Who Is This? A Meditation on Mark 4 and Job 38, for the 5th Sunday after Pentecost

And the same day, when the even was come,

he saith unto them, Let us pass over unto the other side.

And when they had sent away the multitude,

 they took him even as he was in the ship.

And there were also with him other little ships.

 And there arose a great storm of wind,

and the waves beat into the ship, so that it was now full.

 And he was in the hinder part of the ship, asleep on a pillow:

and they awake him, and say unto him,

Master, carest thou not that we perish?

And he arose, and rebuked the wind, and said unto the sea, Peace, be still.

And the wind ceased, and there was a great calm.

 And he said unto them, Why are ye so fearful?

 how is it that ye have no faith?

And they feared exceedingly, and said one to another,

What manner of man is this,

that even the wind and the sea obey him?

 

Mark’s fourth chapter invites the reader to contemplate with Jesus’ disciples one of the central questions of human existence:  who is Jesus?  Not only did Jesus teach His disciples deep and ancient wisdom wrapped up in parables, but He demonstrated His authority over all creation by silencing a boisterous sea with a word of command.  He was not at the mercy of Nature, nor demons or dark powers of any kind, nor the political machinations of the clever and powerful.  Jesus was, is, and always shall be the Eternally Begotten Son of God—the Word of the Father, through Whom all things were made, and to Whom all things shall one day give account.  The great fear of those disciples and others with them in the ship is reminiscent of Job’s encounter with God so many centuries before, where in his fallen humanity, Job finally came to grasp the immense glory and majesty of the King of all Creation, and in knowing God more fully began to understand both himself and his world more fully, as well.  Only in rightly answering the question, “Who is this?” in relation to God, can man eventually answer correctly the questions of, “Who am I?” in relation to himself, and “What is this?” in relation to the world.

 

It is a mark of fallen humanity that our minds are often obsessed with ourselves and what we can get out of the world, rather than be interested in the Creator of both us and the world around us.  The inclination to self-idolatry is strong, and is reflected in selfish ambition, desire, and concern for the self over the neighbor.  Where people strive against each other for personal advantage, they lean into their false conviction that they are the captains of their own ships, serving as their own gods, with their own appetites as the central focus of their lives.  A person who attempts to answer, “Who am I?” without first understanding who God is according to His own Word and revelation, will inevitably come to a wrong conclusion about who they are.  In our own age, this has flowered into various movements that unify a pursuit of hedonistic sexual pleasures with a definition of self identity—a twisting of humanity into a self-serving sexual animal that is defined by the passion being pursued.  But sexual pursuits transformed into personal identity are not the only foibles of modern man, as wrath, envy, pride, greed, and gluttony can result in the same kind of errors.  Man, apart from God, becomes a slave of his passions, so it should not surprise anyone that such willing slaves begin to identify themselves with their captors, and form associations with like-minded delusional deviants.

 

Of course, lies don’t make themselves true by practice, nor by the cacophony of many practitioners.  What lies do tend to accomplish, however, is the destruction of the minds, bodies, and souls of those who embrace them.  Is it any wonder that people consumed by the pursuit of lust, wrath, envy, pride, greed, and gluttony, or any other vice, tend to destroy themselves?  Suicide rates are astronomically high among those who falsely identify themselves with dark passions, as is drug abuse, violence, poverty, and misery.  When the devil leads a soul to define itself according to its passion rather than the Word of God, that soul may believe at first that they have found the ultimate autonomy and freedom, but what they soon find later is the utter debasement of their human dignity.  A soul without purpose or dignity beyond the pursuit of passion is a soul without hope beyond the next pleasurable fix… and those fixes of vice always seem to degrade over time, until the old pleasures lose their flavor.  Deeper and deeper into the vice a soul may plunge, until in darkness and despair, they abandon all hope of recovery.  This is the devil’s ploy rather than the Creator’s intent, but those who follow the devil will eventually find themselves chained and debased in the same darkness to which he is destined.

 

Yet in our confusion, delusion, and self-destruction, Jesus enters in with a Word that dispels evils of every type and kind.  Jesus invites us to know Him as He really is—the Lord God Almighty, full of grace and truth.  In knowing Jesus as our loving Savior we see rightly the Father as our loving Creator, and the Holy Spirit as our loving inspiration to a life of fullness and virtue.  In Jesus we see ourselves restored to the place from which we were fallen, back in communion with the One God who created us to enjoy His good fellowship according to our created order.  Jesus doesn’t just quiet the seas and storms to awe those who see Him, but to teach them that He really is God, the Eternal Word Incarnate, dwelling among men for their good.  In Jesus we see more clearly that God did not create man to torture or destroy him, but that man might have life, and have it abundantly in Him.  The love of God poured out in Jesus as He went to His Cross to save all mankind, rising the third day to declare victory over sin, death, hell, and the devil, is the final answer to, “Who is this?” that gives us also our answers to, “Who am I?” and, “What is this?”  In Jesus we find our hope, our reconciliation, our purpose, and our dignity, all because God has first loved us enough to create, save, and sustain us in His grace.

 

Hear the Word of the Lord as it pierces the darkness of our age with the truth of who God is, who we are, and what this cosmos is made to be.  We were not made for destruction, nor to be slaves of our passions in a false sense of self-worship.  Rather, we were made to be children of God, eternal citizens of His Kingdom which knows no end, enjoying fellowship with our Maker in a love that cannot be exhausted throughout all eternity.  We are who we are, because of who Jesus is, and our lives are given eternal dignity and glory in His service, as we are conformed day by day more in His image.  Let go the false gods and the lies of the evil one, to see the Truth which sets you free, and gives you life everlasting in joy and peace, all for Jesus’ sake.  Soli Deo Gloria—amen.