Three Storms

But he was in the stern, asleep on the cushion. And they woke him and said to him, Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing? -- Mark 4:38

I have a paperback NIV New Testament that I keep by my couch to mark up and make notes in before I go to sleep.  Last night I happened to open to the passage in Mark chapter four that tells of Jesus calming a storm on the Sea of Galilee.  I have a note that says:

• A windstorm
•  A storm of fear – human nature.
•  A spiritual storm – demonic

That’s sounds good enough that I probably stole it from somebody, but I have no idea who it might have been.

The point is that a crisis in the physical world can be very limited or very extensive depending upon how we react to it.  In this case, there was a storm.  The waves were boisterous.  The wind was high.  The boat was taking on water, and the best efforts of the disciples did not seem to getting them out of it.  Meanwhile, the Lord was taking a nap.  The storm was the same and the physical facts of what was happening were the same for both the disciples and Jesus.  The difference was that Jesus was dealing with only one storm. 

The disciples, in addition to rowing frantically and fighting desperately to keep the boat headed into the swells, were fighting a storm of fear, which is quite understandable.  They had no doubt seen the aftermath of a small boat that had not been handled properly, the broken pieces of the craft and of the lives that eventually washed ashore.  Their mortality was distinctly visible in the jagged spears of lightning and audible in the squalling, booming wind.  They feared death in the cold waters. 

Jesus knew that He had a destiny and knew that it was not to drown in Galilee.  He had no fear of death that night.  Most of us, though, lack this certainty of the time and place of our end.  How can we handle the natural fears that rise within us?  If we have Christ in our boat, we can be assured that our destiny is tied to His.  I don’t blame His companions nor do I mock them, for I am certainly no better they were.  Sometimes it just seems like it’s time to panic.  We need to see that our lives and our times are in God’s hands, that what comes to us can come only through His permissive will if not by His perfect and sovereign design.  When we understand and fully trust Him, we can rest in the midst of chaos as readily as the Lord went to sleep in that little, storm-tossed vessel.    

The third storm that night was a spiritual one that sprung up at exactly that point of trust.  Gripped by terror and stressed by their exertions, they heard someone, as it were, whisper, “Look at that one sleeping.  How can you think that he cares for you?”  They did not yet know or understand the implications of the Incarnation.  God was still, to them, distant and not a little frightening.  He might -- for all they knew, forget them, crushing out their lives as thoughtlessly as a human might crush an ant that happened to get under foot.

I understand that feeling, that God can’t possibly care about me, that He either isn’t in control or simply lets things happen to see what I will do like a lab rat in a maze.  The devil knows how to pitch his line to get us thinking that God cannot be trusted in every situation.  When the storm outside is raging and the waves look like mountains and there is darkness and destruction all around, it really does not take all that much to make some of us cry out with those disciples, “We’re dying here. Don’t You see?  Don’t You care?” 

I don’t know what would have happened if they had let Jesus sleep on.  I tend to think that if they could have held on a little longer and trusted God a little more, they could have beaten that storm, but maybe not.  That storm could have been tailor-made to send them to the bottom of the lake because they needed to see for themselves the power that rested upon the Man they called Rabbi. 

Sometimes a storm will come to test our strength and build our muscles and our stamina to endure and overcome.  God wants to toughen us and train us for some greater challenge.  Then there are the storms that are so much beyond us that we can make it through only if we get Jesus in the middle of it with us.  Either way, we can trust that God knows us well enough to know what we can handle.  If we are abiding in Christ and He in us, we will get through it either way.    

Dynamic Tension

Come, behold the works of the Lord, how he has brought desolations on the earth. -- Psalm 46:8

The Forty-sixth Psalm is one of my favorites, both reassuring and challenging, and this verse goes along with our theme of the last couple of days.  God really is in control.  He protects and shields His people.  The ever-flowing river of the Spirit brings joy to the City of God, which is the Body of Christ, and to us individually as sanctuaries in whom He abides.  We may be frightened by war and upheaval, disaster and desolation, but these things are in His hand as well.  He can make wars cease in a moment, break the bow and shatter the spear.

As Christians we have to live with a sort of dynamic tension, and, like the Charles Atlas-endorsed variety, it makes us stronger.  The trouble is that we are human and liable to move to an extreme.  We should live in a vigilant peace.  But peace can slough off into complacency and vigilance can metastasize into fear and panic. 

This may sound disturbing or controversial, but it seems reasonable to me.  If the Church fails and falls, if Christianity is driven out and defeated, it ought be forgotten and abandoned because that would mean it is wrong.  If the Cross and the Blood are not of God then as Paul said, we Christians are fools and of all men the most miserable.  We are not defeated when we are persecuted, martyred, or driven underground.  We must often, in the long spiraling course of history, be the oppressed and harassed minority, a bloodied and battered remnant that lies below the surface like the root of a fallen oak, from which will sprout a thicket to once again seed the earth with truth.   

God is running this show, or He is not.  The fate of humanity depended on Christ’s obedience to the Cross and the reality of His death, burial, and resurrection.  It is finished.  I don’t need to live in a Constitutional Republic with a free market economy or in a fag-free Falwellian theocracy for the Church to be triumphant.  I would prefer a libertarian central government and a Christian-based community morality at the local level.  I’ll work toward that where I can, but God is still in control if the three branches of the federal government collude to create Chicago-on-the-Potomac, declare all Christians enemies of the state, institute a fully fascist economy, and ban assault study Bibles -- especially the ones with high-capacity concordances.    

Taken as a whole, this is what Psalm 46 tells me, “Be still, and know that I am God.  I will be exalted among the nations; I will be exalted in the earth!” (v.10)  

God is not going to be defeated by a bunch of self-satisfied human slugs, con men, perverts, and petty crooks.  Nor will He be defeated by a bloody, backward, antichrist religion that can be sustained only through fear and oppression.  The mockers and the doubters, the scoffers and skeptics will pass like fog in heat.  Christ remains, and Christ will remain.   

The nations rage, the kingdoms totter; he utters his voice, the earth melts.  The Lord of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our fortress. Selah   (Psalm 46:6-7).

Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time he may exalt you, casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you.  Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.  Resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same kinds of suffering are being experienced by your brotherhood throughout the world.  And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you.  To him be the dominion forever and ever. Amen. (1 Peter 5:6-11)

Jesus Has Not Left the Building

But the steadfast love of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting on those who fear him,
and his righteousness to children's children,
to those who keep his covenant
and remember to do his commandments.
The Lord has established his throne in the heavens,
and his kingdom rules over all. 

-- Psalm 103:17-19

This is something that I am going to try and keep in mind as we move into a new year -- really, I think, a new era:   God is in control.   We have a King, and we are citizens of no mean city. 

In the coming weeks and months, there will be pressure on us all the time with endless fear-mongering in the news cycles.  It will be hard not to worry, at least part of the time.  The nearest thing I have to a resolution is to fret less — but I'm not going to fret about being fretless, more or less.  Instead I will try to focus on God's grace and goodness in my life and on the troubles of the day, which, as Jesus said, are sufficient in themselves.

I have a little project started that — if it works out, and that is definitely IF — I will be sharing more fully here.  In the interim, my intent is to slightly increase my posting frequency with a corresponding decrease in verbiage — a verse or quote of the day kind of thing.