And they went and woke him, saying, “Master, Master, we are perishing!” And he awoke and rebuked the wind and the raging waves, and they ceased, and there was a calm. He said to them, “Where is your faith?” And they were afraid, and they marveled, saying to one another, “Who then is this, that he commands even winds and water, and they obey him” (Lk. 24-25)?
It’s the last line of our verse that gives us the answer about why Jesus rebuked His disciples…
Their faith had wavered.
I can relate. There have been moments in my life that my normal “mountain moving” faith wasn’t strong enough to move my own doubts out of the way…
How about you? Have you ever experienced moments of weak faith? Days that even though you know that you know God is Sovereign you panic when a storm comes your way…?
They had been with Him. They believed He was the Messiah—these twelve, His hand chosen. They had read the Holy Scriptures or at least they’d heard the oral traditions told and retold them by their elders. They knew of the accounts spoken of during the time of the Exodus of their people. When Jehovah God delivered His first-born son, Israel, from under the ruthless oppression of Pharaoh—and his taskmaster’s flesh-splitting whips (Exodus 13).
God intervened and showed Himself the Sovereign Ruler over all men, believer, and unbeliever alike. He demonstrated just how all-powerful He is by taking charge over the elements…
They knew, these twelve, that God had split the sea in two so that His people could cross over on dry land and then with the same ease—folded this sea back over the Egyptian’s who were in hot pursuit of His people. Sending them all to a watery grave (Ex. 14:21-30).
And the disciples believed in this God of their Father’s…
But now their Master—their Rabbi, the One Peter had called the Messiah—God’s own Son (Matt.16:16), is sleeping in their boat. While this sudden storm has arisen, and is raging! And they panicked. Some were seasoned fisherman familiar with the sea. Accustomed to sudden, violent, stormy, weather.
Yet they panicked nonetheless…
So, what is it that caused them to be filled with this gripping fear? To doubt that Jesus, God’s Son, could save them from a certain watery death? Was it the sheer size of the storm that raged about them?
Or was it a deeper issue that swirled unanswered within them…?
Let’s talk about faith. Theirs’s, yours, and mine…
The Scriptures tell us that without it, this faith, it is impossible to please God: “But without faith it is impossible to [walk with God and] please Him, for whoever comes [near] to God must [necessarily] believe that God exists and that He rewards those who [earnestly and diligently] seek Him” (Heb.11:6).
Now we know that to please God we must have faith, so the next logical question follows, “What is this faith?”
“Now faith is the assurance (title deed, confirmation) of things hoped for (divinely guaranteed), and the evidence of things not seen [the conviction of their reality—faith comprehends as fact what cannot be experienced by the physical senses]” (Heb.11:1).
So, now that we know we need faith and we know what this faith is, wouldn’t it seem reasonable to think that these twelve men who had walked with Jesus for such a long while would have it in abundance?
Particularly if they truly understood—more, believed that Jesus was truly The Son of God—One with Father. God in the Flesh…
They’d heard Him say as much to the Jews who asked Him for a plain accounting of Himself back at the colonnade of Solomon during the feast of dedication (John. 14:22-38).
And they were His witnesses to so many of the signs and miraculous healings He performed…
There was the man with the withered hand that He fully restored (Luke 6:10). The cleansing of the leaper, (Luke 5:12-13). The healing of a paralytic, (Luke 5:18-20). The powerful teaching we’ve come to know as, “The Beatitudes” (Matt.5:1-12). And even raising a widow’s only son at his own funeral (Luke 7:13-15)!
They—these twelve, and all the Jews, had been waiting for Messiah to come and deliver them from the Romans and their cruel oppression, much like He did with their forefathers in Egypt. And they knew He would, just as He had during the days of Moses and Aaron.
So why was He sleeping at the bow of the boat while this powerful storm was threatening to tear them apart?
That was their question…
But perhaps what they should have asked, what we should be asking is: What was the Voice who spoke to the storm trying to teach that day? What was the lesson He needed them to understand—us too? What is it that He wanted them, and us, to be confident in? No room for doubts?
Let’s go back to our Scripture verses for that answer. He said to them, “Where is your faith?”
Faith…
Jesus was allowing their faith to be built up while simultaneously reminding them that He was the One who had complete control over all things, ALL things—always.
Jesus knew what His disciples would face shortly—how their faith would be tested repeatedly. He knew they believed Him to be the Messiah. But He needed them to continue to grow. To be stretched. He knew also, that He would only be with them for a short time. And He needed them solid—rock solid, unwavering in their faith.
He need them to understand that He was God. And what that soon would entail…
The future of His Church depended on it… (Acts 2:39-40).
In a moment of unbelief, the disciples implored Jesus for deliverance from the raging sea. Much like when Moses called on God for deliverance as he and God’s people stood trapped at the mouth of the Red Sea, with Pharaoh’s army closing in, threatening to annihilate them…
He needed His disciples to know—have faith in, that He was the same God who demonstrated His power to deliver and save the Israelite’s. That it was He who commanded the elements then and it was He who would do it now, and for all time. “And the sea became as wall on their left and on their right” (Ex. 14:22).
He continues to demonstrate His mercy and His unfathomable power to save His chosen ones—His children. And, since this same Jesus cannot change, is it possible that the storm that is raging about you has been allowed?
Was it sent as a reminder that you must stay firmly anchored to Jesus? The One who will never allow the storms in your life to overtake you. Regardless of what things may look like. “Beloved, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you, as though some strange thing happened unto you” (1 Pet. 4:12).
Did your storm come to strengthen you? To build you up? To enable you to push through life’s situations and circumstances that clamor for your attention—the endless distractions? Those situations that frighten you and cause you to freeze drawing your focus away from Jesus? That negative doctor’s report, the loss of a job or spouse? Past hurts and disappointments?
That runaway child or addicted parent?
Did the storm in your life arise to strengthen your faith? Or perhaps to expose your hidden doubt? Maybe it came to increase your understanding? Or to show you how to still yourself, and listen to the One whose Word commands all storms to end?
Jesus needed to remind His disciples that He was Sovereign over all His creation. That He was so much more than their narrow understanding of who Messiah was and the role He would play in His people’s lives…
He needed them to know that not one detail of their life, not one of their trials escaped Him—and we too, as witnesses, are remind, that if we will but anchor our faith to Him, listen for His voice to guide us, no storm will ever overtake us, nor separate us from Him…
“No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor principalities, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord”(Rom.8:37-39).
Jesus is just as aware of what’s threatening to end you as He was of the storm that frightened His disciples. And the sea that needed to part for His children to cross over safely…
Allow me to remind you that Jesus is with you today. And anything that looks threatening around you cannot overtake you unless the Sovereign God of the Universe allows it to be…
“The LORD does whatever pleases him, in the heavens and on the earth, in the seas and all their depths” (Psalm 135:6).
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