Fourth Sunday after the Epiphany

St. Matthew 8:23–27

In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

In the middle of the storm, before He rebukes the winds and the sea, our Lord rebukes the disciples, “Why are you afraid, O you of little faith?” This is not because they were wrong to wake Him, but they are wrong to panic. I suppose that their request, “Save us, Lord,” is legitimate, but their statement, “We are perishing,” goes too far into panic mode. 

Now, they’re probably only concerned with physical life and death. “Save us, we are perishing” could mean nothing more than, “Keep us from dying in this moment.” And if that’s all their prayer is, then they also have little faith because they don’t ask Jesus for enough. Both of these statements have theological significance. “Save us,” in Hebrew is the word, Hosanna, and it means, “Redeem us. Rescue us from our sins.” And “perishing” doesn’t simply mean to die, but it means to go to Hell. This is the word that Jesus uses in John 3:16, whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life.

So, with all Christian prayer, we pray for ultimate salvation and we do not panic, but we trust in God’s promises. That is why, whether we say it or not, all of our prayers must follow the example of our Lord in the Garden of Gethsemane, praying, “Thy will be done.” Because we don’t know what is best for us. We think we know, but we don't. God knows what is best. And sometimes drowning in the Sea of Galilee or being crucified upside down in Rome or being killed in battle is best. The Lord gives and the Lord takes away. Blessed be the Name of the Lord. The Lord calls us to trust in Him above all things, and to trust that He works all things for the good of those who love Him (Rom. 8:28).

However, this doesn’t mean that we can’t or shouldn’t ask to be spared or rescued from these things. We can and we should ask God for this. The Lord healed King Hezekiah and gave him 12 more years of life after he prayed. The Lord spared Israel for the sake of Moses’ intercession. With all boldness and confidence, we come and pray to God as dear children ask their dear father. Even though we don’t know what is best. We can be unashamed not only to pray that we be spared pain and sorrow—pray for things you need, pray to be healed or to keep your job—but we can even pray that we would be spared inconveniences or that we get fun things that we want. Christians can pray for things we don’t need. You can pray that you get to go on a cool vacation or pray for your puppy to get house-broken. We can also pray for big things, seemingly impossible things: for God to end legalized abortion in the United States, for the conversion of Muslim nations, for an end to hunger and bullying and lying politicians. We can pray for all this and more. Our Father wants to hear from us.

But what we aren’t free to do is insist on our way. We don’t bargain or give God ultimatums: “If you love me God, prove it by curing me.” Or “If you heal me, I will never commit that sin again.” And, just as importantly, we don’t panic. We trust that even in the middle of terrible circumstances—when we’ve suffered unjustly, been lied about, or lost our income, or even when we are dying, or we are losing our loved ones, or we’re about to drown in the Sea of Galilee—we don’t panic. Because God is good and God is in control. At least, our New Man doesn’t panic. The new you—the created–in–Christ–you—doesn’t panic.

But we are not entirely the New Man. We still have the Old sinful Adam in us and hanging on. So, when we do panic, when we give into the temptation to doubt God, we are like the disciples in the boat. We sin. We fail to trust God. And that is why they got rebuked. So, we also need to be rebuked by the Law, and we need to be taught to know what is good and to repent.

Notice, that despite their weakness and the littleness of their faith, the disciples do pray. They have little faith, but they do have faith. They aren’t unbelievers. They do look to Jesus for help. They seek to wake Him, to rouse Him. I’m afraid that often our prayer is too passive. “Thy will be done,” turns into “Whatever will be will be,” or “If it’s meant to be, that’s what will happen.” Those are not Christian attitudes. Neither we nor God are bound by some unknown fate. Christians pray, “Thy will be done,” because we know our God will act. 

This is what the Psalms teach us. By praying the Psalms we learn to bring our complaints to God. We go to Him to wake Him up. We dare to say to God that we are suffering because He isn’t looking at us, because we aren’t in His presence. We beg Him to act. We call upon Him to get His attention, to move Him to come and save us. The disciples’ prayer, “Save us, Lord,” is to their credit, even though it’s not perfect. They wake Jesus up and demand His salvation.

I don’t mean to minimize Jesus’ rebuke. The disciples sinned by panicking and not trusting. They needed the Law’s correction. Just compare their panic and little faith to the Roman centurion from last Sunday. He had great faith because he trusted the Word of the Lord, that whatever Jesus did it would be good, and so he did not panic. The disciples’ sanctification wasn’t yet as great as that centurion’s, and maybe they would never be as holy as he was on this side of glory. So they got corrected, rebuked and instructed. Not only was Jesus accusing them, slaying them by the Spirit so that He might forgive them, but He was also showing them how to live by the Spirit, how to be calm in the face of tragedy and danger, how to trust that God is good and in control.

By His example and by calming the storm, Jesus strengthened their faith. He answered their prayer. He saved them, not only from the waves in that moment, but also from eternal death. The disciples aren’t perishing—neither in the Sea of Galilee nor in Hell. They never perish. May this also be true for us. God in His mercy sends us crosses, trials, burdens, in order to teach us to pray. And He saves us from true peril.

God sent that storm with the intent of swamping the boat. If the winds and sea obey Him, then He is also the agent behind the storm. The entire purpose of the storm was to threaten the disciples with death, so that they would repent and they would pray. You can compare this with Jonah, where it is even more obvious that God is the One sending the storm because of Jonah’s unbelief, not punishing him and sending him to hell, but pushing Jonah, rebuking him, pressing him to repent. And you can compare this with your own life. God sends the storms of life, He sends crosses to us to teach us to pray, and to repent, and to rely on His saving action. 

Christianity is not a religion of prosperity and a care-free life. It’s a religion of suffering and crosses. After all, we are disciples of the One who suffered and bore a cross. Christianity is not a religion of accomplishments and great works either. It’s a religion of rebukes and repentance, and a religion that loves learning and loves the Scriptures. And Christianity is not a religion where God is asleep or far away, or where He only shows up once in a while in some fantastic flash, like a superhero. Christianity is the only religion where God came to earth as a man to be with us in our suffering and our sorrow, to suffer for us, and to die in our place. 

Ultimately, God sent that storm on the Sea of Galilee because Jesus was in that boat, and Jesus was going to pay for the sins of the world, and all of this sinful, fallen creation was turned against Him. It was not yet His hour on the Sea of Galilee. But that hour did come, when He was thrown overboard, into the surging wrath of God, when He was crucified and put to death for those disciples, and for us. So, those disciples actually do us a great service. On their lips is the prayer that God most wants to answer, the prayer of all humanity, our prayer: Save us, Lord! And so He does.

In the Holy + Name of Jesus. Amen.

Adapted from Rev. David Petersen, Epiphany 4, 2017.
Artwork copyright (c) 2010 Edward Riojas. Used by permission.