Fear and Faith: A Meditation on Mark 4

In the last few verses of Mark’s fourth chapter, the story of a sea journey is recounted.  After a day of teaching Jesus teld His disciples that it was time to go, and so they boarded a ship to cross the Sea of Galilee.  While the Sea of Galilee may not seem large and dangerous to those of us who have crossed larger oceans (it’s only about 8 miles across and 13 miles long, smaller than many American lakes) it is worth remembering that sailing in the ancient world was always a dangerous affair.  They didn’t have weather predicting or tracking satellites, GPS, high visibility lighting, or advanced ship building techniques.  Most of the ships were open and low, making them susceptible to wind and waves.

After a long day of teaching the multitude, Jesus and His disciples were now in one of these ships, in the evening hours with the dying of the light, moving across the sea.  A difficult and spooky journey to be taken in the dark, it became absolutely terrifying as up rose a storm that tossed the boat in raging wind and waves.  The small boat was becoming quickly swamped and in fear of sinking, and the disciples panicked.

To be fair to the disciples, who could blame them?  In the dark, out in the middle of a large expanse of water, beaten by a raging storm, they thought they would surely perish.  Even if some of them were solid swimmers, tossed about in the dark wind and waves, who would know which way to swim?  Who would be able to stay afloat in such stormy seas without eventually drowning?  Facing a watery mortality in the howling dark is enough to rattle anyone, and the disciples were no exception.

In the midst of the disciples’ panic, they found yet another unsettling sight:  Jesus asleep on a pillow in the back of the boat.  While everyone else was terrified that they were going to die, Jesus rested comfortably.  Apparently unable to contain themselves, they awoke Jesus with a wild-eyed incredulity, asking, “Master, carest thou not that we perish?”

Of course, the question itself was infinitely ridiculous.  In fact, Jesus so loved the whole world, his disciples included, that He descended from the Father to seek and to save everyone—a work he would accomplish through His own suffering and death.  While Jesus knew precisely the situation His disciples were in (He is the Almighty, Omnipotent God, after all,) He also knew that they had much greater needs that what they were focused on at that moment.

For example, why should a person ever be afraid of death?  For however many billions of people who have come and gone upon this earth since its creation, how many of them have escaped death?  The only thing to fear about death, is the judgment of God to whom we shall give a reckoning after we have left this vale of tears.  Death is the unnatural but fully deserved fate of our fallen race for having embraced evil rather than truth.  But in the end, what is fearful about death isn’t the means by which it comes, be it by wind and waves or the hands of jihadists, but rather the terms upon which we shall meet our Maker.

But the fear which gripped the disciples on that dark and sinking boat, is the same kind of fear that grips each of us.  We fear death for countless irrational reasons, most of which mask our real and deepest fear:  our lack of faith in God.  Some people fear pain and suffering, preferring to die in their sleep rather than in some horrible accident or persecution; some people fear a slow and degenerating death, preferring to go out in a blaze of glory; some people fear dying too young, preferring to crutch along a tormented life as long as possible; some people fear dying without having taken care of their loved ones, preferring to outlive everyone they love for the sake of duty; and the list goes on.  But at root, everyone knows that death comes for us all, just as it has for every generation before us, and as it will for every generation to come after us.  People will die in earthquakes, floods, storms, violence, disease, accidents, persecutions, wars and conspiracies… and we know that we have very little, if any influence over how it will come to us.  Somewhere deep down, in places we don’t like to acknowledge exist, we know that it’s not really the means of our death that we fear, but Him to whom we shall go when our life in this world is finished.

It is this deepest, darkest fear that Jesus comes to dispel.  Indeed, apart from Jesus, the fear of meeting God face to face is the only rational fear we have.  We know that we are sinful creatures, having lived our lives in broken and selfish ways, squandering the riches of His gifts.  We know that we do not deserve to live even now, let alone for eternity.  We know that we deserve death and hell for the mess we have made not only of our own lives, but of the whole creation.  Apart from Jesus the Natural Law which God has written into the very fabric of the universe condemns us, and it cries out in terror from within our own breast.  It is a fear which cannot love and trust God, because it knows we do not deserve His love.  It is a fear born of sin, born apart from the faith we were made to have in the beginning.

Into this fear, Jesus comes as our sacrifice and our salvation.  The Lord of Life, the Eternal Word of the Father, Jesus descends into our flesh to bear our sin and to be our savior.  Upon His own shoulders He takes our wretchedness and death, our own hell and despair.  Through His Cross He becomes for us the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world—even our sin, our death, our hell.  Jesus becomes for us our reconciliation with God, so that no one might fear death or the grave, because we no longer have anything to fear from our Maker.  For everyone who is baptized into the death and resurrection of Jesus is already reconciled to God the Father by the blood of God the Son, sealed in faith by God the Holy Spirit.  In Jesus, all who face the terrors of death now face them unafraid.  By the perfect love of Jesus Christ poured out for us through His Cross, our fear is replaced by faith.

This is what Jesus’ disciples were to learn in time, and what His disciples in every age are led by His Spirit to understand through His Holy Gospel.  As you look at your life today, where do you find fear?  It is there that the Law has convicted you of your shortcomings, of your insufficiency, and your failure, ultimately leading you to despair before the Almighty God in whose presence you shall someday stand.  But into your fears, every single one of them, Jesus still speaks His Word of forgiveness and life, of mercy and grace.  Having done all things necessary to secure your life forever through the sacrifice of His Cross, He calls to you, asking you the same question He asked His disciples on that dark and sinking ship:  “Why are ye so fearful? how is it that ye have no faith?”

Turn from your unbelief and its ever tortuous fear.  Hear the Gospel of salvation which is the free gift of His incalculable grace, given to you by Him who endured all things for you.  Trust in the mercy of your God, whose love overwhelms your sin, your sorrow, and your fear.  Live in the new life Jesus gives to you, leaving fear behind that you may walk in His Spirit by faith.  Amen.