Christ Rules Over the Storm

No matter how bad it gets, God is with us.

Why are you afraid? God is with us!!

When I was a kid, I was terrified of spiders. Even Daddy Long Legs, which I now understand are not, technically, spiders but have a very spidery look about them, scared me to death. Once, almost literally, when one leapt out of a half bushel of peaches we had just bought by a road side stand, I leapt out of the car into the road. Fear can do that.

The kids in my neighborhood didn't help, either. They enjoyed picking Daddy Long Legs up by a long leg and chasing me around the yard!

Since then, my fears have grown up a little. Now I fear things that really can hurt me like the national debt and global warming. Just the other day, the headlines named another fear, terrorists, this time, U.S. citizens, independent, guided by some 5,000 do-it-yourself terrorist self-help websites.

On top of these overwhelming world fears, each of us carries personal fears - a deadline, a pink slip, a visa bill, a doctor's appointment. We all have spiders – some fear that gets us in the gut.

These are fearful times, but then – they always have been.

You would think, if ever there were a time and people who would be fearless it would be the disciples, walking and living in the very presence of Jesus Christ, the Prince of Peace, Light of the World, 2000 years ago. But as Mark tells it, they could panic right along with the best of us. That night they piled into a boat after a long day of teaching and preaching, big crowds, lots of questions, the most dangerous time to be on the water: when a windstorm hits! Waves beat into the boat; they've got water up to their ankles. Not only a literal storm, but darkness and the sea and chaos also represent forces of evil. This is serious. At least four of the disciples are professional fishermen and even they are scared. They have phobos. This is phobeo. Our word phobia comes from this root – anxiety, panic, dread. Fear of what we do know and fear of what we do not know.

The disciples do what we do when we find ourselves overwhelmed – They yell, "God, for heaven's sake, wake up!" They do what we do when bad things happen to good people. They ask, "Are you really there God?"

They discover that God is really there. Right in the boat, in the scariest of places, God is there. After they've tried everything they turn to Jesus and he is there and he is able. Jesus can sleep through the wind and yawn at the waves because God is there and he knows that this boat will float. You don't have to go it alone.

Last week, Public TV had a program on children with terminal cancer. Timothy, a teenager, was dying, treatments were no longer helping. One day he shared his greatest fear with one of the doctors. It wasn't pain; it wasn't even death. It was being alone. It made all the difference when the disciples remembered that Jesus was in the boat with them.

But when the storm is over, their knees are knocking. That is when Jesus wants to know, "Why are you afraid?" Not, "Why were you afraid?" but, floating on that calm, smooth sea, "Why are you afraid?" Scripture says, after the storm stops, "A great fear stole over them."

I had a boat ride once that helps me understand. I have never been particularly comfortable in boats on deep water. One time, when I was working Taiwan, I took a side trip off the southern coast. We had to take a ferry. It looked like one of those ferries that you read about that capsizes on a clear day and everybody drowns.

It was old, it was ugly and it was already full when our bus pulled up. People sat on other people's laps. They sat on the steps. And, even on the roof. We threw our luggage on a pile and found a spot against a railing. As we waited, another bus pulled up and all those people got out and got on the overloaded ferry, somehow. Then another bus came and then another came. I was terrified just sitting at the dock!

But then the ferry headed out to sea. The sea was not completely calm. It wasn’t exactly a windstorm and the waves didn’t exactly beat into the boat. But it wasn’t calm either! I kept my eyes on one of the few life preservers overhead. I wondered about sharks; how far I could swim; and that I was too young to die. Phobeo. I was terrified.

There was only one thing that could have scared me more. And that would have been if someone on that boat had stood up and held up his arms and rebuked the wind and said to the sea, "Peace, be still!" and the sea suddenly went still. The storm and the ferry were terrifying. That I could understand. But, a human being who could stop a storm, that would be incomprehensible! What else could such a person do?

The fact is, whenever Jesus heals, walks on water, teaches, feeds, feasts, rebukes, when he is born, is resurrected...it scares the wits out of people. They run, many of them. They freeze. They hang on to the old ways. They attack, some of them. God's power revealed is an awesome thing. But there's more to fear than phobia — panic and dread and hanging on so tight you drown. There is also life-giving fear. The Hebrew word for this kind of fear means reverence, awe. --- Fear of God is the beginning of wisdom. It comes from faith and it leads to faith.

You could call it — Easter fear.

There's a reason why the predominant response to Easter is not joy, but fear. Mark's gospel ends that way, with the women going out to the tomb and meeting an angel who says, "He is risen! Go and tell," but they don't because they are afraid.

Afraid of what? Afraid that Easter just might be true. That waves and wind and death itself will bow down before this one who sits in the boat with us and who will not go away.

It could scare you to death. It could scare you to life.

If you don’t think God is active today you have missed the boat. However having said that the bible and experience tells us that traveling in the boat with Jesus is not always smooth sailing! No sooner than you jump in the boat with Jesus, storms will hit. Consider the storms of life that have hit you.

Don’t you agree it hasn’t been smooth sailing?

Some of you have been hit with antagonism when family members, or friends, or coworkers ridicule you for your faith. Some of you have been hit with a storm called Cancer. Some of you have been hit with a stormy relationship and you’ve been served divorce papers, even after you did everything you knew how to do to avoid divorce. Some of you have been through the storms of grief when you lost a loved one. Let me ask those of you who have been hit the hardest, does God hear, does He care, does He act for your good? Some of you nod your head yes, and some of you remember the feelings of doubt and fear and frustration through it all. Maybe some of you are going through that frustration now.

Maybe right now you feel like God doesn’t seem to care? Maybe right now it seems like God is asleep in the helm? Maybe right now you are terrified about the prospects for the immediate future? Maybe right now you are frustrated because you have cried out in pain and despair, and received nothing in reply? You wonder. Is there anyone up there who cares about us down here?

I am convinced that although things seem out of control during a storm, and that we are tempted like the disciples to say “Don’t you care?” that when we turn to Jesus, and that if He is in our boat He does hear, He does care, and he does act for our good. But events in life are not always as I would expect or hope. I therefore I let Christ be the one who speaks peace to my storms.

Much that is wrong on earth can be corrected. There are mothers who dry tears, repairmen who fix machines, surgeons who remove diseased tissues, counselors who solve family problems. As to correcting the weather, people talk about it, but it takes GOD to change the weather. Jesus commanded the elements of the weather, with the result that even the wind obeys him, and so does even the sea.

"Have you STILL no faith?"

IT USUALLY takes a storm to discover where WE place our faith. Where do WE place our faith? Do WE put it in the boat? In our circumstances? In the weather? In the security of our homes to keep the weather out? Is it in the security of our bank accounts to keep the financial storms out? Is it in the security of our insurance policies to keep disasters out?

But, what happens when one little storm cracks that superficial picture of security? It can happen just as suddenly as a Galilean storm. All it takes is one little storm to find out where our faith is. I hope the Son of God doesn't have to say to us, "Oh, ye of little faith". On the other hand, I hope there is a little faith for us; at least enough to take us away from the fear that can so easily destroy that faith. The storm is but a little matter. What is a storm when you have Jesus in the boat with you?

So, who is this Jesus?

What kind of man is this Jesus?

The narrative ends with the attention focused NOT on the storm NOR upon the miracle, but upon Jesus Christ himself. The Question "who is this" is not answered. Everyone who reads it may give his own answer, may profess his own faith, and add his own doxology.

“Who is this man?” This is THE important question. How do we answer this question? The ultimate answer to this question will make all the difference for us in the storms happening right now in our lives, in the storms in the future, in the great storm to come, and on Judgment day? If our answer is "This man is the Son of God" then we need to make a decision to follow Him. Have you ever made that decision? Have you ever made it public? I invite you to make that decision today........ and remember: If you are with Jesus: 1) “The Boat will not sink, 2) and The Storm will not last forever."

A M E N

This sermon was delivered by Dave Buttgen at the First Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), Berryville, Arkansas on June 24th, 2012