One of my favorite films since I first saw it in the cinema when released some years ago is “The Perfect Storm.” It is a great adventure saga, based on a true story, about brave (or, foolish, depending on your point of view) sword fisherman who encounter an incredibly powerful, disastrous hurricane in the north Atlantic. They are finally overcome by a monstrous rogue wave over 200 feet high; that terrifying image of the wave coming down over the boat is overwhelming. Even if you’ve faced a rough storm in your life, I think it’s safe to say that you’ve never experienced anything like that! In some of the areas of the country in which I have lived, I have seen some pretty tough storms: from the tornadoes of Kansas to the hurricanes of the Gulf Coast; so I can identify with the effects of nature’s fury.
In today’s Gospel lesson, the disciples faced a storm, which threatened and terrified them. Perhaps it was not “the perfect storm” of the magnitude that the film portrayed, but the disciples were still pretty shaken up. The Sea of Galilee is a good-sized lake, about like Lake Tahoe, and nasty little squalls and storms can quickly threaten a small fishing vessel far out on its waters.
In fact, I recall a similar experience one summer when Bob and I were visiting my sister and brother-in-law at their home in South Lake Tahoe. It was a beautiful calm day and my sister suggested the four of us take two kayaks out on Lake Tahoe to a secluded little beach, which we did. After enjoying a leisurely picnic lunch, my brother-in-law scanned the lake horizon and commented in a concerned voice that we better get back to the boat dock quickly since by the look of it, white caps out on the lake indicated some wind picking up. It was not long after we had started paddling back, that violent winds and waves had quickly moved across the lake to us. As the steep waves undulated our little kayaks up high on peaks and then down into troughs we paddled valiantly barely making headway and fighting not to get dashed against the rocks. When we finally made it back we saw the seriousness of the situation – the sheriffs and coast guard were evacuating people from the lake and though exhausted, we were very grateful that we had made it back without mishap. Remembering that, I can identify with how the disciples must have felt in our Gospel story.
Many of the disciples were career fishermen and were probably justifiably alarmed with the situation in our Gospel story, certain the boat would capsize at any moment. Suddenly in their frantic attempt to save themselves they realize that Jesus is in the front of the boat blissfully asleep, unaware of the calamity about to befall them. If the storm did not wake Jesus, the disciples did as they shouted at him, “Teacher, don’t you care that we are perishing?”
An early Christian symbol for the Church was a boat with a cross for the mast. That symbolism recurred in church architecture centuries later; even here in our own parish church. No doubt the imagery of a storm-tossed little boat, like that in our Gospel lesson, seemed appropriate for the early Church which experienced persecutions from the outside and controversies from within. Recalling the story of Jesus calming the storm, like those first disciples in the boat, the early Christians must have joined in their desperate prayer, “Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?”
Little has changed in the intervening years. Many feel the winds of change and the waters of chaos beat hard on the worldwide church, both through persecutions in some parts of the world and at home through controversies which divide many Episcopalians. Our private lives are not spared stress and storm as our individual little boats are tossed about by the tempests of the economic recession, divorce, separation, sickness, and death. Hardly a week goes by it seems that we do not have to face the fearsome realities of these events, either impacting us personally or our neighbors or our friends, or fellow parishioners; and through news broadcasts the troubling images from across the world, our nation, and our city invade the safe space of our homes: “Teacher do you not care that we are perishing?”
In today’s Gospel, Jesus calms the wind and the waves and says to the panicking disciples, “Why are you afraid? Have you still no faith?” There is a clear link in His questions between faith and fear. The opposite of faith is not doubt or unbelief - it is fear. We fear the unknown: We fear the undiagnosed lump in the breast, or the persistent cough. We fear mad cow disease or cancer or AIDS. We fear losing control of our bodies and our health because of aging. We worry about how the recession will influence our jobs, our savings, our retirement portfolios, our home values and our friends and partners and even our parish. Some of us may worry about who the next rector will be who comes to Church of the Messiah. Fear is like the storm and waves ever trying to knock us off our footing; our footing of faith.
When Jesus rebuked the wind, He did not promise that there would be no further storms, but rather, that He would always be with the disciples through the storms. That is what Jesus promises us. He does not promise that if we believe in Him no evil will befall us, no crisis, no tragedy, no anxiety will ever occur in our lives. He does promise that He will always be with us. If the power of God working through Jesus Christ can rebuke the wind and calm the storm, it can also take care of us!
“Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?! And He said ‘Peace! Be still! Why are you afraid?’”
Amen.
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