Jesus stood up and commanded the wind, "Be quiet!" and he said to the waves, "Be still!" The wind died down, and there was a great calm. Then Jesus said to his disciples, "Why are you frightened? Do you still have no faith?"
Sermon for the Fourth Sunday after Pentecost
(Proper 7)
| Text: Mark 4:39-40 Jesus stood up and commanded the wind, "Be quiet!" and he said to the waves, "Be still!" The wind died down, and there was a great calm. Then Jesus said to his disciples, "Why are you frightened? Do you still have no faith?" |
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Most likely you have
heard of Andrew Fisher, the 5th Prime Minister of Australia about a
century ago, but have you heard of Andrew ‘Fishtail’ Fisher the V8 Ute and
Supercar racing driver who recently had a podium finish in Darwin.
Along the way, Andrew has also had his fair share of smashes – one in his
V8 Supercar at Mt Panorama, Bathurst.
Why am I talking about a racing car driver?
This picture will give you a clue.
As you can see Andrew has Jesus painted boldly on the side of his car,
across the front and on his V8 Supercar across the top as well.
You will see that he is also a promoter not only of things to do with car
racing but also the Bible Society.
How odd.
Is Andrew Fisher one of those religious fanatics?
Is he the kind of person that really gets up your nose talking about God
all the time and all you want to do is get away?
I’ve never met him personally, though some
of the kids at our school have had him visit their youth group, but when
interviewed on TV he doesn’t come across like this.
He’s a bloke who loves motor racing and loves Jesus and loves to share
both passions at schools, youth groups, men’s groups and so on.
One of the things he says quite strongly is
that just because he has the name ‘Jesus’ written all over his car doesn’t mean
that he will not have his fair share of close calls, scary moments, crashes, and
even life endangering pileups as he roars around the race track.
Being a Christian doesn’t mean that adversity won’t come his way.
There are some people who have asked him, “If you believe in Jesus, why
do these bad things happen?” And so this
provides Andrew an opportunity to point out that the Christian faith has
something to say about how we deal with adversity and so an opening to talk
about Jesus as Lord and Saviour.
But that’s fine to talk about adversity
like this and say that Jesus gets us through the tough times but when the chips
are down does it really happen like that?
Look at the disciples in the boat caught in a storm.
They knew Jesus better than anyone else.
They walked with him. They
talked with him. They had heard him
talk about God's love and care and why it’s pointless to worry and be anxious.
And yet even though they have Jesus right
there in the boat with them, they panic.
They think that the sleeping Jesus doesn’t care that they are in danger.
Do they really believe that Jesus will let them drown?
Has fear driven out any sign of faith and trust in Jesus’ love for them?
Are they so filled with panic that they have come to believe that Jesus wouldn’t
come to their aid in the same way that he had helped so many others who faced
adversity?
Are they questioning whether Jesus was even aware that they were in grave
danger?
Without a doubt
that’s just what they were doing when the storm was proving too great for them
to have any chance of rowing their way out of it.
They bailed water, gathered in sails, tossed overboard everything that
was unnecessary; they panicked, and now finally turn their anger and frustration
toward the sleeping Jesus. With a
rough shake they stand over him and demand,
“Don’t you care that we are about to
die?”
It’s not that the disciples didn’t have
faith in Jesus at all. And it’s not
that they hadn’t committed themselves to following Jesus.
They had experienced his love and compassion as he dealt with the upsets
and storms in other people’s lives.
It’s just that in this moment of extreme adversity all of that seemed to vanish.
I don’t think it’s any different with any of us.
The great 12th century Christian teacher,
Bernard of Clairvaux described this wobbly kind of faith by saying that we are
like drunken sailors, reeling and staggering out of control.
I see this happening in my own life and
in the lives of others too. It’s very
human and very natural. It’s a part of
being a sinner and saint at the same time. We find ourselves in two minds – we
want to love and trust the Lord but sometimes we find it’s beyond us.
How do we handle adversity especially
trouble that we consider to be unfair?
Let me go back to Andrew Fisher, the racing
car driver. Remember how he said
that just because you have Christ in your life doesn’t mean that adversity won’t
come your way. It happened to him
and he had every reason to say that it was unfair.
His second child was born with a serious congenital heart
defect. The doctors said that the
most humane thing to do for his daughter and for his family was to let nature
take its course and let her die. He describes what it was like to hear that
advice and then to make the decision to go against the doctors’ advice.
Their child endured 23 operations, 3 open
heart surgeries, 6 months in hospital, the family had to relocate from Sydney to
Melbourne; then another round of surgery when she was 5 and all this with the
knowledge that when she turns 16 or 17 her heart will fail.
Now if that’s not adversity for a father
and his family then nothing is. How
unfair can all that be especially for a family who have given so much to
witnessing for Jesus in schools, churches, on TV, on the race track, to
community groups and have also linked up with Compassion and taken his racing
team to poorest of the poor around the world, and here at home raised money for
those people to provide the basic essentials that we take for granted?
I don’t know the story of Andrew Fisher
well enough to know the innermost feelings of Andrew and his wife but I know
that if I was in the same situation I reckon I might have felt like the
disciples in the boat on the stormy sea.
Like the disciples I would have felt that everything had gone crazy, out of
control, so out control that no matter what I did it was all too hopeless.
Like the disciples I would have lost heart and become despondent because the
forces against me would have been too great.
Like the disciples I would have despaired at the overwhelming magnitude of the
situation in front of me and wondered,
“Why me of all people should I be placed in this unenviable position?”
Like the disciples I would have wanted to give God a good shake and a piece
of my mind, “Don’t you care!
What has this little person done to deserve a raw deal like this?
Don’t you care that you are putting our family through an emotional and
financial ringer?” I might even
add this sideswipe, “So much for serving
you all these years and look what I get in return!”
When things get out of our control in our lives it’s easy for us to think things are also out of God's control. That’s not the case at all. That’s far from the truth as we see in the gospel story. In all the rushing about on the boat, the disciples forgot one important thing – Jesus was on the boat being tossed about with them. He too was drenched with the waves as they washed over the side and showed complete trust in his Father’s protection as he slept through the storm. Jesus was right there with the disciples.
They had witnessed Jesus call people who were in trouble to trust him;
now it was their moment to trust
Jesus. Now it was their turn
to face trouble and trust that Jesus would act for their benefit.
These tough, weathered fishermen were
being tested, right in their own familiar environment, by the landlubber from
Nazareth whose nostrils were more at home with the scent of wood shavings than
with tangy sea breezes and the smell of fish.
At the point when they believed that there
was no hope and that they would soon sink into the watery deep, Jesus stood up
in that rocking and heaving boat, demonstrating his clear presence among them
and his mastery of the situation. He
called out to the wind and the waves and everything stopped. The disciples stood
there with their mouths hanging wide open.
How could they have so easily been overcome by adversity that they lost sight of
the one who loved them so powerfully?
How had the trouble that had fallen on them caused them to lose confidence and
trust and faith in the One who mattered the most?
Andrew Fisher is a V8 racing car driver but
he’s also a father who has faced adversity with Jesus by his side.
He sums up his own experience coping with trouble saying,
“So when you live with that sense of
adversity in your life it gives you perspective on many other things in your
life in terms of what’s important and what’s not important; what you want to
live for; what you want to fight for and what you’re prepared to walk away
from”. There’s more in those words
than I have time to reflect on but let me just say that adversity has a way of
making us more focussed, stronger; it enables us to grow in our faith and bring
us closer to Jesus.
So then how do you face adversity?
When everything goes haywire and things get out of your control who do
you go to when you are powerless in the storm of adversity?
Where do you find the strength to face trouble and survive the storm?
Simply – Jesus Christ.
He may not remove you from the storm;
he may not stop the storm,
but with Jesus by your side in the middle of adversity all shall be well;
you have nothing to fear and nothing to be anxious about.
His strength is your strength.
His peace calms your troubled soul.
When things begin to terrify you think of
Jesus stepping into the eye of a storm that took his life on a Friday when the
sky turned to thick darkness. He rose again to promise you his everlasting
loving presence in whatever troubling circumstances you face along life’s
journey.
When faced with adversity remember your
baptism and the promise that Jesus made to you when you were joined to him
through water and the Word. He
invites you call out in faith to him because he is able to strengthen and calm
the wave-tossed soul and will bring you through all of life’s storms to the safe
haven of your eternal home.
There is only one who can truly help when
it comes to facing adversity;
there is only one whose love for us is undeniable and whose faithfulness can be
trusted;
there is only one who is powerful enough to hold us up when the whole world is
rocking and reeling
and that is Jesus.
Some times with strong stern words and other times in the quiet and gentle voice
he says to us, “Be at peace; be still!”
Even the wind and waves obey him.
© Pastor Vince Gerhardy
24th June 2012
E-mail:
sermonsonthenet@outlook.com
