Scripture Focus:
Mark 4:38 (NIV) — “Jesus was in the stern, sleeping on a cushion. The disciples woke Him and said to Him, ‘Teacher, don’t You care if we drown?'”
Most of us know what it is like when, all of a sudden, hard things start coming at us all at once, like a huge, overwhelming storm. A few years ago, I lived through a season like that. I had recently moved to Kenya to work with refugees, and within three months, everything seemed to fall apart. I got news that my grandma had passed away, and an aunt I loved deeply was battling brain cancer and slowly getting worse. My whole team got badly sick with COVID, my team leader nearly died in the hospital. My own health declined as well. My community? I barely had one yet. What I thought was my purpose? Coming apart. My strength? Gone. I remember thinking, honestly, that Jesus had gone to sleep while my whole world was going under. It felt like I was trying to shovel water out of the boat, and the whole time Jesus was just… silent.
There is a story where the disciples felt the same way. They were out on the water when a violent storm came down on them. Many of them were fishermen that were very used to the water, and even they were terrified. Jesus was asleep in the back of the boat, through all of it. When they finally woke Him, they accused Him saying, “Teacher, don’t You care if we drown?”
He got up and spoke to the wind and the water, and it went still. What is interesting is that He had been resting the whole time. Not because He did not care, and not because the danger was small. He was not afraid of what was terrifying them, because He could see what they could not: that God was bigger than the storm.
I still do not fully understand that season in my own life, and the storm did not simply stop the moment I asked. But I came out of it with something I did not have going in. I had no strength of my own left. I felt so alone and afraid, but I found that He was never once panicking about me. My faith strengthened and deepened more than ever, because I had nothing else to stand on. He was in the boat the whole time.
He is in your boat as well. When it feels like Jesus is asleep while your life floods, His quiet is not distance but nearness. You do not have to hold the boat together alone. You can trust the One already in it with you, before the storm ever calms.
Weekly Challenge:
This week, name the storm where it feels like Jesus is asleep or silent, and tell Him about it honestly. Then consider that His calm may not be distance, but the peace of the One who is not afraid of what frightens you.