I hope you brought your Bible with you this morning. If you don't have a Bible, we do have some in our pews that you're welcome to use this morning and actually if you don't have a Bible at all, you're welcome to take it. It's a gift from our church to you. We want you to have a copy of God's Word in your hand. In the front you'll find some table of contents and look for the Gospel of Mark and that's where we are in the fourth chapter.
You see the picture of the tornado recently that showed a pickup truck flying through the air because of the force of the winds. I saw one not long ago in which a cow was actually flying through the air. You say, well what happened? Well, it was utter disaster. Not only was it a bad tornado, but it was raining chickens and ducks. It was really foul weather. Now I can continue on with this, but if you will stay awake, I'll stop.
But I do warn you that if I see anybody getting drowsy, I'll go back to the jokes. That's a warning. Watching the weather is part of my DNA. I suppose that's because I've lived most of my life in the Midwest where there is weather. You have to feel very sorry for the meteorologists out here in the Bay Area. They go to school for years to learn how to do this and then they get assigned to the Bay Area. Right?
I mean that's like going to school for zoology and getting assigned to Antarctica where there are hardly any birds or any animals or anything down there. I mean weather doesn't hardly exist here, but weather does exist in Israel. In fact, there's some fascinating things about the situation in Israel. There's a map I want to put on the screen for you of Israel to show you the situation there. It can be cool and wet in the mountains of Israel.
Cool and wet there, but down near the Dead Sea, for example, just 15 miles away as the crow flies, as we say in the Midwest, just 15 miles away and downhill all the way, you find a very hot arid desert around the Dead Sea vicinity. It's 1,300 feet below sea level there. Jerusalem is some 2,000 feet above sea level. So the difference in the altitude, the difference in the conditions of the two places causes some interesting weather phenomena.
In the northern part of this tiny country, you have Mount Hermon that rises some 9,200 feet into the air on a shared border with Lebanon and Syria. Let's go on to the next slide with the picture of Mount Hermon on it, please. It's snow-capped year-round. Up there around that mountain that's on the top part of that slide, they have 60 inches of precipitation annually.
The runoff from the snow and the water that falls upon that mountain together with the springs that actually flow out of the base of Mount Hermon form what we call the Jordan River. The Jordan River then flows down through Israel along what is called the Jordan Rift Valley. That valley is the longest, deepest, and whitest fissure on the earth's surface. It's part of it. The whole fissure reaches not only from the northern part of Israel, but all the way down into the continent of Africa itself.
It's called the Afro-Arabian Rift. The Jordan River, as it flows southward along this rift line, forms a lake, a lake that is located in the ancient caldera, or a volcanic crater that has collapsed many, many, many years ago. As the river flows southward into that caldera, it forms a lake that is called after the region where it's located. It's called the Sea of Galilee. Then of course the water flows out of the Sea of Galilee on down to the Dead Sea.
Now the Sea of Galilee is also below sea level. It's because of the situation where it's located that you have the reality of what we read about today, beginning in verse 35 of Mark chapter 4. That day when evening came, Jesus said to his disciples, let us go over to the other side. Leaving the crowd behind, they took him along just as he was in the boat. There were also other boats with him. A furious squall came up, and the waves broke over the boat so that it was nearly swamped.
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? He got up, rebuked the wind, and said to the waves, quiet, be still. Then the wind died down and it was completely calm. He said to his disciples, why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith? They were terrified and asked each other, who is this? Even the wind and the waves obey him.
If you've ever been caught in a storm, particularly when you've been in a boat on a large body of water, you can perhaps identify in a special way with what happens here in the text. The wind came up suddenly. The waves were rocking the boat. The motion of that boat up and down and around, facing death by drowning, which would not be the favorite way most of us would choose to die. These are not the kinds of things that you think of on a pleasant boat ride across to the other side of the lake.
But weather can change, and it can change suddenly, and you can find yourself in trouble, as some of you know from even San Francisco Bay. I want to draw a parallel from what happens here to life. As change occurs in weather patterns, so life changes from pleasant calm to violent storms, and sometimes it does that in a big hurry.
By studying our text today about this storm, this late day boat ride with Jesus and his disciples, you and I can learn some lessons about the storms in our lives as well. The first lesson I want you to notice is this, that storms come to those in the will of God. Storms come to those in the will of God. Everybody has them, storms that is. Storms that bring turbulence to our routines, that destabilize our security, that threaten our comfort zones. Am I not right? Don't we all have storms?
It may be the sudden loss of a job. You go to work on Friday thinking this is like any other Friday, a TGIF day, and you find there on your desk a letter from the company saying, it's time to check out. Then suddenly you enter into a storm, or you get that knock at the door. You've wondered why your teenager has been late getting home, and you go to the door, and there's a police officer there.
You're cruising down life pretty well as a teenager, and things aren't perfect at home, but as far as you know, mom and dad are okay, and then suddenly one of them announces to you, we don't love each other anymore, and we're going to get a divorce. Talk about a storm. You have worked hard, all of your college career. You have worked to get the grades you need to get into a certain grad school, and then you get the letter back that it wasn't quite enough, and you didn't make it.
Or you go to your doctor for your annual routine. It's just one of those things that you do, and you expect everything to be fine, but the doctor says, hmm, there's something here that I don't like. I think we better do some more testing. These are the storms that come to life, folks. Why do God's people have storms? After all, when we accept Jesus as our Savior, I thought everything was supposed to get sweeter every day.
I thought that there was supposed to be joy and peace, and everything was going to be hunky-dory once I accepted Jesus into my life. Some Christians view storms as God's way of punishing them for something. Something bad happens, and so they say, uh-oh, God is mad at me. And so he has created this tempest in my life right now to tell me how unhappy he is and how badly I've messed up. That's their theology of storms. They see it as God's punishment for something they've done.
Could I just encourage you to get rid of the word punishment in your vocabulary with your relationship with God if he's your father? God is not out to punish you. There are times that he allows us to experience the consequences of our own sins so that by that difficulty, that suffering, we can learn some lessons. But God has poured out all of his punishment for our sins upon Christ. Christ has borne our punishment for us.
God does not have temper tantrums and creates storms in order to punish us. Indeed, in this text, we don't observe anything here to say that the disciples were out of the will of God. In fact, it's just the opposite. They were very much in the will of God because God had said to them, let's go to the other side. They were talking about the Sea of Galilee, of course. So from the area of Capernaum on the west side of the sea, they were going to go to the east side, to the region of the Gerasenes.
They were exactly in the will of God. There's absolutely no doubt about it in this text. And yet, being in the will of God, there was this furious storm that came up. Mark, excuse me, Matthew says, without warning. Now, weather is in my DNA, it was certainly in the DNA of this crowd. They didn't have weather forecasters except for themselves. They knew how to read the signs. And they were caught in this storm completely unaware.
The Sea of Galilee is, of course, susceptible to violent storms because of that situation I described to you. Being down in the basin, well below sea level, the basin of this collapsed ancient volcano at 650 feet below sea level, the temperature builds up there. And as a result of that, the cooler air from the Mediterranean Sea as it moves across the mountains of Galilee is sucked down into this basin by that hot air.
And the movement of that air coming down into that basin, well below sea level, causes furious storms, wind storms to be created. Will you write it on your heart that storms in your life do not necessarily signal that you are out of God's will? It's a wrong assumption to think that you are. Now, it's always good to examine our lives, I believe, when storms come. There are times that we can suffer because of our own foolishness, our own ignorance, our own bad choices.
Jonah did, for example, right? And he got into a storm. But don't let the enemy confuse you. Remember that Job did nothing to deserve the storm that came to him. But what about our Lord Jesus and the sufferings that came to him in his ministry and then in his death? He was in the will of God. In this case, God allowed this storm to come about in order to test the faith of the disciples. You see, this storm came at the end of a particular day.
It was the day in which Jesus was teaching about the kingdom. Now, what had they learned from Jesus? It's not enough to hear a sermon. It's not even enough to take notes on the sermon. It matters how much we apply it to our lives, and that's what God wanted to know. How much had the disciples really absorbed and applied? So the first lesson I want you to see is this, that storms come to those who are in the will of God.
And the fact that you are passing through a storm this morning is God's way of testing you. It is God's way of seeing what's true about you. I want to talk some more about that in a moment, but there's a second observation that I want to make that we see in verse 36, where Mark inserts a sentence that is not found in the other accounts of this event. He says, there were also other boats with him. Who were these people? We don't know.
Most likely they were other disciples who wanted to come along with Jesus and the twelve who were in the lead boat. And so others who had boats available to them at Capernaum said, hey, Jesus and his twelve are going across the sea. Let's go along. You and I need to remember that when we're in the vortex of a storm in our lives, there are very often other people who are along for the ride. Our storm may well sweep them into its vortex.
Now that may not seem fair, but a mom and dad are having trouble in their marriage. It is not fair that the children bear the consequences of that, but they do. They are along for the ride. In this case, Jesus and his disciples encounter a storm and others experience the storm along with them. We need to remember that our storms affect others. Sometimes that's hard to remember when you yourself feel endangered. You feel threatened. Your world is upset and you get your eyes really focused inward.
But it's good for all of us in the midst of our storms to look out and see who else is being affected by what I'm going through. Sometimes we can find comfort. We can bring aid to them. Sometimes the group experience, the support group that that provides is good for us. Very often there are other boats along for the ride. Who are they? What is God doing in their lives? The third observation is that storms reveal what's really inside of us.
They reveal what's really inside of us, and that's what God wanted to find out about the disciples. These disciples were absolutely terrified by the storm. Now listen, that says something about the storm because at least half of this group were fishermen. They lived on this lake. They knew this lake like the palm of their hand.
But even they were terrified by what they were experiencing, which suggests to us that this was more than just a natural storm, that there was something supernatural going on here. That the forces of the evil one were at work churning up these waters, enhancing the wind so that this storm was way, way out of the ordinary. These frightened disciples go back into the stern of the boat where Jesus is asleep. Yes asleep. And they say to him, teacher, don't you care? Don't you care?
You say, well why is Jesus asleep? I'll tell you why, he's tired. The same reason you sleep. He's absolutely exhausted. The crowds have been around him. He has taught all day long. He is exhausted to the bone. And so he goes to the back of the boat. He puts his head on the little cushion that would be there. And he is asleep. By the way, this is the only reference we have in the gospels to Jesus sleeping. Now he slept every night, more or less. Just like you did, because he was human.
But this is the only time where that's really specifically said. In the middle of a storm. And the experience of all of this now brings out the truth about the twelve. They've heard Jesus talking. They've even had some understanding of his miracles and who he says he is. But do they really know? Your storms and mine bring out the truth about us too. When we feel threatened. When we are afraid of being abandoned. When our comfort zone is pushed. When our feelings of security are under attack.
What's really inside of us have a way of worming themselves out. And our character is revealed. The real level of our spiritual maturity is exposed at that point. We see the reaction of the disciples being not only fear, but also doubtful. And a lack of understanding about who Jesus was. In fact, they're very rude to Jesus. The way they express this is rude. One translation says it this way. Are we to drown for all you care? And Jesus woke up and expected that they would have had greater faith.
But I ask you, what would you have done? If you had been in this boat, how would you have responded? Well, the first question that comes to my mind is, why should I not be afraid? Why should I be a person of faith in the midst of this storm? Well, there's an answer to that. First of all, they should have been men of faith because they had a promise from Jesus. And he said, let's go across the lake, he didn't say, let's go out there and sink the boat. He said, let us go where?
He said, let's go across the lake to the other side. They were going to get there. They had Jesus' word about that. But they had forgotten his promise. They also had his presence. They had seen Jesus' miracles. They had seen him deliver from demons. They had seen him heal sick people. The crippled were made whole. They had seen all of this. And he, the one, the miracle worker, he was with them in the boat. But at that moment, they forgot that he was with them.
They also had his pattern, the pattern he was giving to them. What was that pattern? Well, it was that he was sleeping. Why was he sleeping? Because he knew his father was going to take care of him. He knew that. And so he was asleep. The disciples should have known that. That was the pattern Jesus was giving to them. I can lay my soul down and rest, be asleep because the Lord is looking after me. But aren't we very much like the disciples? We forget the promises of God in our storm.
We forget that he promised, I will never leave you or forsake you. We forget the example that he gave us, that we can trust God. Peter reminds us, cast all your anxiety on God because he cares for you. Oh yes, we all know that. But the storms, they show whether we really have learned that. Here's a fourth observation I want to make, a lesson that we come to, and that is that the storms respond to the intervention of Jesus. Jesus gets up and he rebukes the wind, and then he speaks to the waves.
So why did he rebuke the wind? Well it's a suggestion, there's something more at work here than just the physical forces, number one. But he actually speaks to these physical forces. And he says, quiet, be still. You see Jesus is bigger than anything that his disciples could encounter on that lake. And I want you to know that he's bigger than any storm that you can encounter in your life too. There's nothing bigger than Jesus. Any storm is nothing compared to omnipotence.
Now there are times when the Lord seems to be asleep in the back of the boat, doesn't he? And we're tempted to wonder, well where is God in my storm? But let me tell you, he is as fully aware in heaven of your predicament on earth as he was aware of what was going on in that boat on the Sea of Galilee 2,000 years ago. And omnipotence stood up in that boat and he dealt with the threat that his disciples faced. And he's able to deal with whatever the threat is that you're facing today.
But there's a heads up I want to give you. Boats don't always end like we hope they will. I can't force this point because the scripture is silent about it. But I wonder to myself, what about some of those other boats? Did any of them go down in the storm? Possible. No guarantee they didn't. Storms don't always end like we hope that they will. Parents don't always reconcile and decide to work it out and maintain their commitment to each other, their vow before God. They don't always do that.
People we love get sick and we pray for their healing and they don't always get the healing we pray for. We have goals that are threatened and we don't always make those goals. Sometimes our lives are radically turned. I remember a couple in the church in Kentucky where I pastored, they had two teenage daughters whom they loved a great deal and as far as they were concerned that was their family. And then both of them in their early 40s, surprise! She has a baby and it's a great shock at first.
Some of you can identify with that. I mean, what in the world? The storm hits them. Here we are, our kids are almost raised now and now we have a baby? And then they adjust to the whole idea. And you know they said, we've always wanted a boy. Maybe this will be the boy that God would bless us with. And so you know they go through the routine of buying all the stuff again that they've given away. Some of you have been there too.
They buy all of this stuff, they get the nursery ready in their early 40s now, right? And she comes to the delivery day which happened to be my birthday and she gives birth to a little boy. But in the birth process the cord wrapped around his neck and he died. Storms don't always come out like we wish they would. That's the way life is. But I want to tell you something, God has his reasons when that happens. Now we may not know them this side of eternity. He may hide them from us.
There are mysteries that only God knows. He's not revealed them to us. But one thing you can always trust is that he and his omnipotence is able to deal with the storm in the wisest way and the best way. A final lesson, storms provide new glimpses of who Jesus is. The disciples say, who is this? I mean they have lived with him now for months. They have seen the miracles. They have made their own conclusions about who Jesus is and who he says he is.
And now they say in the midst of this miracle, who is this? Even the wind and the seas obey him, not just the demons and the diseases. The wind, the seas, they obey him. There are some things about God that are only learned in the storms of our lives. The disciples' question is a question of astonishment and amazement. They had known Jesus for what they had seen him do and who he said he was, but now in a new way they are comprehending, beginning to comprehend who Jesus is.
He's not just like the other people who have healed in the history of Israel. Oh, there were others who healed, the prophets who did miracles. They were very aware of these people. But now, even the wind and the seas, when you look back in their history, there aren't many of their prophets who dealt with the elements of nature. It reminds me of Nebuchadnezzar, who in his great pride looked out upon Babylon and said, oh, this great city I have built.
And then the storm hit, and he entered into years of insanity because God sent the insanity upon him. And after the storm was over, he said, I now see who God is. He says God is King of Heaven. Everything he does is right. His ways are just, and he is able to humble the proud. There are some things that you learn about God in the midst of storms. Ask Jonah. Chapter 2 of Jonah is basically a prayer, which he concludes by saying, I now know salvation is of the Lord.
What he knew before was that judgment was of the Lord. But he was afraid that God wouldn't judge the Ninevites, and so he ran the other direction. But now he knows for sure salvation is from the Lord, and he needs to go proclaim that message. Storms provide new glimpses of who Jesus is. What have you learned about Jesus in your storm? It's reassuring to remember this basic bottom line fact. Storms don't last forever. Aren't you glad about that? Storms don't last forever.
Somebody said this too shall pass. Storms like life change. Like the storms that we have in our valley. They come and they go. The storms of our lives are the same way. Storms don't last forever, but what we learn in those storms can last forever. Storms are never without purpose. The greater problems we have do not come from without, but from within us. Here it was the disciples' failure to grasp and to believe who God was, what he could do.
They created their fear and their unbelief and their doubt. It caused them to question whether Jesus even cared for them. But then they saw he did care. He was able to deal with the storms. It was a lesson that was written on their hearts. Frank Graff was a man who lived from 1860 to 1919. He went through some very difficult storms in his life.
The period before writing a particular song was one in which he experienced a great deal of physical pain, which caused doubt in his life and then depression. But then he turned to the word of God and he saw the verse in 1 Peter that I quoted a few moments ago. He cares for you. Sometime around 1901 he wrote the words, Does Jesus care when my heart is grieved? When my heart is pained too deeply for mirth or song? As the burdens press and the cares distress and the way grows weary and long?
Does Jesus care when my way is dark with a nameless dread and fear? As the daylight fades into deep nightshades, does he care enough to be near? Does he care when I've said goodbye to the dearest on earth to me? And my sad heart aches till it nearly breaks? Is it aught to him? Does he see? And then in the chorus he answers, Oh yes, he cares. I know he cares. His heart is touched with my grief. When the days are weary, the long nights dreary, I know my Savior cares.
With Jesus, my friend, you are secure in the storms. Whatever the outcome, you are secure. But yet he asks, you and me, because of our responses in life's storms, why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith? I want to ask you, is Jesus with you in the boat? I came across a story I want to share with you in closing about a young lady by the name of Hannah Rose. This is on the website of Titus II Women.
In this story that is too long to read to you, she tells about the time in her teenage years when her family, in order to make ends meet, took in some boarders, some men who lived in the basement of their house and who taught in the school that she went to. And one of those men seduced her and began sexually abusing her. After a period of time, that ended, but her heart was in great storm.
She was a young lady who was very pure and innocent, and she confesses even naive to get into the situation that she was in. She was overwhelmed by this person who was in a place of authority to her, and she had always been taught that she should obey authority. So she went to a teacher at the high school where she attended. The teacher told her that everything that she might say would be kept confidential, but three weeks later the teacher, having learned what happened, told her pastor.
And so the pastor of her church called the parents and the daughter into his office after the church service and asked if what he had heard was true, and she said, yes, it was true. And without any opportunity to explain the details around it, she was then, apparently it was a Christian school and she was removed from the school by the pastor because she had been sexually active. Very unfair. She carried that injustice around with her.
Her heart was just in a storm, not only by the initial abuse, but by the abuse of the injustice now that had been done to her. But she buried it. She buried it. And then she got married. She had two kids of her own. But what she discovered as she got older was that you can't bury things like that, that they haunt you until you deal with it. And so she decided to try to find the teacher. Well, first she got some outside help, a counselor who kind of led her through a process.
This was as recently as five years ago. She went through a process with the counselor and then she went to the teacher. And when she told the teacher what had happened, the teacher was absolutely repentant, remembered the occasion, asked for forgiveness, and that helped. The betrayal of the teacher was resolved. When she went to the pastor of her church, he had changed by this time. There was another pastor there. She related to the new pastor what had happened.
The pastor was mortified by what took place and helped her to deal with that bitterness that she had borne for so many years, even against the church and the pastor. She went to try to find the teacher, who had actually, excuse me, yes, the teacher, the man teacher who had abused her, but he had simply disappeared from the face of the earth. There was no record of where he had gone.
And someone shared a verse with her that helped her see that God would take care of him, that she had done as much as she could. And after all of these years, some 20 years, she finally was able to get out of that storm that was bottled up inside her heart. And she says that she saw finally, Jesus was with me all the way along the journey. And now she says, I'm released from my bitterness. The anger, the sense of betrayal, the injustice that I felt is now lifted from my soul. The storm is over.
I don't know what storm you're passing through. It may be one that occurred this week, or it could have happened 20 years ago. My friend Jesus is the one who can help you with that storm. He can come into your life and say, peace and be still, and help you to deal with the issues, to process what you've experienced, and settle the waves and quiet the wind, and bring you to the other side. And I'm talking to someone here this morning, and you say, that is what I have longed for.
I need to get to the other side. I'm so tired of this storm. Will you let Jesus help you with it this morning? He does care. He has not forsaken you. He knows what you're passing through. He's waiting for you to surrender that to him. Will you do it this morning? Let's pray together. Across this wide auditorium, there are people who right now, who sense the voice of the Holy Spirit inside. And you've been hurting. And the storm has whipped you around. It's affected your life.
It's affected others around you. You know that. My friend, today, today is the time to surrender that to Jesus, and let him speak to the storm of your life. Sometimes there are not fairy book endings. I don't mean to mislead you. But I can guarantee you this, that Jesus can quiet the storm that has ravaged your life, if you will let him do it. Will you right now give it to him?
Father, in the quietness of every heart right now, I pray the Holy Spirit will do that work that only he can do to bring us to that point of yieldedness and surrender, where we give the storm to you and let you deal with it. Thank you for what you're able to do. Seek right now into those lives that are opening up to you. I pray for the right process, for the right counselor, the right one to come alongside each one who is deeply troubled.
Oh Lord, that there may be peace, that there may be calm, that there may be wholeness and safety in that life. In Jesus' name I pray, amen. You know we have a group of lay counselors in our church who are able to help you with issues like we've talked about this morning. And I want to encourage you to contact the director of our counseling ministry, Jean Galika. Her information is available to you on our website or you can call the church office and we can connect you.
And let someone to help you think through the process, if that's what's required, in order for your storm to be dealt with. One of our pastors, one of our elders can help you. Perhaps a spiritually mature friend. But don't let the storm ravage you anymore. Let Jesus speak to it. And then you can sing, as we're all going to sing now, it is well with my soul. This is a song of course that was written after a storm when there was great loss. Let it be well with your soul this morning.
By Jesus speaking to your storm. Let us stand together as we sing.