The Life of Following Jesus

I stood one day on the eastern shore of the lake and watched the effect of the wind roar down from the western hills and out onto the lake and stir whitecaps.

A small boat would have had trouble getting to shore before getting caught up in the storm.

Another day we were working at the archaeological dig at Wadi Hamam near the foot of the Arbel cliffs on the western side of the Sea of Galilee when a sand and dust storm blew in from the eastern desert.

We could hardly continue to work with the choking dust and very limited visibility.

It was hard enough on shore; it would have been even worse out on the lake itself.

Parking lots on the western shore have warning signs about what can happen in high winds.

Cars that are parked on what appears to be a nice high safe beach can be swamped when a high wind drives the waves ashore.

And the lake itself is not large: I think I remember it as about 14 miles long and 9 miles wide.

There is a day each year when many hundreds of people bicycle around the entire lake, including one I saw hand-cranking a recumbent bike.

Those are a few incidents in my limited time there; how much more would Peter and the other fishermen have known from their lifetime on the lake?

Easy? No. Calm? Only deceptively so.

Dangerous for the unwary or unprepared? Yes indeed!

Yes, that is what being around Jesus is like.

Jesus is on or around the lake much of the time.

The evil that is always lurking nearby is ready to blow in and disrupt things in our lives.

Although Jesus is not afraid to wade into any situation, very often such situations will terrorize us.

Pretending that we can handle it alone may only make the situation worse.

The right thing to do, the only thing to do, is to call upon the Lord Jesus to rescue and guide.

Before Parkinson's disease forced his retirement, Donna's dad worked for a few years as a technical repairman in a knitting mill in Hazleton.

Again and again he would have to remind the operators that whenever they sensed a problem with a machine, they were not to monkey with the machine themselves, because invariably they would only make the situation worse.

They were to stop the machine at once and call him for help and he would be at their side quickly to fix and guide.

Jesus' disciples are just beginning to learn this lesson when the storm arises on the lake, and they cry out in terror, “Teacher, we're sinking. Don't you care?”

And Jesus addresses the forces of nature and gives the word that create space for life, “Silence, be still.”

It should remind us of the actions of God at the beginning of creation, where God says and it is so:

light, land, plant, animals, and us – all the things of life.

And also reminds of other sea-stories in scripture,

such as Paul and everyone on board his ship being saved after the shipwreck in a storm...

and Jonah being turned around through a storm and sent back to do the job he was supposed to do...

and God using the storm winds to make a way for the Hebrews to have exodus from Egypt and preventing the enemies from following.

When we cry out, the Lord does hear, and does not leave us comfortless. [Isaiah 12:1, Ps.23:4,et al]

Remember the icon of Jesus' baptism, which shows Jesus standing in the midst of the River Jordan.

The river's color is black, and the water is roiling, ready to drown.

The evil spirits are depicted as the shadows in the darkness of that water,

and yet Jesus' presence in the water makes space for life where others might see only death and destruction.

Where Jesus is, there the kingdom of God is breaking into this troubled world.

Where in the storms that assail us we call upon Jesus, he is already there to speak the creative word on our behalf.

What wonderful good news!

Another way to think of this incident is as a short version of the whole life of Jesus.

We see Jesus with his disciples, going about their business.

The forces of evil are arrayed against them:

the angry leaders of the synagogues,

those who plot against Jesus,

those who use their power to capture Jesus.

And there is Jesus himself, now not asleep on a pillow but slumped on a cross.

The disciples cry out in fear and run away.

In the resurrection, they again hear his voice: Why are you afraid? Don't you believe?

And not only Thomas, but everyone has trouble hearing that voice with joy.

Come to think of it...this is not only Jesus' story, it is ours as well.

The church in the 20^th century witnessed the persecution and murder of more Christians than in all the centuries before, combined; and the 21^st century is starting out even worse.

Mark's first readers would have understood and identified with those frightened men in the boat.

His invitation comes to us as well:

it is OK for us to wake up Jesus with our fear-filled prayers, in confidence that he can and will deal with the situation, and hold onto us forever, in life and through death, to life remade.

And yes, he may lovingly chide us when we are hesitant to pray,

or are too frantic in prayer.

The kingdom of God is breaking in, wherever his word is spoken and heard!

The problem is of course that the kingdom may not look like we think it should.

That is one of the ideas behind the parables in this chapter.

Seed-time and harvest in the kingdom may not look like what we expect.

Let's just pick one little detail, from the story about the seed growing secretly.

Jesus concludes the story with the sentence: “At once he puts in the sickle, because the harvest has arrived.”

That is not a free-floating thought, or merely a naturalistic detail, but a quotation of and reference to the prophet Joel [3:13].

That little book is about the coming of the Day of the Lord, that time when, after the terrible times they have had,

God's people will have their fortunes restored,

have God's Spirit poured on them,

they would see the defeat of all their enemies around them,

and there is the chance for the Hebrews to lord it over those who oppressed them for so many centuries.

Not so fast, Jesus is telling us.

Good news! There will be a harvest.

The Kingdom will come, but it is on God's terms;

the kingdom will come, but in God's good time not ours.

Good news! He chooses to throw good seed everywhere, even on hard-hearted people such as we are.

Good news! That word will accomplish something far greater than we imagine.

Good news, for the life of following Jesus. Amen.

Please note: The preceding sermon is provided as a resource for the thought, prayer, and meditation of the members and friends of St. Mark's. It is the residue of a verbal event, and thus it does not have academic footnotes and other details that would be expected in a written document. The writer gladly acknowledges the prior thought and work of many Christians before him.