Don't You Care?

Mark 4:35-41

June 24, 2018

            Adrenaline works. When my older sister was a toddler, she and my brother, who was a baby, and our parents, were at a church picnic. As toddlers are wont to do, she got away from the person watching her and started toddling off from the picnicking folk right toward a street. And on that street there was a car. I’m not sure which of my parents saw this first. But according to my mother, my father sprinted toward my sister and snatched her up before she could enter the street. Whenever she tells this story, my mother says that she has never seen my dad run as fast as he did that day. My dad and his brothers were all athletic, so I assume he was a fast runner anyway. But when he saw my sister heading toward the street, he beat any previous speed he had ever reached before. Adrenaline works.

            Adrenaline was also working when my dear friend Shelia confronted gang members with a bat on her front porch in Chicago. They were harassing a friend of her daughter’s who had been sucked into gang life, but had broken free of it. That was not an easy thing to do, and gangs apparently don’t forget or forgive former members. Well Shelia saw what was happening, and she grabbed her bat and marched out there and let them have it. They left. But here’s what you need to know about that bat. It was not a regulation size baseball bat. It was one of those small souvenir bats. It would probably have broken in two if she had swung it too hard, much less used it on someone. These were gang members, and Shelia reflected later that they could have easily killed her right there. But in the moment she didn’t think about her own safety. She was furious that these strangers were on her property, threatening this young man. Perhaps it was the force of her fury that scared them away, but she chased away gang members with a souvenir bat. Adrenaline works.

            Adrenaline is the hormone that is secreted by the adrenal glands, and it is typically associated with our fight or flight response to stress. I suspect that adrenaline was being pumped by the bucketful on that boat in the Sea of Galilee. In my mind the adrenaline flowing that night was practically visible as the boat was being swamped by the wind and deluge of rain from the storm on the Sea of Galilee.

I’ve tried to imagine what it must have been like in that boat that night. Not all of the disciples Jesus called were fishermen, but the first four were. They would have been well aware of the storms that could turn the Sea of Galilee, which is really a lake, not a sea, into a raging tempest. If you wonder how it is possible that a lake could experience such terrible and dramatic storms, think about the storms that can generate on any of our Great Lakes. The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald by Gordon Lightfoot is not just a depressing song. It’s a depressing song about a shipwreck on a Great Lake. My point is this, like the Great Lakes the Sea of Galilee was subject to terrible storms, and at least four of the men on the boat with Jesus would have been aware of that fact.

So I can imagine that when the storm began and the water got rough, the disciples’ first response was not to wake up Jesus. Their first response was probably to try and hold fast through the storm. Maybe they prayed it would pass quickly. Maybe they thought they could continue to navigate and hold the boat aright. But that was not to be. Instead, the storm grew worse. The water and the wind and the rain were battering the boat that held Jesus and the rest of the boats that sailed alongside them. Maybe they tried to bail, but with that much water coming in bailing was pointless.

Finally, when it seemed that they were truly about to sink, to rest in watery graves, they turned to Jesus. Jesus was asleep in the stern. In the midst of that violent and wild gale, Jesus was sleeping, his head on a pillow.

“Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?”

Rabbi, Teacher, don’t you care?! We are about to go down with the ship and you’re sleeping?! I’ve heard of staying cool in the midst of crisis, but come on! Wake up! Help us! Don’t you care?!

Jesus’ response was to wake up and not just calm the sea. He rebuked it. He rebuked it just as he did unclean spirits. He rebuked the wind, and said to the sea,

“Peace! Be still!”

And with those three words, the wind stopped. The waters calmed. The sea was peaceful and placid once more. But here’s the funny thing, the terror that the disciples felt at the storm did not abate. Instead it transferred. They were frightened by the storm, but when Jesus calmed it, they were frightened by him.

I realize that the fear they felt over what Jesus did was along the lines of reverential awe. But they were still pretty scared. In a matter of minutes, the disciples moved from thinking Jesus did not care because he did not wake up to,

“Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?”

Who then is this indeed?

Why did Jesus get into the boat in the first place? It almost sounds like a strange twist on the old joke about the chicken. Why did the chicken cross the road? Why did Jesus get into the boat? To get to the other side.

This passage, these last verses in chapter 4, begins with a simple phrase – probably one we don’t give much thought to.

“On that day…”

What had happened on that day? Jesus had been telling parables about the kingdom of God. Jesus had compared the kingdom of God, the reign of God, first to a Sower of seeds, then to a growing seed that grows and flourishes without much help from the person who scattered it, and then to a mustard seed that grows from the tiniest of seeds to a flourishing, flowering shrub that hosts birds of the air.

That’s what had been happening on that day. That’s what Jesus had been teaching on that day. Now it was evening of that day, and Jesus told the disciples,

“Let s go across to the other side.”

What was on the other side? The other side was the home of the other. They were heading to gentile territory. Jesus will leave the boat only to be confronted by a man possessed by a legion of demons, living in the tombs, in the land of gentiles. That’s what waited for them on the other side. They were going to the place where the other resided, a land, as one commentator put it, where no respecting rabbi or teacher would dare venture.

In between the land of the familiar and the safe and the people who were like them, and the land of the other, they face a storm so terrible it threatens to drown them all. And in this in between they witness a miracle. Jesus rebuked the wind and calmed the sea.

Why were they still so afraid?

How often have I said that if I had been lucky enough to have been in Jesus’ presence my faith would never falter?! How could the disciples see and experience the miracles Jesus performed, and still have such little faith? But I think this story is testament to the fact that miracles do not necessarily equate to stronger faith. I’ve probably seen more miracles than I realize, and that has not kept me immune from struggles with faith and doubt. And it was not just that the disciples witnessed a miracle of healing, they witnessed Jesus doing what only God could do. He rebuked the wind. He calmed the sea. He controlled creation. And yeah, they were scared. But who wouldn’t feel some sense of awe or imposing reverence that borders on fear in the presence of God? I think I would. I suspect some of you might too.

It seems to me that what happened in that boat was not just about a miracle, it was about a moment of recognition of who Jesus truly was and is. And in that moment the disciples moved into a deeper relationship with Jesus. They still won’t get it. They will struggle and fail and fear. But in that moment they sensed that this was not just about what Jesus could do, it was about who he is.

So where does this leave us? What does this matter for us on Tuesday? Is it just about Jesus being in the boat with us when we are swamped and afraid? Is it a reminder that Jesus does in fact care? Yes, but I think there’s more to it. I think this is a story about relationship. The disciples moved from what to who. They were touched by God’s presence in a way they could not have foreseen or completely understood.

Jesus had been telling them about the kingdom of God. Now they were going to the other side to see that kingdom lived out in a new way. And in the in-between, they encountered God in a new way; they crossed into a relationship with God they had not experienced before.

“Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?”

They encountered God in relationship with Jesus. They crossed to the other side with him. They went to the land of the other and back again. What does this mean for us? It seems to me that when we find ourselves touched by God’s presence, that moment does not necessarily eradicate our fears. Instead, it offers us the opportunity to deepen our relationship with God. And when we go deeper into that relationship, then we find the courage to get out of the boat, to go to the other, to not only think about the kingdom of God, but to do our best to live it.

Why did Jesus get into the boat? To get to the other side. Let us follow.

Alleluia! Amen.