What Is Your Storm?
A Sermon for the Fourth Sunday after Pentecost
June 20, 2021
The Rev. Robin Teasley
When evening had come, Jesus said to his disciples, “Let us go across to the other side.” And leaving the crowd behind, they took him with them in the boat, just as he was. Other boats were with him. A great windstorm arose, and the waves beat into the boat, so that the boat was already being swamped. But he was in the stern, asleep on the cushion; and they woke him up and said to him, “Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?” He woke up and rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, “Peace! Be still!” Then the wind ceased, and there was a dead calm. He said to them, “Why are you afraid? Have you still no faith?” And they were filled with great awe and said to one another, “Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?” Mark 4:35-41
Set in the hills of northern Israel, the Sea of Galilee is the lowest freshwater lake on earth at almost 700 feet below sea level. In places, the sea plunges to depths of 200 feet. Around the sea, the hills of Galilee reach nearly 1,400 feet above sea level. The green and brown of the hills contrast beautifully with the deep blue of the water, however what is seen can be deceptive.
The topography of the area makes storms inevitable, as the wind comes over the eastern mountains and drops suddenly onto the sea. When an east wind blows cool air over the warm air that covers the sea, the heavier cold air drops as the warm air rises. This sudden change can produce fierce storms in a hurry.
The Sea of Galilee was also a boundary between Jewish territory on one side and Gentile territory on the other. In today’s text Jesus has been teaching on the Jewish side and in the evening, he said to the disciples, “Let us go across to the other side.”
This was a strange request if you think about it. It was not safe to sail at night when you couldn’t see, and the disciples were exhausted after a long day of crowd management while Jesus was teaching. And no one really wanted to go to the other side, into Gentile territory. That was the “bad part of town”, it was not safe, and people there were not like them. But Jesus said, “let’s go” and so they followed.
The sea had always been a watery kind of chaos for the people of God, deep and filled with unknown monsters, and subject to assailing winds and tossing waves that would rise up quickly with little notice. Even those who earned their living by fishing, had a great respect for the sea. In fact, there was a healthy fear of the sea by all who knew the creation story by heart, “In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep, while a wind from God swept over the face of the waters.”
The disciples quickly found themselves in the midst of the creation story. There was darkness, wind, and rising waves. Was God about to create something new? What dangers and unknowns waited for them under the dark waters? What winds might blow down from the hills? And if they managed to make it to the other side, what would happen then? I imagine that the inner storm of thoughts and fears being experienced by the disciples was a good match for the outer storm, as the waves beat against the sinking boat.
And where was Jesus in the middle of all of this? Asleep. On a cushion. Who could possibly sleep through a storm at sea? What was it that allowed Jesus to sink into fearless sleep?
Each of us knows something about the sea of life that suddenly becomes dark and stormy. The wind and the waves of our worst fears whip up out of nowhere, and we are sure we will sink. We all have our own storm stories. Sometimes they begin when we get the call with the lab results, or with a late-night text from a loved one in crisis. At other times they form on the horizon because of our wrong choices, or they brew in our difficult relationships. The wind rises, the clouds gather, and our inner storm begins to churn in reaction to the external circumstances of our lives.
As surely as storms come and go with the weather reports, they happen in our lives. We can expect forecasts of political partisanship, violence, and injustice. We are tossed on seas of depression, failure, and even suffering. The sea of life can become dark chaos and we feel as if we are sinking in deep water.
Are we not like those disciples, immediately looking around in panic for someone to fix things, someone to hold accountable, to save us when we find ourselves in a stormy place? We wonder if God hears our cries, we wonder how Jesus could possibly be sleeping when we are in such distress.
When the disciples were sure they were going to drown, they noticed that Jesus was asleep on the cushion, oblivious to the raging storm. They woke him up saying, “Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?” And yet, Jesus is with the disciples, in the boat and in the storm.
His response to the fierce wind and waves, however, is very different. While the disciples panic, Jesus sleeps. While they engage in frantic activity, Jesus is peacefully calm. Perhaps Jesus is revealing to the disciples and to us that the circumstances in our lives that appear most threatening are not the real storms. Maybe Jesus wants to calm the storms we hold inside, the ones that churn and rage in our minds and hearts.
We hold tightly to those inner fears and feelings as if they are lifeboats, when in fact they are what threaten to drown us. Maybe it’s our anger and resentment. Perhaps it’s our prejudice or sense of self-righteousness. Any number of things we hold inside can keep us from crossing over to the other side. Sometimes we are afraid to let go of those things that are no longer saving us but are causing us to perish. The thing is, our inner storms make everything around us seem more chaotic. The storm rages in the darkness and we are sure we will sink.
And then, Jesus speaks into the chaos, “Peace! Be still!”
Jesus surely has the power to change the weather, though I suspect he is also inviting the disciples, and us, into a changed life on the other side. Jesus speaks to us about all that we hold within that is making our life a restless sea. The disciples have been pointing to what is going on outside, all around them. Jesus now points to what is going on inside of them. “Why are you afraid? Have you still no faith?”
Facing what is going on inside of us necessarily means change and transformation, it means something old will fall apart. Franciscan monk and spiritual writer Richard Rohr says, “The pain of something old falling apart—disruption and chaos—invites the soul to listen at a deeper level. It invites and sometimes forces the soul to go to a new place because the old place is not working anymore.” Most of us would never go to new places in any other way. Most of us prefer to avoid the storms.
To be a disciple doesn’t mean there will be no storms in life. It does mean that Jesus will always be with us, inviting us to move through the storms, with him, to the other side. In the beginning, the God of creation spoke over the deep darkness and swept the wind over the water. We find comfort, not fear, as we trust that God is, even now, creating new life in us with a word. Peace! Be still!
Title Image: Christ Asleep During the Tempest, Eugene Delacroix
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