Are you ready?
Lily Cathcart
June 29, 2018
Add to Favourites
Mark 4: 35-41
35 On that day, when evening had come, he said to them, ‘Let us go across to the other side.’ 36 And leaving the crowd behind, they took him with them in the boat, just as he was. Other boats were with him. 37 A great gale arose, and the waves beat into the boat, so that the boat was already being swamped. 38 But he was in the stern, asleep on the cushion; and they woke him up and said to him, ‘Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?’ 39 He woke up and rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, ‘Peace! Be still!’ Then the wind ceased, and there was a dead calm. 40 He said to them, ‘Why are you afraid? Have you still no faith?’ 41 And they were filled with great awe and said to one another, ‘Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?’
When you go away, how do you pack?
Have you ever been on a journey with one too many bags? On a train with no hands left to pick up your jacket as you pull into the station? Waiting to board a plane praying they don’t measure your cabin bag because you have stuffed it so full it might no longer fit? There are hundreds of articles and blogs on how to ‘pack light’ or on only bringing what you need and only needing what you bring, but no-one ever seems to get it just right.
When Jesus set off across a lake as big as a sea with his fishermen friends he seems to have only taken a cushion and some confidence.
His friends had been sailing for years but they woke Jesus, the carpenter, from his sleep to say: ‘We are dying out here!’
They were prepared: they had brought all their experience, ability, equipment and fears.
Jesus was ready: he had strength that was not his alone, and a confidence in both it and the abilities of his friends.
God, we are not Jesus and the wind and rain will not listen when we shout.
But you listen and you know what we need to get through our journeys.
Please help us to be confident in your strength and confident in our own ability.
Amen.
Login to comment.