Harvey. Irma. Sandy. Ike. Katrina. Andrew. Agnes.
To most of us these are a random assortment of names. But in fact they are the names of some of the most
devastating hurricanes in history — storms whose impact on the lives of
people continue long after the clouds have parted, the floods receded and the
winds died down.
We watched with horror the devastation wrought
by Hurricane Harvey on the Gulf Coast last year. Interstates in Houston became
surging rapids. Islands in the Caribbean like Puerto Rico lost most of their
infrastructure. Harvey was soon followed by Irma, which hit the Caribbean again
and then turned her wrath on Florida. The recovery from these storms is ongoing
and will take years but, even then, the memories will linger longer.
Naming storms is something that humans have been
doing for a long time. The World
Meteorological Organization (WMO) began the process of officially naming
Atlantic storms in 1953, at first using female names and naming them in
alphabetical order. Male names were added in 1979. Which many females would say is appropriate
since men create many of their most difficult challenges. I won’t go further into that subject.
Let me ask you, if you were to give name to a current or recent storm what might it be called… Hurricane Cancer, Hurricane Divorce, Hurricane Unemployment, Hurricane Financial Crisis, Hurricane Acute Anxiety, Hurricane Recovery, Hurricane Disappointment, Hurricane Bitterness, Hurricane Unexpected Change. What would you name your Storm?
Some of the most vicious storms and Hurricanes take place in the summer months but life’s adversities have no respect of seasons and they seldom come with advance warning.
Biblicly speaking, storms are an old story. It’s no coincidence that the first major story after creation is a story of a Storm. Noah is a righteous man who obeys God, builds a huge ship, and prepares for God’s judgment on a world where the wickedness of humanity was its own storm.
God allows the chaos of the waters to break loose in a horrific flood, reverting back to the watery void of Genesis 1. And yet, while the waters rage, God saves Noah, his family and the creatures of the earth on an ark tossed by stormy seas. God’s judgment, God’s grace and God’s rescue come together in one season. And these storming accounts shown in Scripture we encounter a God who is involved in the deliverance and assistance of His covenant people.
Noah steps out of the ark and into a new creation washed clean by the flood. Chaos is pushed back again. In Exodus God parts the waters of the Red Sea to save Israel from the evil of slavery in Egypt. In the book of Job, Job rails at God in the midst of evil and suffering and God eventually shows him the great sea monsters under his control – as a sign that chaos doesn’t have the last word.
In Isaiah we have a futuristic look
to a day when all can come to the waters and drink without fear (Isaiah
55:1). Jonah tossed into the raging
sea but saved by the belly of a whale (Jonah
2-3). In the New Testament we see Jesus, going through the waters of baptism and into the desert to do
battle with the forces of evil (Mark
1:9-13).
The story of Scripture is the story of how God
brings the people of God through the waters of evil and into a new creation. It’s
no accident, then, that Mark 4 preserves this story of Jesus and his disciples
on a boat being tossed by an unexpected and violent storm. The chaos rages once
again; rickety boats are swamped by 10-foot waves and are starting to sink.
Fear, panic and desperation come over these fishermen, who have clearly never
experienced this type of storm (vv.
35-37).
Mark tells us that in the midst of all the
chaos, Jesus is in the stern of the boat napping quietly (v. 38). The disciples, meanwhile, are in a panic. Jesus apparently
doesn’t sense the chaos, the evil that surrounds them, and so they are
concerned. “Wake up!” they yell over the howling wind. “Don’t
you see that we’re dying here? Don’t you care?”
Jesus wakes up, and in my imagining he looks at
them for a long moment with one eye open. He doesn’t answer their question.
Instead he stands and addresses the wind and the waves. Mark says that he “rebuked”
the wind and said to the sea, “Peace! Be still!” (v. 39). Isn’t it interesting that these are roughly
the same words that Jesus uses to cast out demons? He rebukes them and tells them to be quiet.
It’s no coincidence that the next scene in Mark is Jesus casting out a demon on
the other side of the lake in Mark 5. Mark, as well as the other gospels, makes it
clear: Jesus has command over the wind and waves, over chaos and calamity and
over evil and despair.
How did he calm the storm? How did he turn a violent, raging sea into a
placid pond of tranquility?
We might expect a presentation outlining
Jesus’ humanity and divinity. Jesus instead turns and asks them a question: “Why
are you afraid? Have you still no faith?” (v. 40).
And I could easily imagine the disciples
response, “Well, duh, of course we’re afraid! We’re in a Category 5 storm,
we almost died we had no idea the forces of nature would obey you…yes we were
afraid!”
And we remember how Jesus said to the waves, Quiet! Be Still! He brought absolute calm to raging storm and
terrifying fear. In their fear, however,
the disciples had forgotten the important fact: Jesus in in the boat with them.
They woke Jesus up so that he could share in their panic. Jesus, on the
other hand, wants them to have faith — not fear. “Always remember, I’m in the
boat with you,” Jesus says in effect, “and I’ve got this.”
The storms hit us, often with great fury. Devastating hurricanes can hit our lives no
matter where we live: Where is Jesus in the midst of these storms? Where is
Jesus when the typhoon of devastating illness hits? Where is Jesus when the
lightning strike of a loved one’s death leaves us in shock? Where is God when
the waves of death, destruction, and doubt threaten to sink us?
Where is Jesus? In the boat,
with us, and there he invites us to turn from fear to faith — the kind of
faith that Jesus himself had in the God who brings order out of chaos and will
one day still all storms forever. At
the end of the Bible in the book of Revelation, we see a vision of the new
creation made possible by Jesus’ as the completion of God’s plan.
In chapter 21 we read about the new heavens and
the new earth “coming down” and casting aside all the storms of
evil from the old creation, making all things new. As John sees this vision, he
notices that in this new creation “the sea was no more” (Revelation 21:1). There’s no
place for evil in the new creation. No place for tears. No place for mourning
or crying or pain (21:4). No more
storms! But until such eternal
peace prevails let us remember He is always in the boat with us!