As we jump back into Luke’s Gospel we find ourselves on (overly?) familiar territory. There is a danger that we are so used to the story of Jesus calming the storm that we simply reflex into what we assume it means… Jesus calms storms. I doubt that at MIE anyone would apply this by asking what storms are there in your life, because Jesus can calm them too?? I hope that isn’t where we end up! If for no other reason than the simple observation that it was Jesus who sent them into the storm in the first place.
There are a lot of good things to take away from the passage. We began to look at the question of faith in our service on Sunday. But as with any story in a Gospel, there is always more going on. We’ll look at a number of different elements in this study, but let’s focus on Jesus as we introduce our time together. The question we are invited to ask is: Who is this? He commands even the winds and the water and they obey Him (v.25).
Sigmund Freud got many things wrong! Among them is his theory of religion. He posited that the growth our religiosity was an evolutionary response to a primal fear of nature. Realizing that the world was a frightening place to live, humanity began to hope that there might be someone or something that could protect them from the elements, from earthquakes, from volcanoes, from … well, storms. And thus was born the idea of God. Like I said, he got many things wrong – at least in terms of Christianity!
Do you look at the disciples at the end of this passage and think that here are people who are comforted by the idea that Jesus might be God? Not so much. If anything, they are more afraid of Jesus than they were of the storm.
It does raise interesting questions about our sense of who Jesus is. Are we, as Freud imagined, simply those who come to Jesus for comfort, for some sense that someone is watching over us, protecting us, shielding us for a brutal and painful world? Is it wrong to expect that from Christ? Or are we those who have been gripped by a sense of Him as Creator and Sustainer of all that is? And are we amazed and fearful at such a One?
Questions:
Do you think Jesus knew there would be such a furious storm when He told the disciples to set sail to the other side of the lake?
Why is Jesus content to sleep while the disciples are in ‘great danger’? What does His capacity to sleep through a storm reveal about Jesus and His mindset?
Why does Jesus rebuke the disciples? Come to think of it, why does He ‘rebuke’ the storm (v.24)?
What is it about their behavior that demonstrates their lack of faith? What would the presence of faith have looked like?
What mistakes did the disciples make in this incident? What is Jesus seeking to teach them? How could we learn this lesson today?
Is MIE a place where your faith grows? How would you measure that?
Stormy seas are consistently used as an image of the nations in turmoil as they rail against the Lord (see e.g. Is.17:12-13; Is.57:20; Rev.17:15). Do you think this imagery lies behind the story of Jesus calming the ‘raging waters’? How would that affect how you read the account?
Is it a good thing that they are ‘in fear’ of Jesus? …and that they are ‘amazed’ at Him? Should fear and amazement characterize our response to Jesus today? Does it?
Have a look at Heb.1:2-3, and 1:10-11. What is the relationship between Jesus and Creation? How should that affect your attitude to Jesus? …and to Creation?
How should Christians engage with the ‘environmentalism’? Where can we agree with environmentalism, and where must we disagree? What is distincitvely Christian about our views?
