Hurt and Offended by False Promises.

Mark 4:

³⁸ But He was in the stern, asleep on a pillow. And they awoke Him and said to Him, “Teacher, do You not care that we are perishing?”

³⁹ Then He arose and rebuked the wind, and said to the sea,“Peace, be still!” And the wind ceased and there was a great calm. ⁴⁰ But He said to them, “Why are you so fearful? How is it that you have no faith?”

In this wonderful account shows the power of Jesus over the elements. Myself I will probably never face a raging storm on a small ship. However, life has constant storms of a different kind. A job is lost due to a weak economy and one finds it nearly impossible to find another one. A marriage or other relationship will go on the rocks against a person’s desire and not a result of abuse or neglect. The Specialist Physician, speaking of a cell in your body which has turned into a consumer, has taken over and nothing more can be done. These are the storms of life which can overcome us all.

Some offended people at God will at times share how that at a critical time another believer referred to the above passage as accusation. This, perhaps was meant for comfort, but the dear suffering saint of the Lord sees it as accusing him or her of no faith.

This is not the lack of faith to which Jesus is referring. The disciples were well acquainted with the scriptures which refers to the coming Messiah. These tell of how this Deliverer will be whipped, crucified and rise again. Jesus had proven his Messianic office many times in many ways. His followers did not look at those passages in assurance that they would not flounder in a raging storm.

Jesus as God incarnate can of course address all those storms and solve each one. However, we have no promise in scripture to this end result. What we have is the promise of Jesus there with us. Jesus with crucified and risen arms to hold us up and ultimately, in the resurrection, deliver us from sin and death.

Let us strive live in peace according to the precious promises we have from our Good Shepherd. Let us not give accusation to the suffering people by telling them he or she has no faith. Rather we want to weep with those who weep and point to the strong and precious promises of Our Lord.

In the name of Jesus. Amen †