The Sermons at Calvary
By Father Richard Humke
"PEACE! BE
STILL!"
June 22, 2003, 7-B, Calvary Church
A
storm at sea and the fright of those caught in the midst of it. That's what our Gospel story is about
today: a storm at sea. There is another story in the Gospel today
as well, but we didn't read that story.
If you notice, some Sundays parts of the readings are in parentheses, as
the one was today, and that means that they are optional. And so I decided that one story was
sufficient for a Sunday morning!
The
disciples were out on the Sea of Galilee with Jesus, and every Bible commentary
tells us that the weather on that inland sea is very unpredictable, especially
at night. When the winds come, one had
best take note.
I'm
not a sailor, and I would guess that most of you are not either. However, my son is a sailor and has
sailed alone, or with others, to many places in the Caribbean as well as to
England and to Brazil. Just this past
week he and his wife sailed from Virginia to Bermuda, and when it got to be two
days late and we hadn't heard from them, we began to worry. But yesterday morning he called to say that
they had arrived safely but had run into a storm that had slowed them down. So today's Gospel had a particular interest
to me this week.
One
time he told me that one feels very helpless and vulnerable in the midst of a
large body of water when the winds and waves begin to mount, as was the case
with Jesus and his disciples in our Gospel today.
Our
Gospel reading today is a well-known story about Jesus, this story of "The
Stilling of the Storm," as it is commonly called. It is a story that lends itself very well to
study and discussion in a Bible class because one can very easily look at the
story on three different levels, and that is always a good way to study many of
the stories of the Gospels. The three
levels are addressed through three questions:
·
What does the story simply
say?
·
What did the story possibly
say to the people to whom it was first addressed?
·
What does the story say to me?
Any
group of people interested in doing some Bible study can study it that way
without having a professional leader for the group. A good commentary, an inquiring mind, a prayerful attitude, and
an honest willingness to look at one's own life in the light of the passage are
all that are needed. And then those
three questions will supply the outline, as they do for this story. That's what I'm going to do in this sermon
this morning in a departure from my
usual style of sermon: I'm going to
look at this story on those three levels as if we were in a class.
So
here's the first question: What does
the story simply say? Pay attention to
the details. What is of interest in the
story? Try not to read anything into it
at this point that isn't already there, but read it for what it says. It says that it's evening, when they decide
to go to the other side of the sea; and a good commentary will tell you that that
is the time when storms are most likely to arise on that inland sea. Why would they have gone at such a time?
The
other side of the sea to which they went is Gentile territory, as you also find
out from a good commentary, and this is one of the few stories in all of the
Gospels where Jesus leaves Jewish territory to go among Gentiles. Why did he want to do that, do you
suppose? Was he carrying his message to
non-Jews?
You
hear that Jesus slept through the storm.
He is either very tired, or not concerned, or both. They waked him with a petulant question as
to whether he cared about them or not, and then he commanded the wind and the
sea to be quiet. Finally he challenged
his disciples about their faith, and they looked at one another in amazement at
what had happened.
There
you have it. That is the story as it is
told, and it is a simple enough story that you can keep the details in
mind. At this point you haven't read
anything into it. You have only taken
note of the details of the story and perhaps learned a few things you didn't
know. You have also raised a few
questions that will have no definitive answers but could lead to a lively
discussion.
The
second question, when reading a story like this, is a particularly important
question: What did this story possibly
say to the people to whom it was first addressed? Remember that the Gospel writers didn't know they were writing
for you and me. They were writing their
accounts to a particular group of people at a particular time. What could this story have meant to those
people in their situation? Why did Mark
put this story in his Gospel when he must have left out many other
stories about Jesus that were circulating at the time he wrote his Gospel,
possibly 35 years after the time of Jesus?
Why did he include this story?
What might he have had in mind by doing so?
Here
we enter the realm of supposition, but again, a good Bible commentary can help
us out, and we should draw on good biblical scholarship. So you need to know something about Mark's
Gospel, that it was written about 65 A.D. at a time when Christians were
suffering their first persecution, the first of many persecutions that were to
take place over the next couple of hundred years. Nero was the emperor when this book was written, and it was Nero,
as we all know, who fiddled while Rome burned.
But then Nero blamed the Christians for the fire, and because of that
the persecutions began.
So
now -- think of this story being told to a little band of Christians living
under Nero, who were frightened with what each day held for them. Every day was for them like a storm at sea
when the forces of darkness threatened to win.
This story, then, not only told them an event in the life of Jesus, but
it also assured those Christians in Rome that in the midst of storms in their
own lives, when persecution and death were all around, they had a Lord who was
stronger still. They needed to remember
this story, that he had stilled the storm on the sea and he could do the same
then, too.
"Peace! Be still!...Why are you afraid? Have you still no faith?" Jesus says in
the story. And we think -- we can never
be 100% certain but we think -- that this story was a story that would give
them courage in the frightening times of their own lives.
So
it is suggested that Mark, our Gospel writer today and for the next weeks to
come, preserved this story of Jesus and wrote it into his Gospel to give
courage and hope to a persecuted Church, buffeted by the storms of persecution
and needing to hear that the Lord is Lord even of that.
So
finally we come to the last question:
What does the story say to me?
You know, that's really the only question that is finally important
because it makes the story come alive for each generation and for each
person. The other questions are
interesting and may answer some things we wonder about, but they don't have any
existential quality to them.
The
story will not necessarily say the same thing to you as it does to me or to the
person sitting next to you. And it may
not say the same thing to you a year from now as it does today. You might even now be saying that it has no
relevance to you. However, if you were
to let this story percolate in your mind and settle in your heart during the
week, you might find that it does have something to say to you, and then
it will be one of those stories you won't forget. I can't tell you what it might say to you. I can only suggest what it says to me.
Could
it be that this is not only the story of those disciples of 2,000 years ago --
who were afraid in the midst of a storm even though Jesus was right with them
-- and it is not only a story for fearful Christians during the time of Nero --
but that it is our story as well?
Jesus has called us to follow him, and we have accepted the call. He has promised to be with us, not to
forsake us, and yet in the midst of the storms that come into our lives, we
become afraid. We, too, either forget
that he is with us; or we do not really believe that his presence with us
matters.
It
is so easy for us to find ourselves enmeshed in situations in which we lose all
perspective. We so easily forget the
grace and the mercy of the past, and only see the present and its dangers. Those disciples were like us: they had already been with Jesus long enough
to know that they were with someone who was different from anyone they had
known before. And yet they had
forgotten all of that in the midst of the storm and had turned to Jesus in fear
and anger.
I
recognize that. I see that they are
just like me. It is all too human to
act that way. My life has been filled
with grace; my life has been filled with God's love and care. I know that, and sometimes I am grateful for
it. And yet, in the twinkling of an
eye, as quickly as a storm can rise at sea, I forget it all and ask God,
"What have you done for me lately?"
You
see, I'm reticent to trust. I'm don't
like to let go. I never cease trying to
control every single thing that comes into my life. I know that that old Alcoholics Anonymous motto, "Let go and
let God," has so much truth in it, but I find it hard to do. I find it hard not to try to control my
world. I find it hard not to try to
control other people. But the truth is: I know that I can't even control myself
sometimes. And I certainly cannot
control God. Somewhere along the way I
have to make a faith commitment and remember Jesus' words today,
"Peace! Be still!"
So
that's what the story says to me today.
It might say something different a year from now. But today it says to me: You've got to learn better how to trust.
You've got to learn better to let go.
You've got to learn better to live in a quiet confidence that, even in
the midst of whatever storms come into your life, God is present.
So,
what does the story say to you? Give it
some time this week and see what message God has for you in today's
Gospel. I assure you that, if you do
that, it will be a Gospel story that you will always remember. And you can do it with so many of the
stories that we will be hearing in the months ahead, for our Gospels from now
until the beginning of Advent in late November will mostly be stories about
Jesus' ministry and teachings of Jesus.
What
does the story say in its details? What
might the story have said to the people who first heard it? But most important: What does the story say
to you and for your life? That's the
question that matters most.
Richard
H. Humke