Surviving the Storm

Preliminary:

Reading from Luke 8.

Introduction

Storms:

The word - Storm is a generic term, popularly used to describe a large variety of atmospheric disturbances, ranging from ordinary rain showers and snowstorms to thunderstorms, wind and wind-related disturbances, such as gales, tornadoes, tropical cyclones, and sandstorms.

Britannica, The Editors of Encyclopaedia. "storm". Encyclopedia Britannica, 3 Nov. 2023, https://www.britannica.com/science/storm. Accessed 19 November 2023.

Thunderstorms are some of the most dangerous weather events in the US. All thunderstorms produce lightning, which is one of the top three causes of weather related deaths in the US. In fact, lightning kills approximately 50 people every year. https://www.thehartford.com/claims/thunderstorm-safety#:~:text=Know%20the%20warning%20signs.&text=Large%2C%20puffy%20cumulus%20clouds,Sudden%20drop%20in%20temperature

Here's how people who have ridden out hurricanes and tropical storms describe them:

"At first, it was like a regular rainstorm—lots of rain and wind. Then we noticed the wind kept building and building until it was howling loudly. It got so loud we had to raise our voices to hear each other speak."

"...Winds increase and increase and increase—winds that you can barely stand up in; trees are bending over, branches breaking off; trees pulling up out of the ground and falling over, sometimes on houses, sometimes on cars, and if you're lucky, only in the street or on lawns. The rain is coming so hard you can't see out the window."

- https://www.thoughtco.com/whats-it-like-to-experience-hurricane-4092994#:~:text=Here%27s%20how%20people%20who%20have,to%20hear%20each%20other%20speak.%22

I remember my Uncle Milton and Aunt Christine telling about a storm they were in one time. They were in a tornado. They lived in a mobile home and the only place they had to go was under the table. Now this wasn’t some flimsy particle board table it was a heavy wooden table - but Aunt Christine said that as the tornado was passing over she could feel herself being pulled up underneath that table and how her back was bruised from hitting it so hard as the force of the storm attempted to pull her out from under that table.

Lets read about a storm the disciples find themselves in now this is found in three of the Gospels - and we get a fuller picture when we see their perspectives together - but for this morning we are just going to read Luke 8:22-25

Luke 8:22–25 KJV 1900

22 Now it came to pass on a certain day, that he went into a ship with his disciples: and he said unto them, Let us go over unto the other side of the lake. And they launched forth. 23 But as they sailed he fell asleep: and there came down a storm of wind on the lake; and they were filled with water, and were in jeopardy. 24 And they came to him, and awoke him, saying, Master, master, we perish. Then he arose, and rebuked the wind and the raging of the water: and they ceased, and there was a calm. 25 And he said unto them, Where is your faith? And they being afraid wondered, saying one to another, What manner of man is this! for he commandeth even the winds and water, and they obey him.

These disciples find themselves in a storm - a very real storm - in fact that is one of the first of three points I see in this text:

1 - Storms are very real

A. They can be felt and experienced.

You can see them, hear them, feel them, experience them, be hurt by them.

This event happened on the Sea of Galilee which is some seven hundred feet below sea level. There are hills surrounding it and the eastern side has a particularly steep set of hills. It is not unusual for a cold wind to shoot through the gaps and collide with the warm air over the lake - any meteorologist would recognize these as ingredients necessary for a storm.

While Jesus grabs a cushion and goes to sleep - the disciples are met with one of these storms.

Now this isn’t just men being dramatic - the Bible indicates the water is surging into the boat - waves are sweeping over the edge of the boat - they are taking on water - they are about to capsize

While it wasn’t a storm - but capsizing is extremely dangerous.

Several years ago - a man by the name of Lester Schloemann well known in the Lincoln County area and a member of our church at Troy, MO. They were out in a boat and in the process of the trip - somehow the boat capsized and he was unable to get back to the top before he drowned -

This was a very real storm and capsizing isn’t just turning the boat over - it is a very real and dangerous situation.

Illustration

No one had to explain to those sailors with Jonah that they were in a storm. - Those seasoned sailors were in great despair - These fishermen - who were used to the water were in despair.

It is so real and frighting that these seasoned and professional fishermen - at least some of them were - turn to a teacher to rescue them out of the situation.

"I pass my life in preventing the storm from blowing down the tent, and I drive in the pegs as fast as they are pulled up." - Abraham Lincoln

Application

Your storms may be spontaneous, or you may see them coming from months or years in advance - but let me assure you one very truth thing - STORMS ARE REAL!!!

Not only are storms real… as they can be felt and experienced

B. Storms Refashion or change things

Have you ever noticed how the atmosphere is different after a thunder storm?

Some storms are so powerful that they forever change the ecosystem and severely disrupt the previous order of things

Illustration

Between December 16, 1811, and late April 1812, a catastrophic series of earthquakes shook the Mississippi Valley. Towns were destroyed, an 18-mile-long lake was created and even the Mississippi River temporarily ran backwards.

It fluvial tsunami in the Mississippi River, actually making the river run backward for several hours. The series of tremors, which took place between December 1811 and March 1812, were the most powerful in the history of the United States.

The first earthquake caused fissures—some as much as several hundred feet long–to open on the earth’s surface. Large trees were snapped in two. Sulfur leaked out from underground pockets and river banks vanished, flooding thousands of acres of forests. On January 23, 1812, an estimated 8.4-magnitude quake struck in nearly the same location, causing disastrous effects. Reportedly, the president’s wife, Dolley Madison, was awoken by the tremor in Washington, D.C.

February 7. This one was estimated at an amazing 8.8-magnitude, a reading that ranks among the strongest quakes in human history. Church bells rang in Boston, thousands of miles away, from the shaking. Brick walls were toppled in Cincinnati. In the Mississippi River, water turned brown and whirlpools developed suddenly from the depressions created in the riverbed. Waterfalls were created in an instant; in one report, 30 boats were helplessly thrown over falls, killing the people on board. Many of the small islands in the middle of the river, often used as bases by river pirates, permanently disappeared. Large lakes, such as Reelfoot Lake in Tennessee and Big Lake at the Arkansas-Missouri border, were created by the earthquake as river water poured into new depressions.

The Mississippi River was forever changed - there are huge hills by where I grew up that it has been said were the old Mississippi River banks before the earthquake.

Application

Storms that we encounter can impact and change us:

While the change should be for good - we can let it hurt and harm instead of help -

God sends or allows storms to:

Bring us to repentance. Sometimes we create chaotic conditions with our own sinful choices. Yet like Jonah, we’ll discover that the Lord is always with us—even in our disobedience—drawing us back to Himself.

Grow us spiritually. Trials force us to rely on God’s strength rather than our own. We learn to endure, persevere, and submit to the Father so He can make us more like Christ.

Reveal Himself to us. Turbulent times give us a more accurate perspective of God and the way He works. Sometimes this understanding comes when we look back on a storm and see how He brought us through. Then we realize His strength was sufficient and His purpose was good.

These points are from https://www.intouch.org/read/daily-devotions/why-does-god-allow-storms-in-our-life#:~:text=The%20trials%20we%20go%20through,good%20purposes%20for%20our%20life.&text=No%20one%20likes%20turbulent%20times,found%20in%20Psalm%20103%3A19.

As Bill Hybels said, “Storms draw something out of us that calm seas don't.” Stormy situations can serve us various lessons about life and living. When stormy situations come up, they often shake things up in our lives. We can either wallow in these situations and the flooding rain or look towards a brighter day.

Not only are storms real, and they can refashion us, storms are also...

C. Far and Near (everywhere)

While they happen everywhere in some form or fashion - THANK GOD THEY ARE TEMPORARY

Illustration

I read that one day Mark Twain and a friend walked outside in the rain. The friend asked him, “Do you think it will stop?” Twain responded, “It always does.” That’s true with any storm. You’ve got to go through it, but it’s not going to last forever. Eventually, or ultimately, it will end.

Alex Banayan an author and according to his bio - The day before his freshman year final exams, he hacked The Price Is Right, won a sailboat, sold it, and used the prize money to fund his quest to learn from the world’s most successful people.

In that quest he interviewed Maya Angelou - who told Alex to write down this sentence on a notepad and never forget it:

that sentence is actually lyrics from a song but it was, “Every storm runs out of rain”

Application

We may not have Jesus asleep in our boat - but we do have Jesus with us and there are seasons and times - and someday the storm will run out of rain and clouds and wind and the sun will shine again - storms are not permanent - they are temporary

"No storm can last forever. It will never rain 365 days consecutively. Keep in mind that trouble comes to pass, not to stay. Don't worry! No storm, not even the one in your life, can last forever." - Iyanla Vanzant

OKAY - so storms are real… another thing we notice in our passage is that...

2 - Storms can be very rough

A. The Force of the Storm

Storms come with force and furry and can harm and damage - they are

Illustration

In order to realize the worth of the anchor we need to feel the stress of the storm. ~ Corrie Ten Boom

I heard a news blip recently about those who study tree rings - and there is an entire network of them - but as they were studying old trees in the Florida Keys they found an interesting correlation between rings that seemed to indicate a harsh year and the loss of ships from hurricanes. The force of the storm forever marked the trees and took the ships to the bottom of the sea.

Application

In the force of your storm - it is important to remember that the storm can be rough - but you also must remember who you are anchored to. Who is with you.

B. The Fear of the Storm

Astraphobia is a specific fear of storms, thunder, or lightning that might cause some people to experience intense fear, worry, or even panic attacks. This is a real condition, and it may be one of the most common phobias people experience.

Illustration

When you’ve been in a bad storm or had a bad experience in a storm - it often produces the fear of it ever happening again -

The least bit of thunder and lightening my Aunt Christine was a mess - storms terrified her after that experience -

Application

"If you spend your whole life waiting for the storm, you'll never enjoy the sunshine."

Not only are storms real, and rough...

3 - Storms must be readied for

A. Somethings have to be nailed down

You don’t wait until the wind is howling, the hailstones falling to prepare for a storm. You do it before.

Illustration

During hurricane season - people are ready to board up their windows, lock some things in place, do what it takes to prepare for the onslaught of the storm.

"Like many animals, wild ponies can sense a drop in barometric pressure. When a storm threatens, they know to seek shelter in hilly areas and huddle together with their rumps facing the oncoming wind."

- Diane Ackerman

Application

As Christians - we have to understand that the storms that are real, and rough, must be readied for by nailing some things down before the storm. Two extremely things that must be nailed down

God is God - He doesn’t need me or my suggestions.

Darrel Bock, a while a dispensational Calvinist is so correct when he writes on the storm in our text, “The sovereignty of Jesus makes him far more than a prophet or ethicist. Confessing Jesus as Lord means that he is in control of nature with all its power. In our world where nature is often personified as its own cosmic force with an independent identity, the reminder of who really is the force behind creation is important.”

Dr. Larry Crabb tells in his book Finding God that there are four conditions that must be met in order to have a solid structure for the storms that come our way: NOW I WANT TO PREFACE THIS BY SAYING THESE AREN’T SUGARY LITTLE DAINTIES - THIS IS SOME ROUGH STUFF TO STOMACH - BUT THERE IS BIBLICAL TRUTH AND PRINCIPLES HERE - BRACE YOURSELVES

We must be willing to endure internal suffering without knowing when it will end and without the ability to arrange for its relief. We must endure what will seem like the loss of life.

We must enter that suffering to an unendurable level where every pleasure that earlier brought relief and comfort no longer does so. We must enter that suffering to the level where we become bored with the pleasures that used to relieve the pain. The pleasures of sin must lose their power to relieve our pain.

We must plead with God’s Spirit to answer our cry for mercy by exposing our fallen structure as dangerously evil.

We must plead with God’s Spirit to reveal the sheer beauty of the character of Christ until the opportunity to know him, and to reflect him to others, becomes the stabilizing anchor during life’s toughest storms.

Not only is God GOD but GOD is GOOD!!

God isn’t good because he prevents the storms, or even takes the storm away -

God is good because of his care for us

Think of this, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego - God didn’t put out the fire - he just put Jesus in there with them - and they came out unsinged, and without smelling of smoke.

Its not about God stopping all the things that look bad, its not about him taming every tempest, or calming the storm - its about him being there with you.

B. Somethings need to be put up

Strong Shelter -It’s building on Christ Jesus that prepares us for the storm

Emergency pack

Provisions (pray in the storm, most definitely, but pray before storm for sure)

Promises- Knowing that God is in control and he knows what is best.

C. Some things need to be put in place.

Some things need to be put in place - others need to be put aside

Gaither’s talked about rearranging pictures on a wall in house fire

Others have talked about rearranging deck chairs on Titanic

A matter of priority in a storm - we have to put aside only thinking of ourselves, and our comfort, and our control

Even Jesus prayed the Psalm - “Into your hands I commit my spirit” what better hands do we have to put anything into?

But back to putting things in place -

Emergency drills - You don’t do a fire drill when the fire is blazing - you do it to prepare for it

Mr. Brewer’s reputation for drills

Tornado drill I thought was fire drill

Tornado drill with a fire drill

While we hope it never happens it is preparing us for if it does

There are things we need to put in place

Rest on God’s provision

Trust in God’s promises

Depend on God’s presence

Accept God’s Providence

Conclusion

Charles Spurgeon - “If you never go anywhere but where Christ leads the way, you need not be afraid of storms, for they will beat upon him more than upon you.”

“There are storms of this life still to be met, so get behind Christ by following him in the path of duty.

From every stormy wind that blows, From every swelling tide of woes, There is a calm, a sure retreat: 'Tis found beneath the mercy seat.

Storms are:

Real

Rough

Need to be Readied for