Good morning. When I say “tis the season” some may think of the fishing opener. It is coming late this year, the 14th but the season is nearly here! While I love to fish, that isn’t the season I am thinking of. I am thinking at this moment of the tornado season. From May until about September we in the upper mid-west find ourselves at the mercy of severe storm warnings which could turn into that terrible weather event, the tornado.
Tornados are a force of incredible power. Such power that there is no force on earth capable of interfering with them. We can’t change their path, or their duration, or their severity. We simply try to ride it out in a safe place until the problem has gone away.
Jesus was in a boat with His disciples when a terrible storm blew up. It reads like this: On that day, when evening had come, he said to them, “Let us go across to the other side.” And leaving the crowd, they took him with them in the boat, just as he was. And other boats were with him. And a great windstorm arose, and the waves were breaking into the boat, so that the boat was already filling. Mark 4:35-37
It wasn’t a tornado, but it was close enough! When you are on the water in a boat and a storm comes upon you, you are often at its mercy. Imagine their terror. Imagine them wondering what to do. Wait a minute, we don’t have to imagine, because Jesus was in the boat! However, Jesus was sleeping through the whole thing. But he was in the stern, asleep on the cushion. How does anyone sleep through a boat being wrecked by the wind and the waves? That is exactly what the disciples were wondering: They woke him and said to him, “Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?” Quite the question, isn’t it? Or perhaps it is more of an accusation, do you not care?
Jesus did care, and Jesus was quick to respond, Jesus awoke and rebuked the wind and said to the sea, “Peace! Be still!” And the wind ceased, and there was a great calm. He said to them, “Why are you so afraid? Have you still no faith?”
As we go through another tornado season, or any other season of storms for our lives, we need to always remember that it isn’t about the size of the wind or the waves, it is all about the power of the One with whom we are sharing our boat.
If you are out there on your own, well then you may have reason to worry. If you are sharing the day with Jesus, ride in confidence and comfort, for greater is He that is in you than he who is in the world! (1 John 4:4)
Vern