Lord for I am an unclean man.” All of Jesus’ miracles were visible, physical proofs of His power and glory, but this one especially – power over winds and waves – because who but God can control the forces of nature? So is that the bottom line of this Gospel – that we have an all-powerful God? No, that’s too shallow an interpretation.
I’ll let John, the beloved disciple, have the last word as he explained in John 20:30-31, “Jesus did many other miraculous signs in the presence of His disciples, which are not recorded in this book. But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in His Name.”
Believe on Him for the forgiveness of sins and keep believing on Him even when disaster suddenly strikes. Believe that He always, always cares for you and in the promise that by believing in Him you HAVE – not “might have” – but HAVE eternal life in His Name. Like the honest father of the demon possessed boy in Mark 9 (9:24) just cry out in faith whenever you are afraid of what you are facing or wondering if God really cares or is asleep in your boat. He spoke with perfect honesty and humility. You do the same: “Lord, I DO believe; help me overcome my unbelief!” Amen.
