Trinity 2 – Eucharist – 21.vi.

2009
(Job 38.1-11; 2 Corinthians 6.1-13; Mark 4.35-41)

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

That’s the question the disciples ask about Jesus after their brush with
disaster on the Sea of Galilee. At least, disaster is how it seems to them at
the time. They were fishermen who must have sailed on that lake many
times; but however many times you’ve put out from shore, you only have to
sink once… and that’s your last voyage. What happens in these few minutes
may be the briefest of episodes in their lives. But it will stay with them, and
as they look back on it they will recognize something – not only about the
dangers they faced that night – but also about Jesus, the man they had with
them in the boat.

My father was a sailor. I was talking with my brother who’s been in this
country from the United States during the last week, saying that our Dad had
the major excitement in his life early on. But in a sense we can still say, “My
father is a sailor.” He might have left the Merchant Navy nearly 60 years
ago, but the young man in him was formed in and by his travels from icy
Spitsbergen to Australia and Nauru, from Canada and Hawaii to Singapore.
He can’t see the photograph albums any more, but he still comes out with
the stories. And the stories he can still tell most clearly are the stories of
near-disaster: of storms with hundred foot waves; of 10 days adrift in the
Indian Ocean without engine power or radio communications; of ships
which sank, and the ship which his own boat sank coming into harbour.

1
When we say that “the sea is in someone’s blood”, it’s something to do with
respect for its force, the knowledge that it can turn against you, the challenge
of battle in the face of the storm against the elements. As our Psalm (107)
today puts it of those who “go down to the sea in ships, and do their business
in great waters”:

24 They beheld the works of the Lord and his wonders in the deep.
25 Then he spoke and a stormy wind arose,
which tossed high the waves of the sea.
26 They mounted up to the heavens and fell back to the depths;
their hearts melted because of their peril.
27 They reeled and staggered like drunkards and were at their wits’ end.

Then, the Psalmist goes on, “they cried to the Lord in their trouble…” And
he hears, the calm returns, and safely they are brought back into harbour….

Except… there is always the possibility that God won’t hear, the storm may
get worse, the boat may break up and sink, families in port may be left
bereft.

We can recognise the mercy of God – as the Psalmist recognises it – only if

we see the possibility of disaster. If our safety is guaranteed so long as we
say the right prayers, then the God to whom we pray must be a God who
simply tests us to see if we’ll do the right thing… in fact he must be a god
who uses us as play things for his own amusement, to see how we will
respond to the dangers he sends against us. What we need to recognise when
we read this story of the disciples in the midst of the storm, when we sing
that wonderful hymn, “Eternal Father, strong to save”, is the absolute terror
that the disciples feel, the all-too-real danger in which they are set, the fact

2
that they might not get out of this one alive. It’s when they come through it –
knowing they might not have – that they can appreciate truly the Psalmist’s
words, “Let them give thanks for the mercy of the Lord…”

Perhaps we know the story of the storm on the Lake too well. We read it and
we know that all will be well. But it doesn’t seem like that at the time to the
disciples. Already they are taking in water when they realise that Jesus is
actually sleeping through it all. Read the story now, and it seems that all they
need to do is wake him up and he will make everything OK. But think how
the disciples might be feeling as they struggle to stay afloat, and you realise
they probably were not all that polite as they woke him up. There wouldn’t
be time to be gentle – more likely they’d grab him roughly and shout at him
to get baling. The surprise is that when he wakes he simply speaks to the
wind and the sea: “Peace! Be still!” It’s not what the disciples expect. They
know him as someone who can captivate crowds with his words,…. and
hearing him talk about God is one thing. Actually finding that his words
make a real difference is quite another. So, “Who then is this, that even the
wind and the sea obey him?”

That seems to be the crucial question: to ask who Jesus is for us. To be able
to recognise that he is at the centre of the storm with us. That we are not
alone. But we wouldn’t be human if we didn’t have times of sheer
desperation. Jesus is sleeping in the stern of the boat. It’s not the first
thought of the disciples that they’ve got him with them. Their first thought is
that Jesus is asleep. They feel on their own, and this man is doing nothing
for them. They feel on their own, even though other people must be near to
hand. St. Mark tells us that as they set out across the Lake, “Other boats

3
were with him.” But there’s no other reference to the people in these boats.
When we are in the midst of the storm, perhaps we forget the peril that other
people are in – “this is my disaster, and I’m going to suffer it all myself.”
When we are in the midst of the storm, perhaps we forget that there are other
people who might be able to help us. But the disciples are so pre-occupied
with danger that they forget anything other than their own fight for survival
on that one tiny boat. Nothing else and no one else matters. It’s as though
nothing else in the world seems to exist.

And perhaps that’s how life is for us when we know that we are in trouble.
All we can do when things are extreme is be conscious of the peril. So easily
we feel that we’re on our own. We don’t care that other people may have
their problems, because nothing can match mine. We don’t think that anyone
else can help, because my problems are so far beyond my being able to deal
with them that we don’t believe anyone can help us find a solution. And if
we call on God, it might be only to find that he seems to be asleep.

It’s this story that tells us that it’s not necessarily so. There is the chance of
disaster. Our problems and perils are real and need to be taken seriously. But
perhaps as well there are those other boats near to hand – people who can
come to our help, people who might have more experience in surviving the
storm, people who at least are in the midst of our troubles with us.

And we can be those people for others – just by being there for them. We
need to recognize people for what they are – beloved of God. That’s the
problem that Job has. We’ve read from chapter 38 today, and it’s taken all
the previous 37 chapters for God to get into the picture. Job has suffered

4
more than anyone: loss of wealth, health and family. And it bothers him – he
doesn’t deserve this, and he can’t see how things can get any better. He feels
so alone, and we can see why: his wife tells him just to curse God and die;
and his so-called friends turn up to treat him as a theological test-case and
prove that he must have done something wrong for all this to happen. …And
they’re all wrong. For Job is and remains a human being in spite of the
calamity which befalls him. He needs his humanity to be affirmed, and it can
be affirmed only when he sees that he is loved by God. It’s love of the
Creator for the created which Job finally must recognise. It’s the fact that
God goes on loving us which we need to recognise, that we need to hold
onto; and it’s recognising that love which is to form us in all our
relationships.

It’s easy for us to treat people as Job’s so-called Comforters treat him – as
someone who must obviously be at fault, who therefore can’t expect to share
in the fullness of God’s love. We can treat ourselves like that too. There’s
been a lot of criticism of Members of Parliament recently - and
understandably so: it’s one thing to defend your expenses claims as being
within the rules, and something else to stretch their interpretation beyond all
reasonable limits. But even as we hear our own voices of condemnation, we
have to ask how we might act, given the opportunity to stand in their shoes.
Or perhaps we need to look more closely at the things we do anyway, and
take for granted? How pure are our motives and intentions? How deserving
of God’s love do we count ourselves? If we find ourselves like Job’s
comforters, quick to condemn without a fair hearing, then we are not only
hating the sin (if there is a sin) but also despising and pillorying the sinner.
And what hope has any of us?

5
We need to know that God is near, however far away from his love we may
hold ourselves. This is what Jeffrey John has to say in his book “The
Miracles of Jesus” about the storm on the Lake, and about Peter’s attempt to
emulate the Christ who walked on water:

… These miracles have strengthened countless millions of

Christians, whether going through the tempests of corporate
persecution… or through personal storms of illness, loss,
betrayal, bereavement or breakdown. There can hardly be a
Christian who cannot immediately identify with Peter, losing
faith in face of fear and trouble, sinking in panic, then gathered
up and rescued by forgiving love. However much modern
Christians may wonder what did or didn’t happen on the Sea of
Galilee over 2,000 years ago; however much we may struggle
to understand what it means to say that Jesus was God on
earth, as Mark and the early Church were so unshakeably clear
he was – it remains a fact of Christian experience that these
miracles “work”. Their message is true… certainly in the sense
that Christ’s words still have extraordinary power to bring “a
great calm” in times of turmoil and chaos – when we have faith,
however faltering, that he is who he is: “Peace, be still. Do not
be afraid. I AM.”