 |
||
|
E-mail
Fax (765) 362-6865
Sunday Worship Schedule (September-May) Sunday School 9:30 a.m. Morning Worship 10:40 a.m. (June-August) Morning Worship 9:30 a.m.
|
This Is Your Captain Speaking Mark 4:35-41 One of the ongoing tests of will I have with my toddler Sam concerns the all-important issue of . . . maple syrup. While Sam used to be purist, enjoying his pancakes plain, he now has discovered the joy of syrup. And in his book, you can never have too much of that. Our routine goes something like this: Whenever we are having pancakes, Sam always asks for syrup. And I put some on his pancakes. Just a little bit. “More,” is the inevitable request. So, I lightly glaze some more over the still-plain portions of the pancake. And still again the request comes, “More.” So, I lightly glaze the rest of his pancake, which is now fully – but lightly – covered with syrup. Sam is now happy. But not for long. Pancakes, you see, are porous things. And soon the syrup that once was on top of the pancake disappears from view as it quietly, quickly descends inside the pancake. When what once was a glistening, caramel-colored puddle atop a light brown pancake disappears – so that only a darker-brown pancake is left, Sam inevitably responds with three words, “More syrup please.” When I tell him that the syrup which once was on the pancake is now in the pancake, that explanation doesn’t go over too well. Generally, there are tears and a plaintiff wail / demand for more – because for Sam the syrup you can’t see simply doesn’t exist. While that is cute as far as it goes for toddlers, that exact same dynamic goes on for us all when it comes to God. For Sam, the syrup you cannot verify by sight simply doesn’t exist. For us, the God we cannot verify by sense simply doesn’t exist either. That exact dynamic is what is going on in our text today. In the few, short chapters before our passage this morning, Mark tells us that the disciples have been called. They’ve been following this mysterious teacher from Nazareth named Jesus. They have heard astounding things; they’ve seen amazing miracles. Demons have been cast out; the sick have been healed. Things that only God can do have been done by their new friend and master Jesus. And so, after a long day of teaching and healing on the shore of Lake Galilee, they head off across the lake by boat to the other side. But the weather turns and suddenly this little pleasure cruise becomes a real nightmare. Hard waves are slamming into the boat that keeps getting heavier and lower. Jesus’ companions – fishermen who have lived their entire lives on the water – who have, no doubt, faced many a storm before are so worried about this one that they sound May Day. Sloshing back through the filling boat to the stern, they find Jesus zonked out, seemingly oblivious to the peril they’re facing. And they wake him up: Not by saying, “Master, we just wanted you to know that we’re going to push back our arrival time a bit.” Or: “Jesus, here’s a life vest. For your comfort and security, you might want to put this on.” No. Shaking Jesus, and yelling to be heard over the wind, they say, “Teacher, don’t you care if we perish?” Translation: “The ship’s going down. We could use a little help here! Rouse yourself and pitch in, why don’t you?” A popular, contemporary theologian has said that basically all of human prayer boils down to two types: Dear God, help me; help me; help me! And: Dear God, thank you; thank you; thank you! The disciples’ plea is definitely the former: “Jesus, help! Help us; help us; help us!” I don’t know about you, but I am really good at praying: help me, help me, help me. I am not always so good at the thank you, thank you, thank you part. But the “help me” prayer comes pretty quickly to all our lips when the storms of this life overtake us. A loved one is swamped by illness. Or our once-sunny economic future turns into a monsoon. Or the very foundations of our world – our health, our relationships, our future – change from solid rock to watery chaos. And, like the disciples did, we would shake the Lord awake – if only we could find him. The great poet Robert Browning once penned the line: “God is in his heaven and all is right with the world.” That spiritual logic is floating around somewhere in all of our subconscious – whether we know Robert Browning or not – because when all is NOT right with our world, we immediately conclude that while God may still be in heaven, God is definitely NOT on the job. We figure that God must be just like Jesus in this story: asleep in the stern -- asleep at the switch! The minute our perception of our state of blessing changes from one of prosperity to adversity, we immediately pray, “ God, help me; help me; help me!” And most of the time our implicit assumption is that God has somehow abandoned us or forgotten us or willed things to be so that we are experiencing is at worst actively dispensed by God or at best passively allowed to happen by God. Like Sam with his maple syrup, everything is fine as long as he can see it. But if he can’t see that syrup, then he immediately assumes that it’s no longer there. The same thing goes for us: When it comes to God, if we can’t feel God or see God or sense that God is helping us, then we immediately assume that God is no longer there. But try this one on for size: What if the problem is not with God – but with us? What if the problem isn’t God – but the problem is our perception – our expectation – of God? If the Bible is right, that the God of Israel never slumbers nor sleeps; that God always keeps promises; that God is love; that in our baptism we are claimed and made one with Christ forever, then the upshot of all that is this: God is never, ever going to abandon us. When we feel abandoned, what might be happening is that we are looking for God in the wrong place or in the wrong way. Right now, Sam looks for his maple syrup on top his pancakes – not in them. Maybe when we are busy looking for God on top the world in heaven, we need to realize that God is here in the world with us. Not up on top, but in – inside – here with us. In Jesus Christ, God became one with humanity for all time. If you are here, then God is here. Truly, every human situation is truly God-soaked. An old Middle Eastern proverb says, “God is closer to us than even our own heartbeat.” In Christ, we know that God is one with us and God will never let us go. So, when you feel that your ship is sinking, know that God is on that boat with you. And God will get you through. The way through, though, is often different from our expectations. When it comes to watery chaos, the Bible tells us that God helped Noah build a boat. When Jonah was thrown overboard from a ship in the midst of a storm, God had a whale keep him alive. Moses faced a wall of water, only to walk through on dry ground. Jesus answered one newlywed couple’s problem by turning water into wine. Jesus answers all our problems by offering us the waters of baptism, and -- from the blood and water that flowed from his pierced side on the cross -- Jesus offers us forgiveness for sins and a resurrection into life everlasting. The Harvard chaplain Peter Gomes reminds us that of all the nations that have suffered through human history, the Jews have experienced it all: From pharaoh’s gulags to Hitler’s ovens. Again and again, says Gomes, the Jewish people have survived by remembering that God was with them. Time and time again, the Bible calls us to remember the mighty acts of God – to retell the stories – and to know in our bones that when it comes to storms, by grace and grit, God’s people always pull through. A Christian who experienced firsthand Hitler’s hatred for the Jews was a Dutch Presbyterian woman named Corrie ten Boom. “During World War II, Corrie's convictions led her to join in the resistance effort to hide Jews during the Nazi occupation of Holland. For this ‘crime’ she was sent to a concentration camp, where she endured terrible conditions and witnessed the death of her sister (From A Book of Reformed Prayers).” Few of us can imagine the horrors she faced. But Corrie survived. After the war, she shared her faith as a speaker and through her books. Listen to what she says about riding out the storms of this life: “When a train goes through a tunnel and it gets dark, you don’t throw away your ticket and jump off. You sit still and trust the engineer. Friends, that is the key: trust. The good news is that the God we seek is already found: Found fully in Christ Jesus to whom we belong forever. The even better news is that Jesus is not only to be found in our boat with us, but our Crucified and Risen God is in command of time, history, and eternity. Over and over, like an airline pilot, God through the Bible announces to us: This is your captain speaking. You are going to experience turbulence in this life: tribulation, heartache, and trials. But I, the way-making God, will make a way for you through the storms of this life – even a way through death to life that has no end. Have faith in me. Hold on. We will make it together. And so we shall. Peace! Be still! Amen. |
