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Emmanuel Church Northwood 9:00 Service
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Reliées par le texte biblique ou par des thèmes communs.
Before we begin, let me offer a short prayer that John Stott used to pray before preaching:
Heavenly Father, we bow in your presence. May your word be our rule, your spirit our teacher, and your greater glory our supreme concern, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
This account from Mark's Gospel, chapter four, appears almost identically in Matthew and Luke. The three Gospel accounts differ little in the sequence and timing of Jesus' ministry. This miracle occurred some way into His ministry—after His baptism, the calling of the disciples, the appointing of the apostles, and numerous miracles and teachings to crowds.
By this time, the disciples had spent considerable time with Jesus. They must surely have been asking themselves: Who is this man who performs such miracles and teaches with such authority? Yet despite witnessing His power, they still needed to learn what it meant to truly trust Him.
At the end of a day of teaching the crowd, Jesus said He wanted to cross to the other side of the lake—a journey of about ten miles, expected to take just a couple of hours. The water looked calm and peaceful. They got in the boat with no special preparations, no warnings, no special provisions. They had no idea what was about to come.
The boat itself was probably a smallish fishing boat with sails, perhaps twenty feet long with very low sides. This detail is significant—the sides were only about four feet high above the water level. Mark mentions that there were other boats, which suggests he wanted his readers to know that other witnesses would see what was about to happen.
All went well at the beginning. The sailing was smooth and easy—so smooth that Jesus fell asleep in the back of the boat after His long and draining day of teaching.
Suddenly, a furious squall blew in. At the Sea of Galilee, this happens when cold air rushes down from the surrounding steep hills and meets the warm air rising from the water, creating freak conditions. The sea, which moments before had been glassy calm, became a cauldron of waves so rough that they swept over the boat.
The contrast must have been terrifying and overwhelming. Some of the disciples were fishermen well used to the Sea of Galilee, yet the account tells us it was so terrifying that they felt the need to wake Jesus and cry out to Him. They shouted: "Teacher, don't you care if we drown?" The other gospels report they cried: "Save us, we are going to drown!" Picture ten-foot waves against a four-foot side of the boat—a desperate situation.
Jesus got up, rebuked the wind, and told the waves to be quiet and still. Whether He shouted the command or spoke it with quiet authority, we don't know. But the astonishing result was that the wind died down, the huge waves stopped, and all was completely calm.
Here was a person—a man—telling nature what to do.
In the passage, Jesus asks the disciples two questions:
And then the disciples themselves ask: "Who is this? Even the wind and the waves obey Him!"
These questions were not directly answered in the Gospel accounts at the time. Let's examine how they speak to us.
This might seem like an odd question. Of course they were afraid! They faced a terrifying storm with high waves rolling towards their tiny boat, liable to capsize at any moment. They thought they could all drown.
But by asking this question, Jesus was seeking to teach them where their hope should be. He was asking whether they simply trusted their own strength, wisdom, and abilities to get them through life. The storm had suddenly taken away everything they knew, trusted, and relied upon, and they were scared they would die.
But Jesus wanted them to trust Him and have faith.
What faith was Jesus wanting them to have? They had been with Him for a while and seen many miracles, including bringing someone back to life. Surely they knew He was in control by then?
Jesus wanted them to have faith, trust, and confidence that when with Him, He was in control. Yes, there could be a storm. Yes, bad things would happen. But He was in control and held their future and eternal destiny in His safe hands.
He was teaching them that they could trust Him in all situations, no matter how dire they may seem at the time.
The disciples had seen Jesus do many miracles—healing numerous people, bringing someone back to life, changing water into wine. They recognized the authority in the way He taught, spoke, and acted. But they were completely astounded by this demonstration of control over nature.
One moment, a terrifying storm. The next, complete calm.
Surely the only person who can control nature is God—the God who separated the Red Sea, the God who created the wind and the waves at the beginning. Surely the wind and waves would only show obedience to God. Could the disciples believe this was really possible?
Throughout the Gospels, Jesus often asks: "Who do people say that I am? Who do you say that I am?" Sometimes the disciples really do seem to know and answer correctly: "You are the Son of God." But then they seem to forget it very quickly, perfectly able to forget all they've just seen and the answer they've given.
Surely we're all subjected to storms from time to time. Sometimes they come suddenly, out of the blue. Sometimes they're gentle. Sometimes they're devastating. Sometimes they don't last long. Sometimes they last the rest of our life.
The range is as infinite as the number of people in the world. The storm can be:
The list is as long as the number of people and their individual situations.
Let me share briefly of a sudden storm I experienced last November. I woke with nothing worse than a tickly throat, but as the day went on, my throat got increasingly sore and it became more and more difficult to swallow. I didn't eat all day, just sips of water or hot drinks. It got worse and worse all day and all night.
Suddenly, at half past four in the morning—having not slept at all—the storm really hit. I suddenly couldn't breathe. No air was coming in. I was absolutely terrified. I completely panicked. I cried out: "Help! Help!" I couldn't speak. I couldn't breathe. I honestly don't know who I thought I was calling to—it was an entirely reflex response. I couldn't think at all.
Mercifully, the ambulance men arrived quickly—a miracle. They rushed me to Watford A&E where I went straight in—another miracle, because at that time ambulances had five-hour waits and getting into A&E was nearly impossible. But I went straight through.
The doctors there quickly diagnosed what was wrong—another miracle. I had a very rare bacterial infection called epiglottitis. It's when the little flap at the back of your throat swells up hugely and you can't breathe. It's very rare, largely unheard of by most doctors, but a significant proportion of people who get this infection die—I think about one in five—unless very quick action is taken.
I was given oxygen and quickly pumped with different medications, and thankfully I survived.
Why do I tell this story? Because when the storm rages, you can feel helpless, alone, terrified, panicked—and you cry out: "God, help me!" Have you been there? Can you relate to my story? Maybe you're there now.
In my situation, I totally believe He heard my cry in panic. As His calmer prayers show, He wanted, by His will, to save me that morning. Why? I don't know. Why are others not saved in such situations? In all humility, I don't know.
I didn't have time to think. I didn't have time to construct a prayer or ask for prayer, unlike the disciples. The storm just hit me.
If you're like the disciples or like me on that occasion, you can panic. But I don't believe panic is what God wants us to do. That's why Jesus asked the disciples: "Why are you so afraid? Why do you not trust?" He was wanting to teach them—and us—more about faith and trust.
The challenge surely comes to each of us: in the storm—be it sudden or over a long period—will we panic as the disciples did, or will we be calm and trust Him, moving towards His peace?
The disciples had seen lots of evidence of Jesus' authority. Yet they still panicked. They woke Him shouting: "Wake up! Don't you care? We're going to drown!" I did the same: "Wake up! Don't you care? I'm going to die!" as I felt I couldn't breathe.
But the illustration of hope from the passage is that Jesus is with us in whatever storm we're going through. He doesn't suggest we won't have storms. We will. For many of us, at different times, the storms can be terrible. But the good news is that:
I want to think about how we turn to Him in such situations and how we can consciously respond.
We may ask: Where is He? If there's no obvious answer to our prayers, we may wonder if He's asleep. But He does hear, and He does care. We may be looking for Him to act, but He's looking for our faith and trust. He's in the boat with us in our storm.
We're offered peace with God. Corrie ten Boom wrote of her time in the concentration camp: "The blacker the night around us grew, the brighter and truer and more beautiful burned the word of God." She also said:
If you look at the world, you'll be distressed. If you look at the world, you'll be depressed. But if you look at God, you'll be at rest.
There are many promises in the Bible:
There are many more.
When the storm comes, we can:
One of the features of the storm is feeling alone, but the wonderful truth is that Jesus is there next to you. You are not alone. He may not fix the outside storm, but He can fix the inside storm. He can give you peace.
The old song asks: "Will Your anchor hold?" The anchor of faith ties us to His love. Jesus is firm and unchanging. Though a storm threatens to drown us, do we hang on, trusting Him?
Martin Luther King Jr. of the American Civil Rights Movement, back in the 1950s, told a story about when he felt overwhelmed by fear. He recognized that he had reached his saturation point. Calmly, he made himself a coffee, then sat down at the table with his head in his hands. He said to God: "I'm at the end of my powers. I've got nothing left. I've come to the point where I just can't face the future alone."
At that moment, he says he experienced the power of the divine as he had never known before. He describes the quiet assurance of an inner voice which said: "Stand up for righteousness. Stand up for truth. God will be on your side forever." God had given him calm to face what lay ahead. And we know the storms that he was walking towards.
Joseph Scriven, the author of the beautiful hymn "What a Friend We Have in Jesus," had his own storms. The evening before his wedding, his fiancée died. Later he got engaged again and found happiness again, but his fiancée died shortly before he got married. Yet he went on to write this beautiful hymn, encouraging us all to take our burdens to God.
My prayer as I finish is that each of us may keep our eyes on Him in the middle of whatever storm we are facing. That our faith may increase in Him in eternal things, and our hope should be in Him alone.
There's a promise in the Bible. Jesus says: "I will pray to the Father, and He will give you another Comforter, that He may abide in you forever—the Holy Spirit."
