“Why are you afraid, you of little faith?” - Matthew 8:26
Today’s text comes from a familiar passage about Jesus and the disciples crossing the Sea of Galilee when a storm threatens to overwhelm their boat. It is a story repeated in Mark’s Gospel 4:20 with a similar admonition, “How is it you have no faith?”
Storms, most of us know from experience, are part of life. How each person deals with whatever threatens to overwhelm their boat, depends on personality and character. But it also depends on the mind-set when the storm hits as sometimes we are in a better place emotionally to ride out a storm. However, as followers of Christ, when faced with shocks or chronic battering of confidence, we have something else besides the shifting sands of our own resources to fall back on.
Standing on the Promises that cannot fail
When the howling storms of doubt and fear assail;
By the Living Word of God, I shall prevail
Standing on the promises of God.
Jesus’ life was not immune to anxious moments and danger and he even warned his disciples that: “I have told you these things so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have tribulation, but be not afraid I have overcome the world”. John 16:33
So just because we are being buffeted, coming up against a brick wall or have suffered set-back after set-back, does not mean we are not going about what God wants us to do. It is far more likely we are and that is exactly why we should not allow ourselves to be blown off course. While the disciples steered the boat over to the other side of the lake, Jesus was hoping to get a bit of shut-eye in. He was probably exhausted as he had given out in ministry so much and had more to do once he got to the other side. Isn’t life like that? You are just recovering from something then bang something else rocks your boat – the enemy never lets up!
The reaction of Jesus to the disciples’ panic, was one of shock that his followers, some experienced fishermen among them, were so easily perturbed by a storm. I wonder what, as fishermen, they normally did if a storm brewed up when they didn’t have a miracle-worker onboard!
Maturing in the faith is what we are to do. We don’t have a physical Jesus with us to instantly quell our storms but what we do have is the Living Word of God - helmsmanship we can rely on.
Okay, so how do we get this fantastic resource called Faith? Well in the letter to the church in Rome we read: “Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God” - Romans 10:17. So, to make sure we can ride out life’s storms we are to be fully absorbed in the Manual for Christian Living, the Word of God.
In the news recently we have heard of the stories of Jasmine Harrison and Frank Rothwell who set out on separate sea voyages and both safely made it across vast oceans braving storms and loneliness. They knew they were embarking on monumental journeys of unknown challenges but they still set off with faith in their equipment, their sailing skills and a determination to get on with their objectives. No doubt they too had moments when they felt they were in over their heads but their faith in themselves and others’ faith in them, kept them going to the end.
Are we willing to believe that in the storm, when all we have is God’s promise to be with us, then that is exactly the time to exercise our faith that “He who has promised is faithful”? – Hebrews 10:23. Trust is the only thing we can offer to a God who already has everything else.
If the roll-call of the faithful in Chapter 11 of Hebrews was to be written today would it read like this:
‘By faith, despite everything, [Your Name] believed and it was accounted unto her/him for righteousness’
Elisabeth Sweeney-Smith