Jesus In Your Boat

Where were you when the floor gave out? What happened that stole the breath from your lungs? How unfair was it? How confused were you? What broke you for the first time and caused you to ask the question that comes to all of our lips at some point or another, "God, why?"

I was nine when the innocent ignorance of my childhood shattered against the cold, hard stone of reality. That was just the beginning of my search. I needed an answer. Why do bad things happen to good people? Where was God when it all went wrong?

I was the bane of every youth leaders existence. They just wanted to play dodgeball and love on some teens, and there I was with the ultimate question "Why does God let bad things happen?"

I asked those I deemed wise, experienced, and spiritually authoritative, yet the answers revealed a wide gap within the Christian church today.

Many of God's followers, his own children, don't have a clue what his will is.

Let's take a quick pause to establish that I'm not claiming to have all the answers. What I am saying is that we all have access to the One who does have all the answers, and he's not trying to hide them from us. Please, hear me out until the end before you decide to pull out your Bible and study it for yourself (which I hope you always do).

1 Corinthians 2:9-16 lays out for us that we have been given the same Spirit as God. This Holy Spirit allows us to know the will of God. Verse 16 literally says, “who has known the mind of the Lord that he may instruct Him?” But we have the mind of Christ. (emphasis mine)

We can have the mind of Christ if we receive the Spirit of God. This means that we can know what God knows, and we can think how he thinks. His Spirit will lead us in wisdom and discernment that is beyond our natural logic and reasoning.

Romans 12:2 tells us

Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is the good and acceptable and perfect will of God.

Let me break this down with my own paraphrase.

As we renew our minds to the Word of God, and allow his Spirit to teach us, we are actually, truly transformed in life, and we begin to know the perfect will of God and can see it manifest in our lives. We can know what his will is! He is not keeping it a secret from you and I. He is happy to reveal it to us, but he doesn't reveal it to our logical minds. We wouldn't be able to grasp it in our natural, flesh self. It is revealed by the Spirit of God to our born-again spirit.

When we receive the free gift of salvation we receive the gift of his Spirit. This Spirit empowers us to know the heart, the plans, the purposes, the thoughts, and the pure and faultless will of God.

Let's make this simpler yet.

In the fourth chapter of the book of Mark Jesus is teaching the crowds what the kingdom of heaven is like. He begins by describing it as seed sown amongst many different types of soil. He explains to the disciples privately after that the seeds represent the word, and depending on the condition of a person's heart the word will either not enter at all and be fruitless, or it may develop a shallow root, but then be choked out by hardship, trial, or doubt. Or the word will go down deep and root and plant and grow producing fruit in that person's life.

From these verses we can see that a person's willingness to receive the word is directly connected to the level of fruitfulness the word can produce in their life.

Jesus then compares the Kingdom of Heaven to the light of a candle that is not meant to be hidden under a basket. Neither is the Gospel, or the will of God for all humankind to be hidden or kept a secret. He closes that thought with the statement, “Take heed what you hear. The measure you give will be measured for you, and to you who hear will more be given. For to him who has will more be given. And from him who has not will be taken, even what he has.” (Mrk 4:24-25)

Which to me sounds similar to the idea of the seed and the soil. If we commit ourselves to the Gospel, the Gospel will continue to be further revealed in more depth to us. If we treat it lightly, or hide it under the bed, even what we have will be lost.

The last example Jesus gives in this chapter is that of a mustard seed. Here Jesus seems to want to make it clear that we don't have to have giant faith to become a giant in the faith. Faith as small as a mustard seed can grow into a large, strong plant. Translated for this age I would say Jesus is telling us that you don't need to be something special to nourish a deep, powerful relationship with him that has an impact in the world and the lives around you.

After finishing this sermon, preached from a boat on the shore so the crowds could hear him properly, he told the disciples it was time to cross over to the other side of the sea of Galilee. His exact words (as far as we can understand through translation) were,

"Let us go over to the other side." Nothing that seemed profound, if we're honest. Yet, it was because the disciples treated that statement as "not profound" that they got themselves into trouble.

As they began to make their way across the Sea of Galilee a storm rose up.

"And a fierce windstorm began to blow, and waves were breaking over the boat, so that it was already being swamped. But Jesus was in the stern, asleep." (Mark 4:37-38)

Why was Jesus asleep? It's a question worth asking and answering, so we will come back to it. First, let's look at the disciples' response. If you know the story, don't abandon me on this journey. Let the Word go down a little deeper today, like a seed in good soil (wink, wink)

"And they woke Him and said to Him, "Teacher, do You not care that we are about to die?" (Mrk 4:38)

Uh-oh, did anybody else just have a flashback of a time you yelled that at the sky, demanding God answer for himself? Me neither.

"And He [Jesus] got up and [sternly] rebuked the wind and said to the sea, "Hush, be still (muzzled)!" And the wind died down [as if it had grown weary] and there was [at once] a great calm [a perfect peacefulness]. Jesus said to them, "Why are you afraid? Do you still have no faith and confidence [in Me]?" (Mrk 4:39-40)

He had just spent the entire day teaching that if we will allow the Word a.k.a. the will of God, to go down deep within us we will be strong and fruitful, and now, as is often the case, the disciples had an opportunity to put into practice what they had learned. What was the last thing Jesus had spoken to the disciples before falling into a deep, restful sleep?

"Let us go over to the other side"

Remember how we agreed with the disciples that this didn't seem very profound? Yet, that statement plainly revealed the will of God for the boat and all of its passengers. They were to go over to the other side. Jesus had full faith and confidence that they would make it over to the other side because he had spoken it, and Jesus only speaks what he hears his Father say.

So let me ask you quickly, what was the last thing the Lord spoke to you? Have you disregarded it because it didn't seem very profound? Maybe you just knew that you were supposed to do something, and the idea won't leave you alone, but you keep procrastinating because you are listening to the lies of insecurity that tell you you'll never be able to do it right. Maybe you haven't obeyed because it seems like a weird idea and you're concerned with what other people will think. Maybe it just straight up doesn't make sense, and you rely heavily on your logic and reason to guide you through life.

I think the questions we ask in the storm reveal to us the true condition of our hearts, and they make us very quickly aware of how deep the Word has been rooted within our lives. There have been seasons in which I have cried out "God, why?" in anger.

There have been seasons in which I have cried out "God, why?" in weariness and emptiness.

Then I began to give up. I said, "God, I don't get it."

Then I totally gave up and the bitterness choked out the Word I thought I had known. I won't even tell you what I said to God then, because it hurts my heart to think that I ever lived in a space where I could have uttered those words. The reality is, sometimes we hurt. Sometimes we break. Sometimes we blame God for it.

The reality also is that God is not the author of these things.

John 10:10 states, "The thief comes only in order to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have and enjoy life, and have it in abundance [to the full, till it overflows].

Like I said, the questions we ask in the storm reveal the depth of our roots in God's Word. If we are still blaming him for the bad things our roots are shallow. His Word is plain on this. We can know his will, and his will is always for our good, for life, and life abundant.

If we have moved passed blaming God, but we still demand to know where he was and why he let it happen, we have deeper still to go. If I tell you the answer you probably won't like it, but I've been there, and I promise, as soon as you let go of the anger and the offense you will begin to find comfort in this answer. Are you ready for it? He's in your boat, asleep.

Jesus is not moved by any storm, because he prepared you for this. He equipped you with his Word. What has he spoken to you? Have you even opened his Word? Have you asked him for a Word and been still long enough to receive one? What he spoke in the sermon was enough to sustain the disciples in the storm.

When you can believe that he can be trusted to do all that he said he would, the storm loses its power over you. When you know what he said you won't fear the wind and the waves. When you can accept that Jesus is in your boat, and he has given you everything you need to get through to the other side, you will be able to enter into the same rest that Jesus did, napping in the stern.

This is the will of God for us today,

Jesus replied, "It is written and forever remains written, 'MAN SHALL NOT LIVE BY BREAD ALONE, BUT BY EVERY WORD THAT COMES OUT OF THE MOUTH OF GOD.'" - Matthew 4:4 (AMP)

His word is the only thing that will consistently keep your head above water. When circumstances seem bigger than you can fathom, when the pain is more than your physical body can handle, when your mind is reeling but there is no justifiable explanation, you can stand up, feet firmly planted, on what he has spoken.

Rather than asking "God, why?" we can ask, "Lord, what do you say about this? What have you already said about this?" He is always faithful to respond, and his word really is "a lamp to my feet and a light to my path." (Psalm 119:105)