Readings for the Day:
Sermon:
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Original Manuscript:
Whenever things in my life start to get crazy, I start to worry. 'What can I do to solve this? Are things going to end well or terribly? What if things don't turn out well?'
And then things usually turn out okay, and I find myself thinking 'why did I spend all that time worrying, especially when I know God has it covered?'
That is the reaction a lot of us have. When things get crazy, or out of control, or even just out of our hands, it is natural to worry or to even panic. It is a natural, human response.
But no matter what we go through, God is always there with us. We tend to forget that.
In the Gospel this morning, the disciples find themselves in a difficult situation- a literal storm. Even though Jesus is right there in the midst of them, they panic.
Really what they think is that Jesus has abandoned them. To them, Jesus is taking a nap, not caring what is happening around them.
They do what we often want to do. They wake Jesus up because they want Him to act on their time, not God's time.
But God's time is often a little slower than we would like to be, because it is not always immediate. It often takes a lot of time for us to realize that God has really been acting the whole time.
That is why Jesus chastises them. They didn't have faith, or trust, that God was there protecting them, not from the storm but in the storm. Though things seemed bad around them, God was still there through the physical presence of Jesus with them.
When we find ourselves in our own crises, we need to remember that Jesus is there with us in the midst of it, like He was with the disciples. It may seem like He's not doing anything, but He is. He is protecting us from the worst the storm has to offer.
We should also remember that God's time is not our own. It is often not immediately that God calms the storm, but He is still there, even if we only realize it much later.
We are often like the disciples in our attitudes to times of trouble, those storms in our lives. What Jesus says to them could equally be said to us. We can learn from the disciples' mistake. Instead of panicking when trouble comes our way, or even getting angry at God for not acting sooner, we can put our trust that He is with us always.