Calming the Sea

A storm came up on the Sea of Galilee.

But when Jesus called the wind and waves. The disciples were even more afraid only liked his power when they were in trouble. Wake up Jesus help us when he showed them the power you for this is not common. This man is different from any other person on the face of the earth, and when they were in the presence of the holy one of Israel.

They were consumed by fear.

Chapter 4 recounts the incredible story of Jesus committing the elements to be still and they obeyed him today on Renewing Your Mind, Dr. RC Sproul looks at how the disciples reacted to Jesus. Miraculous power so any of us would react in that situation. That's because God's holiness is far more terrifying than the most furious storm. If you've ever been to Israel and had the opportunity to take a boat ride on the Sea of Galilee. I'm sure you experience the warnings of those who took you on such a voyage that even with the modern equipment that sailors used today to navigate the sea of Galilee that there is always a profound and imminent danger of sudden storms that arise without warning the reasons for that climactic play in geographically and we realize that the top biography of that region in the Sea of Galilee has not changed very much in the last 2000 years mountains that were present then remain present. Now and the sea level of the Sea of Galilee is basically the same today as it was in Jesus day and the structure of the ground there creates opportunities for wind tunnels winds that come either from the east off the desert or winds that come from the West off of the Mediterranean Sea.

We notice that in this passage the event takes place in the evening and we know that in ancient times, though the Sea of Galilee was so rich for the fishing industry. Most of the fishing was done at night to avoid the worst wins that occurred usually during the day so the storm this perfect storm that Mark describes to us in this text takes place at night which was somewhat unusual and gives us some insight into the exceedingly great fear that these season veteran fishermen experienced on that occasion. One other detail before we look at the text itself, and that is this, that in recent years of interesting discovery was made by archaeologists along the shores of the Sea of Galilee.

When in one of their digs. They found a fishing boat intact when their dating indicated that the ship dated back to the end of the first century BC or right around the beginning of the first century A.D. so that it comes right from the time of the narrative that we've just heard and the boat was 27 feet long and they were normally 4 feet high so they were little rowboats but they weren't, you know exactly the Titanic.

Either they were propelled by four sets of wars and saleswomen it was possible to use them, but always in the back of these boats. There was a a seat or a bench for the coxswain and it had a comfortable pillow there for him to sit. That's enough of the background let's go to the text itself. Jesus said to them, and in the evening. Let's go over to the other side and so they left the multitude they took him along the boats as he was in there were other boats little boats that were also with them, then suddenly a great wind storm arose and the waves beat into the boat so that it was already filling but he that is Jesus was in the stern and for you landlubbers.

That's the back of the boat. Jesus was in the stern sleep on a pillow sound asleep, oblivious to the peril that is immediate utterly unconcerned for his own or anyone else's safety and we see Mark's description here that the disciples are both afraid and their angry and they not only awaken Jesus, but they rebuke him. That's the first rebuke the takes place in this text. They sentiment teacher.

Don't you care that we are perishing to sponsor for second how like the creature to rebuke the creator. How like the servant to sass the master and there they are rebuking their Lord but he tends to ignore them, except to ask them about the reasons for their fear. But first he rose up, and he gives a rebuke. But first he doesn't rebuke them instead to reduce the wind and he says to the sea piece be still know what happened soon as the Lord of glory, who created heaven and earth was master over nature who could curse a fig tree and make it with her on the spot gives his command. Just as the father had commanded the light to come on in creation. Now the sun says to the elements piece. Be still and as soon as the command comes out of the lips of Christ sees like glass and there's not the slightest Zephyr to be felt in the year everything is call except the disciples they remain agitated, which I find quite fascinating. Jesus then rebuked his disciples say why are you so fearful. Don't you have any faith.

What follows is Martel's will, then they finally calm down. No, it said that they feared exceedingly, and said to one another who can this be that even the wind and the sea obey him the once the notice that in this passage three times.

Mark uses the descriptive term great were enormous. The Latin translation uses the word magna the Greek here speaks of mega you know what megaton bomb is like you understand what the force of this prefix is in the three times that we read of it in the text is first of all to describe the Tempest that comes up so suddenly on the sea. It's not just a storm. It's not just a Tempest. It's a mega Tempest. According to the text. It is a great storm and enormous storm, surpassing the usual types of maelstrom that will arise on the open water. This is on horrific Tempest that threatens the lives of the disciples, we read the great wind storm arose and the waves beat, not against the boat simply but end of the boat that 4 foot deep craft is about to capsize as the waves are beating into the boat and filling the boat with water. It's at that point that the sailors go to their leader wake him up and say something or we perish. Then when Jesus utters his command and rebukes the seaside peace be still. Then the text says a great calm. A mega call my calm comes upon the waters from great distress from great violence comes great and instant peace. But the one great descriptive term that I'm most interested in.

In this passage is the third use of that term mega in the text and that is when Mark uses the term magna in the Latin or mega in the Greek to describe the fear of the disciples will also want to see is this the progress of that fear. When the storm comes up there phobic there a freight there intimidated but when the storm is call their fear is intensified, not remarkable, the great fear doesn't come until after the threatening storm has been removed. We dare not miss the significance of this in the lives of the disciples in the response to the person of Christ. Recently I saw in the paper.

A list of the top 10 phobias that assaulted people's comfort zones, particularly in the United States of America. People are afraid of the marketplace agoraphobia. They're afraid of water Aqua phobia. They're afraid of small cramped spaces so we know that, but in the top 10 phobias in our country is a phobia called xenophobia spelled with an XXE and O xenophobia and xenophobia is the fear of strangers. The fear of aliens, the fear of people who are different from us.

The fear that one ethnic group has for another ethnic group. The fear people of one nation have for people of another nation. They're not familiar with their customs. They're not acquainted with their behavior and so their strangeness their difference haunts us because were not sure how to respond and so we always have this fear of the stranger Mark Twain this little short story on the mysterious stranger and how people did not know how to respond to the stranger from out of town who came into their community, frightened. I was teaching seminary in Philadelphia many years ago I had a senior course that I was teaching in the history of atheism and I required my students to read primary sources such that all would just read about atheism. I wanted to read the atheists and so I made them read Calphalon I made them read Nietzsche I made them read Sartre and Camus and I made them read Marx Feuerbach and Freud's Future of an illusion than civilization and its discontents and as they would read these works of the most brilliant atheists of the last couple of hundred years, then we would have discussions about their arguments against the existence of God, and there was a common thread that ran through particularly 19th-century atheist because after the Enlightenment thinkers of the Enlightenment said will we know longer now have to look to the idea of God to account for the beginning of the universe or the origin of human beings.

Now we know that the universe is come to pass through spontaneous generation answer the question that was left for the followers of the Enlightenment was there since there is no God. How is it that everywhere we go on this planet we find people who are practicing religion. Mankind seems to be incurably Homo really… Worse at all come from, since it doesn't come from God. Why so much religion and the same answers given over and over and over again in the atheistic philosophers, namely that religion is invented as a crutch. It's a psychological bromide to help us cope with the scary things that surround us and Freud had an interesting theory about this he said as human beings were frail, were always in imminent danger of having our lives destroyed here today gone tomorrow and we look at those things around us in nature that can terminate our existence and we see for example that we can succumb to fatal illnesses.

We can be killed on the battlefield in war, we can be murdered by a robber.

We can be killed in a hurricane and earthquake or afar or some other natural disaster. Freud said basically nature's hostile to us and is a threat to our survival. Nowhere is that more eloquently portray that in the text that we've read this morning. It was the force of nature.

The great wind, but great turbulence in the see the beating of the waves against this boat that threatened the very lives of these human beings. Freud made this observation we have learned how to cope, to some degree with hostile people. If you are angry at me and expressing that anger to me and I want to get rid of that anger. I can do a few things I can beg you for mercy. I can apologize to you and maybe that'll turn away your anger aura. Either you want to be mad at me I'm president of your fan club and let me show you. Here's a gift and I offer you a gift and hoping to assuage your anger and turn it aside, and he said, and religion rises up when we use the techniques that we find will work sometimes to remove the threat of humans against us, we will use the same tactics with non-human entities.

We will personalize the impersonal forces of nature because how do you negotiate with Katrina you can pray Katrina go down the coast to someplace else.

Don't hit us.

She doesn't hear so we personalize the storm we personalize the earthquake and then the next step is.

We sacral eyes. It we begin to invent personal gods who live in the hurricane who live in the earthquake who live in the sea so you have see gods and win gods and all arrest so that now we can talk to them. Pray to them, offer sacrifices to them fortunate.

That's how religion started. He got it really simplified when you boil it all down to one God over all of the forces of nature. So if you're afraid of the hurricane. You can pray to the God who makes the hurricane. Not so fast Sigmund. Although I think it's true in the history of religion that people do tend to sacral eyes, non-sacred objects and to personalize objects that have no personality. Nevertheless, in all of his creativity. But one thing human beings don't do when they invented God's to protect themselves is to invent a God who is more terrifying than the force were trying to tame. That's the point of Freud overlooks because what human beings don't want is a personal God who is holy, nothing threatens sinful humanity. More than the presence of the holy city same reaction takes place this night on the when the disciples see that storm instantly calmed by the command of Jesus we see the third use of mega now they're not just afraid there fear is a mega theater. It's exceedingly great and they cry out what kind of man is this, but even the winds and the seas of the kind of person they met all kinds of people and you do it every single time you walk down the street in a city and you see hordes of people coming your way. The amendment in your life and you pigeonhole every person that you see instantly may not consciously think about it which are watching all the time is that person smiling that person safe is this other person's eyes, furious, give them a little extra space because you know what unbridled anger can be like in human beings. And so you give room for people like that you separate and sort every person you meet into a category safe dangerous nice cantankerous whatever but we don't have a category for somebody who can speak to the waves and they listen to this one sui generis. This one is in a class by himself. This one is so alien, so other that there is no compartment for us to include in a word, beloved what the disciples experienced on the Sea of Galilee.

That night was the holiness of Christ only liked his power when they were in trouble. Wake up Jesus help us. Social power when he showed them the power you for this is not common, this is holy. This man is different from any other person on the face of the earth, and when they were in the presence of the holy one of Israel. They were consumed by fear. This would Prof. Freud never understood. And the thing the Prof. Freud was more afraid of than anything else in the world was the holiness of God. That's why people run from God. That's why people run from Christ. As soon as he manifests his transcendent majesty. They are reduced to tear.

That's why beloved, if Christ. Now in his Majesty would come in this church this morning.

Know what he would go up to him and shake his hand and say hey pal. Come on in. None of you would be on your faces.

Just as John is on his face from Christ appears in the all of Patmos.

When the resurrected Christ and his glory and the manifestation of his holiness appears all creatures hit the dirt because he's other he's holding so that not only do people tremble at his voice sees that have no ears listen to his command and wins that have no knowledge know enough to stop blowing since the source. I have always been fascinated by this particular story in Scripture but Dr. RC Sproul has a beautiful way of underlining it putting it in bold font and ending it with a solid!

Always glad when we have the opportunity to feature Dr. Sproles sermons here on Renewing Your Mind and on the Sunday edition of our program. We return to his verse by verse series through Mark's gospel. A resource offer is designed to help you get the most out of the study. It's RC's commentary on Mark is nearly 400 page hardbound volume provide you with insight into every passage of this book, you can go online to make your request with your gift of any amount to litigator ministries or web address is Renewing Your Mind.work we've always been about the business. Later ministries of helping you grow in God's holiness were also committed to proclaiming Christ Lordship in every area of life are homes, workplaces, schools and communities. When you support later ministries you help ensure that we reach as many people as possible in every age and stage of the Christian life. So we are grateful for your financial gifts like sitting RC examines the story of a man possessed by a legion of demons. When the demons were cast into a herd of pigs. The people had the same reaction.

The disciples had when Jesus called the storm they were terrified. We hope you'll join us next worst day for Renewing Your Mind