S - Gospel of Mark Pt. 15 (Mark 4: 35-41)
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Why was the book of Mark written?
To prove that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, who suffered, died, and rose again as Lord.
What was Jesus’ plan?
His plan is to save the world from its sin through His death and resurrection.
Who do you trust the most?
I want to tell you guys a story. When my wife and I were house parents we had some kids come into care. They all had names that started with the letter W so they were known around campus as the W’s. Well after a few months after they were here we found out that they were going to go to a foster family and if any if our house parents have experienced something like this then you know it can be hard. Not because we don’t want our kids to go to a good place, or because we don’t want our kids to be with their family again, but because most of the time, when our kids leave, we don’t know where they go. And that’s scary to us. My wife and I were very worried about where the W’s were going to go. When we asked where they were going, no one could tell us. Our fear of the unknown caused us to pray that the W’s would end up in a good home.
Back when Mrs. Stephanie was in college, she went to a conference called D-Now weekend. And there was a lady there that was participating in one of the events as a speaker or something like that. My wife liked her content and began to follow her on Instagram. The same day the w’s were picked up by DSS, this lady posted a picture on her instagram and she was sharing with her followers that her family had just taken in 3 kids into their home as foster kids. All three of the kids name started with a W and she posted a picture of a little boy, we couldn’t see his face, but my wife recognized him because she had dressed this little boy named Warren in the exact clothes that morning.
God used that moment to give me peace, to give my wife peace, and to show me AGAIN, that I can trust God especially in the moments in which I don’t have control. Jesus is going to show us today that He is someone who can be trusted.
35 That day when evening came, he said to his disciples, “Let us go over to the other side.”
36 Leaving the crowd behind, they took him along, just as he was, in the boat. There were also other boats with him.
37 A furious squall came up, and the waves broke over the boat, so that it was nearly swamped.
38 Jesus was in the stern, sleeping on a cushion. The disciples woke him and said to him, “Teacher, don’t you care if we drown?”
39 He got up, rebuked the wind and said to the waves, “Quiet! Be still!” Then the wind died down and it was completely calm.
40 He said to his disciples, “Why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith?”
41 They were terrified and asked each other, “Who is this? Even the wind and the waves obey him!”
Last week we spend some times reading some of Jesus’ parables. And if you remember Jesus would spend his time teaching and healing people. So when he spent all day doing something like this, it wore Him out. Jesus was tired. But even though Jesus was tired, He and His disciples still needed to travel to get to the next town to do some work. And it just so happened that while they were traveling in this boat that this storm comes up. Jesus is not traveling in a Yact, He is not traveling by submarine, Jesus and His disciples cannot avoid this storm. It’s coming, and when you are in a small boat. The storm is so bad that everyone in the boat is afraid, so afraid, And in my opinion, rightly so. I am not afraid of much, but one of my biggest fears is to die drowning. That’s a scary thought.
Imagine for a second you are in this boat and there is a big storm shacking your tiny boat, and water is getting on the boat, and the wind is throwing water in your face so you can’t even see. What would you be doing? You might be trying to get water out of the boat, you might screaming or crying or praying because you don’t want to die right? But let’s take a look at what Jesus is doing:
38 Jesus was in the stern, sleeping on a cushion. The disciples woke him and said to him, “Teacher, don’t you care if we drown?”
I don’t know much about boats so I had to look up what the stern is and in my very limited understanding of a boat I learned that while I don’t know what the stern is used for, It is located near the back of the boat. And while this massive problem is happening all around Jesus and His disciples, Jesus is asleep. We have got to remember 2 things:
Jesus is God
Jesus is Human
So because He is human, He get’s tired and when you are tired what do you do? You sleep. Some people think Jesus is sleeping because He doesn’t care about His disciples, but He’s asleep because He’s human and He’s tired. Every night I go to sleep you know why? Because I’m tired. And it was night time. So guess what Jesus was doing? He was sleeping.
And if we can learn anything about this is what our response should be when storms come into our lives. What are the storms that show up in your life? A storm in your life is any kind of problem or issue that can cause you distress and distract you from Jesus. The loss of a loved one, the loss of your job, break ups, sickness, stress, anxiety depression, any kind of difficulty that comes into your life.
The Gospel of Mark is using a physical example of what their spiritual life was looking like. Jesus and His disciple’s were going through a Spiritual storm in the moment. Do you guys remember what has been going on?
Jesus has been healing people, preaching, and casting out demons. And the religious leaders saw this and what do they want to do to Jesus? They want to kill Him. Tell me that’s not a storm. If I’m one of the disciples, I might feel like I’m in danger too. And now I am running away from the pharisees, and yeah I’m watching Jesus perform all of these miracles but the stress of death is taping me on the shoulder everywhere I go. And now, I am inside of this rickity boat in the middle of the storm and the God/Man who put me in danger is sleeping. So I understand why the Disciples are panicked. I understand why they feel the way they do, and you might be thinking, Pastor Luis, the disciple’s didn’t feel that way:
38 Jesus was in the stern, sleeping on a cushion. The disciples woke him and said to him, “Teacher, don’t you care if we drown?”
Jesus don’t you care if we drown? Don’t you care if we die? Don’t you care what happens to me? I think this happens to us all of the time,
We misinterpret God’s intentions
I’ve done that before, I have misunderstood what God was trying to do in my life. I have been through difficult moments in my life without knowing what God was trying to show me and sometimes instead of being patient, instead of waiting on His response, Instead of trusting Him, I say something dumb like: Teacher, don’t you care if I drown? Don’t you care about me? This is a natural human response. King David said that on multiple occasions in the book of Psalms.
The Disciples allowed their fear to take control of the situation and it made the situation worse. Do you know why?
The Disciples had lost faith in Jesus
Why did they loose faith? Because although they had seen Jesus perform all of these miracles, it is always easy to forget what God can do when we focus on our difficult situations. When we are confronted with situations that are too hard for us to handle, we lose hope quick. And we begin to feel that since we can’t handle our situation then God can’t either. And that is so far from the truth. Man I recognize life is hard, and we go through it. Some of us go through harder situations than others, but regardless of what is going in our lives, we can all agree that life is hard.
But God has still saved us from our sins through Jesus Christ. And if we trust that God can save us from our sin then why do we walk around like God doesn’t know what He’s doing? God knows exactly what He’s doing. And that day He was teaching His disciples something important:
39 He got up, rebuked the wind and said to the waves, “Quiet! Be still!” Then the wind died down and it was completely calm.
40 He said to his disciples, “Why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith?”
Jesus get’s up and He deals with it.
I know not many of you guys are married. But there is a marriage stereotype that when a husband and wife are sleep, the wife might hear something scary, who has to go check on it? The Husband does. My thing is if you heard it first, then you should go check it out. I’m afraid too.
And that’s not what’s happening here, but Jesus get’s up to “go check it out” and he very quickly deals with the problem. He rebukes the wind and the waves. Do you know what a rebuke is? Jesus didn’t say: hey wind, hey waves, chill out” No! Jesus said: “Quiet! Be still!” like, I’m trying to sleep and you’re out here scaring my kids, what’s wrong with you kind vibes. But then Jesus responds to His disciples:
Why are you so afraid? Where is your faith? Haven’t you’ve seen everything I have done? Jesus was trying to teach them a few things, and He is teaching us the same things:
Jesus Has Authority Over Nature Because He Is God
Only God can tell the wind and the waves to sush and they listen. Even the disciples recognized that:
41 They were terrified and asked each other, “Who is this? Even the wind and the waves obey him!”
Jesus was showing them again that He was God.
2. Trials and Difficulties Come for the Benefit of our Faith
This was going to benefit the disciples in some way. It brought them peace, they knew they would be safe with Jesus even if the religious leaders were coming after them. And Jesus tells you and me the same thing. We belong to Him guys, we can trust Him. Especially in the moments in which we don’t have control.
