other side of the lake.” 36 So they took Jesus in the boat and started out, leaving the crowds behind (although other boats followed). 37 But soon a fierce storm came up. High waves were breaking into the boat, and it began to fill with water.
38 Jesus was sleeping at the back of the boat with his head on a cushion. The disciples woke him up, shouting, “Teacher, don’t you care that we’re going to drown?”
39 When Jesus woke up, he rebuked the wind and said to the waves, “Silence! Be still!” Suddenly the wind stopped, and there was a great calm. 40 Then he asked them, “Why are you afraid? Do you still have no faith?” (Mark 4:35-39, New Living Translation)
If you are a disciple of Jesus, I'm sure you're familiar with this story. After a long day's work of teaching and story-telling, Jesus announces the need to travel to “the other side of the lake”. While the Sea of Galilee is a whole lot smaller than, say, Lake Superior or Lake Michigan, it's no Walden Pond either. It's similar in size to Lake Mille Lacs in northern Minnesota which is pretty big water as lakes go. It's gonna take a while to get there. And while it may have been clear sailing when they left Capernaum in the waning afternoon light, somewhere between here and there a squall stirred up that threatened to swamp their boat. Things become so harrowing that even the guys who made a living out on that water are terrified by the size of the waves and the force of the wind.
Mille Lacs at dusk. Maybe Galilee looked the same that day
As
the boat is taking on water and guys are bailing with anythingthey
can lay their hands on, someone has a thought: where
is Jesus? And why isn't he doing anything to fix this?
An earnest search is made and in short order they find him fast
asleep in the small cargo hold of the boat. As only frightened people
can do, they yank him awake and proceed to yell at him: “We're
drowning here! You better do something! Don't you care about us at
all?”Somebody wake that guy up!
I imagine that moment like a time or two when I have been suddenly roused from foggy bottom with my eyes barely open, one side of my face squished and drool sliding down my chin. After a quick glance around, Jesus does some yelling of his own at the wind and the waves: “Settle down! Be quiet!” and immediately, as if someone had flipped a switch, its a beautiful night for sailing. For the disciples, the quiet that follows is more frightening than the clamor they had just been surrounded by. Soaking wet he sternly stares them down and says (in so many words) “What's a matter with you? Why are you screaming as if you are going to drown? Just what do you really believe? Why would you be afraid if I am in the boat?”
"THAT'S ENOUGH!" might be one way to translate it
It's a sobering question for disciples of every age, our own included, to mull over. How often do we really comprehend what God is doing in our lives? I mean, we expect to be beset by some challenges now and again. After all, we are not living in the Garden of Eden or even next door to it. But then there come these moments for all of us when quite suddenly, “out of nowhere”, we're caught up in a squall that threatens to undo us. Life seems to clip-clop lazily down sleepy Seussian Mulberry Street and then suddenly and unexpectedly our horse is startled and races down Strangeway Avenue (an actual road in a southern Wisconsin town!)
 |
| Normally, this is my life. |
 |
| But every once in a while... |
Yesterday I was on the phone with one of the members of Refuge who called to let me know that by sundown he would be in jail. Now, he has a history and a past with the Department of Corrections and I was vaguely aware he had some fees to pay from a case from a number of years ago. But he never brought it up after the worship gathering on Sunday when we last spoke. Maybe he didn't realize how dire his circumstances were. Either way he and his wife no doubt can relate right now to the sense of helplessness that those disciples were facing that night out on the sea. “Don't you care that we're going to drown!?!?”
In the fall of 2020, in the middle of an otherwise normal Cross Country season, I was pulled into the Athletic Director's office to be informed that one of my athletes had accused me of harassing them on account of their ethnicity. Frankly, I was stunned. When confronted with the things they had reported me as having said I couldn't deny that I hadn't said them – I had! I just had no idea they had caused them and their parents so much pain. Within two weeks the school board had ruled that after 13 seasons of serving as our high school's Cross coach with nary a mark on my record I should be terminated. Emotionally speaking, it felt like I had been walking across a field on a beautiful day and had unexpectedly stepped on a landmine. My prayers and yelling to (and at God) made not one lick of difference. “Don't you care that I'm going to drown!?!?”
When Jesus sternly reproves his disciples – myself included – he asks if we “yet have no faith.” According to New Testament scholar Ekhard J. Schnabel:
While I've never witnessed the plethora of supernatural activity that the Twelve had by this time in the story, I have enough history of my own with God to know that as dire as my particular set of circumstances were it would not be the death of me. But that storm sure left me bewildered. How could my loving, good Father let the drama play out the way it did? To be truthful, a year and a half later I still don't know the answer to that one but I no longer need to know the answer. It's enough to know that he has been with me and will continue to be with me regardless of the circumstances that beset me.
Chuck Swindoll offers these words on this moment in the disciples' story:
"If you are currently experiencing the other side of life [i.e., Jesus had announced that they were going to 'the other side'], you may quite likely be entertaining the lie that God doesn't care. You might think, If He cared, He'd change things. The fact is, He cares enough not to change things. It will help to remember instead that He's in control and He's brought you this far. Yes, there are scars. Yes, there are painful memories. Yes, there's brokenness. I've learned in life that anyone who's effective in other people's lives is a broken person. In fact, broken people often resemble Jesus Christ." (Living Insights from Mark)
When I was Cross Country coach, every Monday I'd share my “Monday Minute” with the team, a brief, inspirational thought for the week ahead. My very last one that I gave to the crew was on how humility is good for the soul. I had no idea I was about to get another lesson in it but I have found that as painful as it has been to process the events that led to the end of my coaching tenure, it is well with my soul. And that is enough for me.
