ARE YOU FEELING SWAMPED?

 (35) “On that day, when evening came, Jesus said to them, “Let’s go over to the other side.” (36) After leaving the crowd behind, the disciples took him along in the boat, just as he was. Other small boats also followed him. (37) A great windstorm arose, and the waves were splashing into the boat, so that the boat was quickly filling up. (38) Jesus himself was in the stern, sleeping on a cushion. They woke him and said, ‘Teacher, don’t you care that we are about to drown?’
(39) Then he got up, rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, ‘Peace! Be still!’ The wind stopped, and there was a great calm. (40) He said to them, ‘Why are you so afraid? Do you still lack faith?’
(41) They were filled with awe and said to one another, ‘Who then is this? Even the wind and the sea obey him!’” (Mark 4:35-41)
 
I bet you remember most of the words to this song…
 
Just sit right back and you'll hear a tale,
A tale of a fateful trip
That started from this tropic port
Aboard this tiny ship.

The mate was a mighty sailing man,
The skipper brave and sure.
Five passengers set sail that day
For a three hour tour, a three hour tour.

The weather started getting rough,
The tiny ship was tossed,
If not for the courage of the fearless crew
The Minnow would be lost, the Minnow would be lost.

The ship set ground on the shore of this uncharted desert isle
With Gilligan
The Skipper too,
A millionaire and his wife,
A movie star
The Professor and Mary Ann,*
Here on Gilligan's Isle.
 
Did you find yourself singing it to yourself?  You may recognize that as the opening theme of Gilligan’s Island, a very popular sit-com that had a 3-season run in the mid 1960’s.  It was a comedy about a shipwreck.  It was funny because everyone knew it had never happened.  And no matter what happened, you knew that every one of the seven regulars on the show were going to survive.  You can still watch every episode on Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime, and probably dozens of other places.  Shipwrecks can be funny if it’s fiction and written as a comedy.
 
But the really scary ones are when it’s our boat and the storm is real.  You know what I’m talking about – those storms in life that seem overwhelming:  swamped with bills we did not expect, illness that’s threatening life – ours or some loved one’s, or maybe it’s a combination of things - we’ve hardly come up for air on one problem and another wave crashes over us.  How do we survive?  How do find a sense of peace even in the midst of those howling storms?  How can we be ready when the next storm comes?  Today, let’s get into a boat with Jesus and head out onto the Sea of Galilee, Things are going to get rough, but by the time we make shore we will have learned a very important truth about what it means to be a Christian:  It doesn’t matter what rocks the boat as long as Jesus is in it with you!
 
A lack of faith lets fear flood in.
 
(35) “On that day, when evening came, Jesus said to them, “Let’s go over to the other side.” (36) After leaving the crowd behind, the disciples took him along in the boat, just as he was. Other small boats also followed him. (37) A great windstorm arose, and the waves were splashing into the boat, so that the boat was quickly filling up. (38) Jesus himself was in the stern, sleeping on a cushion. They woke him and said, ‘Teacher, don’t you care that we are about to drown?’
 
If you want a quick little timeline so far in Mark’s gospel, it would go something like this:  Chapter 1 – Jesus was baptized by John and began his public ministry.  Chapters 1 and 2 – Jesus got to work:  preaching, casting out demons, healing the sick.  Chapters 2 and 3 he called the Twelve to follow him.  At that point they began their adult instruction class about the kingdom of God.  Chapter 4 – the first two-thirds of the chapter Jesus taught about faith.  In this chapter (4) he taught that faith grows where the Word is planted.  He taught that when Satan or the sinful nature of people take that Word away, faith doesn’t last long.  He taught that growing faith in the human heart is God’s work.  He taught that faith’s power lies not in the size of the faith but in the power and grace of the one we trust.
 
Jesus had done lots of teaching about faith, and here at the end of chapter 4 the Master Teacher took his disciples on an extraordinary “field trip” for some practical experience to understand better what he’d been saying.  “On that day, when evening came, Jesus said to them, “Let’s go over to the other side.”  Now, apart from putting the disciples in a situation where they could get a powerful understanding about faith and the absence of it, Jesus had an agenda here.  On the next day, on the other side of the Sea of Galilee, he would drive many demons out of a man who was so tormented and possessed by them that he took to living in a cemetery.  Jesus would cast all those demons out of him with a single command.  That man would go from possessed by demons to powerfully professing to anyone who would listen what Jesus had done for him.  Then Jesus would cross back over the Sea of Galilee in order to raise the daughter of a synagogue ruler, from the dead.
 
The Twelve were going to see lots of things in the days to come, and that would include opposition and unbelief by many of the people who would see and hear what the Twelve did.  By the time their ministry with Jesus came to an end three years later on a hilltop as he ascended into heaven, they would know that the good news about Jesus would be opposed and rejected, and it would be believed and confessed.  Their faith would be encouraged by lots of people whose hearts were changed by the gospel, and their faith would be attacked by those who did not believe it.  By that time, the disciples would have grown in their understanding of faith, the blessings that God imparts through it, and the disaster that comes when faith is lacking.  This incident was one of the very first times that they were going to get a powerful lesson about that.
 
So there they were, somewhere out on the Sea of Galilee.  And out there, in the dark, at the worst possible time, with a number of boats in the entourage, 37 “A great windstorm arose, and the waves were splashing into the boat, so that the boat was quickly filling up.”  This was serious.  Boats were getting swamped.  If they went down, lives would be lost.  In the dark there was no way to know how close they were to safety on the other side. But the darkness wasn’t just outside; it was inside, too.  The disciples were afraid.  They were afraid for themselves and they were afraid for the people in the other boats.  They were afraid of the storm, to be sure, but they also expressed another fear: “Teacher, don’t you care that we are about to drown?”  They were afraid that Jesus did not care that they were about to drown.  Let me say that again, and let it sink in:  they were afraid that Jesus did not care.  At that moment, out on the sea of Galilee, it suddenly didn’t seem to matter that Jesus had cast out demons and healed diseases.  It’s as if the wind tearing at their clothes drown out those powerful words and deeds of Jesus.  It’s as if the waves swamping into the boat washed away the memory of those powerful displays of Jesus’ power and love.  They did not ask Jesus to help.  They did not pray.  They accused, and make no mistake, that question was an accusation.  Just change two English words around and you have it:  “Teacher, you don’t care that we are about to drown.”  Later in this story Jesus, the Great Physician of Souls,  diagnosed the problem:  “Why are you so afraid? Do you still lack faith?”  Fear flooded in because they lacked trust in Jesus.  They had yet to really learn that Jesus was more than a Teacher; he was and always had been and would always be the Son of God himself.
 
“Jesus, don’t you care that I…” – complete that sentence with whatever is swamping your boat right now.  Complete that sentence with whatever has made you feel swamped in the past.  Let me help: “Jesus, don’t you care that my loved one is so sick?”  “Jesus, don’t you care that I’m drowning in these bills?”  “Jesus, don’t you care that I am struggling against this sin?”  “Jesus, don’t you care that I am so sick and tired of being sick?”  “Jesus, don’t you care?” 
 
Jesus doesn’t care – that is a really scary thought, isn’t it?  That’s scary because those things that rock and swamp our boat are bigger than we are.  If Jesus doesn’t care, then we are in serious trouble.  If Jesus doesn’t care, then he is not reliable.  If Jesus doesn’t care, then who needs him?  And if Jesus doesn’t care but wants me to believe in him, well, that’s when we get angry at him.  And the accusation that spilled from the lips of the disciples spills out of our hearts, too.
 
So what’s to be done?  By you and me? – nothing.  What we need is to be quiet, close our mouths, open our ears and our eyes and watch and listen to Jesus.  Only then will our faith – and the peace that comes with it – be strengthened. 
 
Knowing God’s power and grace produces peace.
 
(39) Then he got up, rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, ‘Peace! Be still!’ The wind stopped, and there was a great calm. (40) He said to them, ‘Why are you so afraid? Do you still lack faith?’ (41) They were filled with awe and said to one another, ‘Who then is this? Even the wind and the sea obey him!’”
(38) Jesus himself was in the stern, sleeping on a cushion…”. How could Jesus sleep through that storm?  Why wasn’t he afraid?  Jesus was not afraid because he knew who he was.  He was the One who created water and wind.  He was the One who spoke to Job in our first reading.  Do you remember what he said? “I laid the foundation of the earth … I clothed the sea with clouds … I wrapped it with thick darkness as its swaddling clothes … I broke its power with my decree … I locked it up behind barred, double doors … I said, ‘You may come this far, but no farther.  Here is the barrier for your proud waves.’”  Whether he was awake or asleep, he was that Son of God.  He knew that he could still command both water and wind and it would have to obey him.  The disciples did not yet fully understand that, but he did.  And so he slept. 
 
But Jesus knew more.  He knew that his Father’s plan was for him to die on a cross for the sins of the world, not to die in a storm on the Sea of Galilee.  He knew that plan perfectly well.  He had always known it.  In time, he would explain it over and over and over again to the disciples so that they would know it, too.  At the other end of this three-year ministry, as they were going to Jerusalem for the last time, Jesus would say, “Look, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be betrayed to the chief priests and the experts in the law. They will condemn him to death and will hand him over to the Gentiles. (34) They will mock him, spit on him, flog him, and kill him. On the third day he will rise again.”  Does that sound like he didn’t know God’s plan for him?  Of course, not.  Jesus was sound asleep on the cushion because he knew perfectly well that God’s plan did not involve his death by drowning.  That boat was not going to sink.  No one in those boats was going to die – not that night, and not that way.  The disciples did not yet fully understand that yet either, but Jesus did.  And so he slept.
 
And then, in loving response to the fear that had overwhelmed the hearts of his disciples, Jesus who created wind and wave – Jesus, who knew his Father’s plan to act in power and grace for sinners on a rocky hill called Calvary, acted: “Then he got up, rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, ‘Peace! Be still!’”
 
The effect of his command on wild and unruly nature was immediate and complete:  “The wind stopped, and there was a great calm.”  Of course it became calm!  This, after all, is the Son of God, the second person of the Holy Trinity!  This is the One through whom all things were made!  This is the One who can make any promise and fulfill it!  This is the One who exercised power over demons and diseases!  Of course the wind stopped and there was great calm!
 
But not only in nature.  It became calm and still in the hearts of those disciples, too.  Look at the effect of all of this on them:  “They were filled with awe and said to one another, ‘Who then is this? Even the wind and the sea obey him!’”  Hearts that were filled with fear, were now filled with awe.  Teeth had been clenched as they strained at ropes because they thought only human effort could hold that boat together, but no mouths hung open in awe at what they had just heard and seen.  These guys were never going to be the same again.  Now they were beginning to see it – their Teacher was not just a teacher!  Wind and waves obeyed him!  The next day they were going to see demons obey him, and death obey him.  And one day, just three years later, they were doing to see him die on the cross and forever quiet the accusation of the law against sinners.  They were going to see him rise from the dead and provide peace to all those who travel through the valley of the shadow of death.  They were going to see Jesus ascend into heaven, where he would forever rule over all things for the benefit of his people.  Power and grace – that’s what was at work in Jesus’ command in that storm.  Power and grace – that’s what led him to the cross for sinners.  Our Savior’s power and grace – knowing them gives us peace even when – especially when – our boat is really rocking and the waves are pouring over the sides of life.
 
So, here’s our take-home:  Jesus cares.  Of course, he cares!  Let’s stand at the cross and remember what he did there and why he did it.  John, who was in that boat that night, said it this way: “This is how God’s love for us was revealed: God has sent his only-begotten Son into the world so that we may live through him. (10) This is love: not that we have loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins.” (1 John 4:9-10)   Jesus has power.  Of course, he has power!  Let’s stand at the empty tomb, and remember what that means for us, even in the face of death itself.  Jesus, who was in the boat that night, said, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me will live, even if he dies. (26) And whoever lives and believes in me will never perish.” (John 11:25-26).  Our Savior Jesus is the same Son of God who spoke to Job in our first reading.  And he is the same Savior who says to us when the wind is howling and the waves are crashing, “Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have summoned you by name; you are mine. (2) When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and when you pass through the rivers, they will not sweep over you. When you walk through the fire, you will not be burned; the flames will not set you ablaze. (3) For I am the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior.”   That’s who’s in the boat with us every day and every night of our lives.  In that truth there is peace and stillness in the storms of life!  Amen.