Pentecost 4B 21/06/2015 Have you ever been in an accident where you almost died? Have you ever been overwhelmed by an event or loss so great that you wondered how you would ever get through it? When a close call came, have you ever felt that God either didn’t care or that he was asleep because you couldn’t reach him? That is what is going on in our G o s p e l t h i s m o r n i n g , the story of the apostles in a little boat during a violent storm on a lake called Galilee where the wind rushes down from the hills with such speed that even seasoned fishermen are sure they are in grave trouble. Most of us don’t experience close calls that extreme, but we know what close calls are. Life has a way of dishing out close calls of one kind or another and yes, when that happens, even the best at first may ask: “Does God even care?” It may be only later we see the bigger picture. Our story leads us into the very deep waters of two life-changing questions: Is the Lord asleep when we need him most? and Who is in charge here? That’s what the apostles thought and said to one another on the storm tossed waves of the Lake of Galilee. In fact, as the waves broke over the boat and nearly swamped it, the exhausted Jesus was sleeping in the stern. The frightened apostles, some of them fishermen by trade, woke Jesus with a question, “Teacher, don’t you care if we drown?” We can identify with the disciples. That’s how it feels sometimes when life comes crashing in, when the storms of life threaten to take our life away, when the God we love and have followed suddenly seems to go silent when we need him most. In his book The Silence of God Helmut Thielicke tells of times like these in his life, especially during World War II, when the terrible physical suffering of war was further complicated by what at times seemed like God’s absolute silence. Thielicke describes it this way: “How many meaningless blows of fate there seem to be! — life, suffering, injustice, death, massacres, destruction; and all under a silent heaven which apparently has nothing to say.” (1) We want an answer. We must have an answer. We demand an answer. We have the right to an answer. Jesus gave an answer. In part, it is an answer we hoped for, but part of the answer, the part we might call “the reversal,” we do not expect. Jesus got up from his sleep, rebuked the wind and spoke to the waves with authority like the apostles had never seen before. “Be still,” Jesus said, and the wind and waves obeyed him. That’s what we hoped would happen. Because we’ve heard the story before, that’s what we expect to happen. But these words from Jesus to the elements must not be taken for granted. It is shocking and astounding that nature obeyed Jesus’ words. The surprising part of the story is the questions and the meaning of the questions Jesus asked. “Why are you afraid? Do you still have no faith?” Who wouldn’t be afraid in a storm like that? Who wouldn’t fear for their lives? Who wouldn’t scream at the heavens for help and receiving none, feel deserted? What do you mean, Jesus, by your question about faith? We have faith, but this is a life-threatening emergency. We 1 of 4
haven’t lost faith, we are just scared to death. What do these questions of our Lord mean? Of course, there is the basic meaning. To have faith in God means to trust him in the worst times as well as the best times. Yes, but there is more, much more, in these questions than at first meets the eye or comes to mind. Consider that the Old Testament was written by Jews. Consider that Jesus was a Jew. What is going on in this and many similar Bible stories can best be understood if we allow ourselves to get into Hebrew thinking. In Hebrew thinking, the one who asks the question, not the one who answers the question, is in charge. When Jesus was asked a question about paying taxes, he answered by asking, “Whose image is on this coin?” When Jesus was asked about his origins, he replied, “I will answer your question if you answer this one: ‘Was John the Baptist sent by God or not?’ ” When a lawyer asked Jesus, “Who is my neighbour?” Jesus never answered his question. Instead Jesus left a question hanging in the air for the lawyer to consider: “Are you going to be a neighbour to those in need or not?” A dramatic shift in the meaning of our story takes place when we move from the questions of the apostles, “Are you asleep? Don’t you care?” to the questions of Jesus, “Why are you afraid? Do you still have no faith?” In fact, a reversal takes place. The reversal is described in these words: “You are not in charge here. I am.” The bind in our story of the little boat in a really big storm is the human tendency to think there is absolutely no option to our being in charge. We ask questions about life and death as if we are in charge. The reversal, indeed the good news in our story, is that in fact God is in charge. Consider the story of Job, in many respects, a parallel story to the apostles in an unstable little boat in chaotic waters. Generally speaking, Job is a prototype of unjust suffering. After all, he was a good man, trying to follow God in every way. Then whoosh, like a storm, life came crashing in. A man of God doing his duty should be rewarded with blessings on blessings, right? But as we know from the story of Job and from our own lives, it doesn’t always happen that way. What’s going on here in the story of Job? What’s going on in life in your story and mine? Life just doesn’t seem fair at times. Job was tending his farm, taking care of his family, praying regularly, and following God’s ways when along came tragedy after tragedy. His crops failed, his health failed, his children died. Then as if to add insult to injury, Job’s wife turned against him with biting criticism. His friends insisted that he was being punished for his sins. With friends like that, who needs enemies? The multiplication of troubles and tribulations caused Job to do what we do. He started to turn his resentment about his situation into speculation and accusation against others and ultimately against God. “Why me? Am I being punished for something I’ve done? God, are you asleep or is it that you just don’t care?” Sound familiar? Projection — blaming others and eventually blaming God for our troubles — is an all 2 of 4
too familiar human reaction when life comes crashing in and we don’t know what else to do. In the story of Job, the reversal came when God answered Job’s questions with his own questions. God introduces his questions with a stunning declaration: “Stand up now, like a man and answer the questions I ask you,” said the Lord (Job 38:1, 3). Then the questions put Job’s situation into a different light: “Where were you when I made the world?” “Who decided how large it would be?” “Do you know all the answers?” “Who closed the gates to hold back the sea?” “Have you ever in all your life commanded a day to dawn?” (Job 38:4-5, 8, 12 paraphrased). Imagine if God spoke to us like that in the midst of a tragedy, our 21st Century egos would bite backthank God for Job he finally was shaken out of his self- pity and rage with those God given questions- not answers. We are at the turning point in the story. The turning point is that God is asking the questions. Since this is a Jewish story, that means God is in charge, not humanity. God is in the middle, not man. In modern life, we a r e c o e r c e d a n d u t t e r l y c o n v i n c e d to think of ourselves as being central and in control. The elevation of humanity to the middle to replace God in the middle has been a tendency from the beginning of time, but it got a big boost in the Renaissance when art and science began to replace religion as the central theme for intellectuals, then for the masses. Man in the middle, trying to control everything, being critical of everything, evaluating everything, being first, last, and always central in his own thinking — that’s the bind in which we find ourselves today. We can’t get ourselves out of our own hands and when something goes wrong the consequences are terrible as we flounder and thrash and try and fight our way out of it. No act of the self can lift the self out of the self by the self because too much self is the biggest problem we have. I shall repeat that statement: No act of the self can lift the self out of the self by the self because too much self is the biggest problem we have. The story of Job in the Old Testament and the story of the apostles on the stormy sea in the New Testament are both biblical correctives to shake us out of thinking of ourselves as the ones in control of life. When Job calmed down and listened to God’s questions and when the apostles observed the calm sea around them, they were astonished to discover who they were really dealing with — the Lord of heaven and earth. Not glib answers to their rational mind. That is what brought peace of mind and soul to them. That is what can bring peace of mind and soul to us today. When Saint Paul wrote, “From now on... we regard no one from a human point of view” (2 Corinthians 5:16), he was making this same point. The human point of view of people and situations is too limited. Saint Paul had discovered the ability to get up high, high enough to see from a heavenly perspective what most people miss — God’s perspective on how things really are. That’s what the story of Job and the story of the storm on the Sea of Galilee are all about. Saint Augustine of Hippo the great 4th Century African Bishop put it this way in a 3 of 4
prayer: “Watch over us who are still on this dangerous voyage. Frail is our vessel, and the ocean wide, but in your mercy you have set our course.” If you have ever had a close call, perhaps the biblical corrective for thinking too highly of yourself has dawned on you too — like it dawned on Augustine, Paul, Job, the apostles, and thousands of others. If it hasn’t dawned on you yet, maybe it will soon. Fr Robert Newton 1. Helmut Thielicke, The Silence of God (Grand Rapids: William Eerdmans Publishing, 1962), p. 14.
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