Do you not care, Jesus?
“Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?”
That is an interesting question from these 12 disciples in the boat with Jesus found in Mark 4.35-41. Jesus is taking a well-overdue nap at the back of the boat where guests of honor were put. They, along with some other boats, Mark tells us, are trying to cross the Sea of Galilee in the evening. They’ve had a long day of teaching. They are trying to get away from the crowd. As they make their way across, Jesus falls asleep and then “great windstorm arose, and the waves were breaking into the boat, so that the boat was already filling” (Mk 4:37). As they bail out the boat, they are convinced they are going to drown. They are in the midst of “perishing.” That’s what we will talk about in this blog: the unexpected cry from the disciples: “Teacher (1), don’t you care? (2)” and Jesus’ unexpected response (3): “Peace! Be still!”
Photo by Timur Garifov on Unsplash
“Teacher,” they call him. Jesus is more than a teacher; he’s the Savior who acts upon us every time we read Mark 4:35-41. Mark 14 reminds us who is in charge. It puts each of us “in the same boat” as the disciples. We all face death. We did not make the world. We do not control it. We cannot stop death from coming. It humbles us all. This moment of realizing you are out of control, that you don’t know what’s coming next, and that you are mortal and can die, and in fact are dying, is important. Jesus’ nap forced out a true confession: we are perishing.
Jesus flushes out the fear, the faithlessness in each of us. “Teacher” the drowning men cry – not Savior, Rescuer, Almighty Creator God who gave his life to save me from death and doubt - no, teacher. To be fair to the disciples, Jesus had not given them the understanding yet. He will not until he rises from the dead and gives them the Holy Spirit. But these stories are told just as they are because we can all relate. The skeptic, the spiritually questioning person is asking Jesus, the teacher, if he is relevant to her problems. The Christian is too.
In the post, Made to Boast, based on Galatians 6, we talked about how the Christian has two natures in her. The new creation who has faith in Jesus. And the old creation, the sinner, who has none. I wish I didn’t have that old creation in the boat with me. She can’t see or hear Jesus in her problem and is annoyingly persistent in turning to any and everything else other than him. Keep him in the teacher category so I can figure this out on my own like the Scribes and Pharisees and famous people in the world. Ugh. In the eyes of our Father in heaven and for all eternity, that old creation is thrown out of the boat and nailed to the cross of Christ the moment the Holy Spirit gave us faith to believe in Jesus. Yet, while we live on this earth and await Jesus’ return, that old creation is in our boat with the new. That’s why the disciples kept these stories and why Jesus delayed in helping them understand him because he was going to continue to speak to the skeptic and the sinner in all of us through his living and active word. You can hear Mark and the disciples inspired by the Holy Spirit saying, keep “teacher” in there because that “teacher” is about to do something to our heart that we need more than a bigger boat.
“Don’t you care?” the disciples seem annoyed and exasperated with Jesus. I really relate to this question. When I am in a panic, I want people to join me in the severity of the situation with the same hyper-drive and immediate solutions. I’m working my tail off over here because we have a massive issue and you don’t seem to care at all! They don’t cry out, “Save us, Lord!” Or even “Help, Jesus!” In Mark’s Gospel, they have seen Jesus heal paralytics and lepers with a word. He has cast out demons. It seems they never thought he might have mastery over the wind and the waves. They had not made the connection that he was the Son of God, the same God who created the sea and the wind and you and me as Job tells us. Jesus was in the problem with them—they were all going to go under together. Yet, he did not enter into the survival pattern we are used to doing. Jesus is the non-anxious presence we need saying, I’m here, I’m bigger than this. It was his response to the fact that they were perishing that is so other-worldly, so not our way. We all need that reassurance today. We need him to expose our survival patterns that are not from faith in him. He’s got better ones. “Don’t you care?” Every page of Scripture, every person who knows him testifies to the fact that, yes, Jesus does care. He cares very much.
Jesus meets us in the present and applies his cross to our faithless fear. We have shame that makes us live in the past. We have pride and worries that make us live in the future. His nap forced the fear to come out so he could address it. We are terrified of drowning in our problem right now. Chronic illness, repeating sin, dysfunctional patterns, exhaustion, overwhelmed, injustice, war, broken creation, a broken heart, or actual drowning. I wish I never worried about anything because I know this guy Jesus and what he can do. But the more I know him, the more aware of my worries, I get! That’s why I need Him to speak to me, and you need him to speak to you, today, in this moment, in this storm, with these waves. You are not alone. I’m in the same boat. But so is Jesus!
Photo by Travis Leery on Unsplash
Jesus applies the full authority of heaven, and the full power of the cross as he rebukes the wind and says to the sea, “Peace! Be still!” We need to see that he is God; we are not. Jesus is God who has come to save, to forgive, to rescue us. This passage is nailing down a vital piece of his identity and ours. He is the Almighty Creator described in Job. He is the One God sent to forgive us of the worst we could do and overcome sin, Satan, and the world on the cross. “He who knew no sin became sin for us so that we might become the righteousness of God,” (2 Corinthians 5:21). He did it once and for all on the cross; he does it again and again in our daily lives. He puts our old creation to death—exposes it, reveals it so we can see that it is hurting us and others. In the same moment, he reassures us that he has forgiven us, loves us, is with us, and has a better way across. He replaces terror with good fear, the kind that comes only from being saved by Jesus, by encountering the Almighty Creator God in his mercy and kindness for us.
We are all in a storm right now. Jesus is in it with us. He does care. He has the power. He’s in the boat and he has surrounded you with others whom he has met in their storm too. Look around you… We are all in his boat. He gives peace right now. He has the way across.
“Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid” (John 14:27).
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