We are Never Sunk!

Mark 4:35-41

I think the biggest mistake that Jesus disciples in the boat, in the middl of the storm make is that they have convinced themselves that there is no possibility for survival. Notice what they say to Jesus in verse “Do you not care THAT we are perishing?”=the same as saying: “We’re sunk!”

As far as I can tell from the story, though-even though they stopped bailing, stopped rowing, stopped straining to go to the back of the boat to get to Jesus, wake him up, wait for him to wipe the sleep out of his eyes, and then look at them and say “What’s up?” so that they could say “Do you not care THAT we are perishing?”…in all the time that it took to do all of that-we have to assume that the boat is still floating, they are still in it, not tossed into the sea, and even though they are probably wet, cold, and trembling-still alive. NOT, as they put it, “perishing.”
These disciples made the mistake of making up their minds to fail, instead of to succeed. Making up your mind to fail, by the way-and you can look this up in a thesaurus-is the opposite of faith. Which is why Jesus responds the way he does: “Why are you afraid? Have you still no faith?” It’s the same as saying: “Boy, you ARE sunk!”

This is a story about a mistake, but it’s a mistake that every disciple makes every now and then. We jump in our metaphorical boat, we push off from a metaphorical shore, and we expect to coast through life as if it were a metaphorical sea that always stays as still as glass. But, before long, a metaphorical “mega-storm” suddenly arises-and when it does the wind, and the waves, and the water that rises around our feet seems awfully real. And when it happens, sometimes we make the same mistake Jesus’ disciples made-we look at it all, and we say “We’re sunk!”

Guess what? When we get to that point, we are sunk!

It would have taken a miracle for the disciples in the boat to feel anything other than that the end was near. Fortunately for them a man who was capable of miracles was in the boat with them, lying in the back, asleep on the cushion.

Sometimes it seems it will take a miracle for us to feel anything other than the deadly power of all those metaphorical winds, waves, and deluges. Fortunately for us, the man who is capable of miracles is always nearby.

I want to share a story with you of a group of people who felt that the end was never near. It goes like this. A long, long time ago there was a ruthless king named Nebuchadnezzar who built an enormous golden statue-it was 90 feet tall and 9 feet wide. When it was finished, he called everyone in his kingdom, he gathered them together and he told them: “This is what you will worship. So, from now on, when you hear my royal band strike up a tune, when you hear the horns blowing, the pipes whistling, the strings strumming and the drums beating-you will know it’s time to worship. And when that happens…” he said, “I don’t care what you’re doing, you’ll worship. At the sound of my music, you will stop whatever you’re up to, and you will look to my golden statue, and you will fall down on your knees and you will worship with all your heart.” Then he added: “The ones who don’t do this will be gathered up and thrown into a furnace of blazing hot fire.”

Now, in Nebuchadnezzar’s kingdom, there were three guys. You may have heard their names before: Shadrach, Mesach, and Abednego. If you have, then you know that this is their story. When they heard this decree, and when they saw the enormous golden statue, they looked at each other and said “Where have we heard this before?” Then, at once, they remembered a story from their Bible-about the time when the Israelites were wandering through the wilderness and they made a golden statue of a calf and said to one another: “This is what we will worship.” And they did. They bowed down to it and worshipped it. Shadrach, Mesach, and Abednego remembered this story and they agreed with one another that the golden calf seemed eerily similar to Nebuchadnezzar’s golden statue, and that the people bowing down to that golden statue seemed eerily similar to the Israelites who bowed down to the golden calf. Well, Abednego looked at Mesach and said “What happened to those Israelites? How did it turn out for them?” And Mesach looked at Shadrach, who had gone to fetch his Bible and was just opening to that story. And as Shadrach read silently, he shook his head, looked at his friends and said “It didn’t turn out well for them. The golden calf was a fake god, and unfortunately for them, the real God was nearby as they worshipped it…and that God wasn’t happy about it.” And right then and there, Shadrach, Mesach, and Abednego decided among themselves that they would worship the God they knew from the Bible, not the god that Nebuchadnezzar had created. Furnace or no furnace, they agreed, they would never bow down to it.

Before long, word got back to King Nebuchadnezzar that three men in the kingdom weren’t worshipping. They weren’t stopping what they were doing, they weren’t fixing their gazes on the statue, and they weren’t falling down to worship. Needless to say, Nebuchadnezzar was not thrilled. He called for these three men to be brought before him. When Shadrach, Mesach, and Abednego arrived, he gave them one more chance. “I’m going to strike up my band” he said, “and when they do, you will fall down and worship my statue. If you don’t, I’ll have you thrown into the fiery furnace.”

And do you know what they said? They looked at the king and told him “Don’t waste your time. Don’t strike up the band. We would rather go into the fire. If the God we believe in, the God we worship , saves us, then He saves us. If he doesn’t, then he doesn’t. But we will NEVER worship anyone or anything else.”

So, into the fire they went. The king stoked the flames, and made it seven times hotter than normal. His had Shadrach, Mesach, and Abednego tied up, and ordered them thrown into the fire. It was so hot that the servants who threw them in died themselves. And the king stood and watched. But then, something strange happened. While the 90 foot tall, by 9 foot wide golden statue stood on the hill in the distance and did nothing, the real God…the one of the Bible, the one that Shadrach, Mesach, and Abednego knew, stood in the fire with them. Not a hair on their heads was singed. Not a scrap of their clothing was burned. When they came walking out of the furnace, they didn’t even smell like smoke! These three men were ready to die before they worshipped any God but the God they trusted for everything.

I tell this story again because I don’t believe that the words “We’re sunk” were in Shadrach, Mesach, or Abednego’s vocabulary. They walked into the most dangerous place on earth, expecting to find God there…and they weren’t disappointed.

Unfortunate though it may seem, mega storms and mega fires seem to make themselves at home right in the middle of our lives. We don’t want them there. We didn’t invite them to come. We wish they didn’t, but the reality is: they arise. That’s life.

The good news is, God doesn’t mind walking right into even the fieriest of furnaces. In fact, God feels right at home in the middle of the raging winds, the drenching downpours, the thunder, the lightning, and the high waves. If you don’t believe me, go back and re-read today’s lesson and look at what Jesus is doing when the mega-storm arises: “But he was in the stern, asleep on the cushion.” Storms don’t bother Jesus. Fiery furnaces won’t scare God away.

When people told Jesus to worship their way, practice their religion, and play by their rules…or die….well, you know what he did. He walked straight toward the cross and the grave because he believed that God would be waiting for him there. Then, when he walked out of the tomb, he didn’t look like death, because as painful as the whole thing was-God was there!

So, the next time you’re getting ready to sail your metaphorical boat out onto that metaphorical sea, and that very real mega-storm arises, remember that Jesus isn’t phased by storms. And the next time you’re standing in front of what feels like a fiery furnace, remember if you walk into it-God will too. But, if all you can say when the wind and the waves and the rains pound against you is “I’m sunk.” Then chances are, you will be, because faith in the God that walked Shadrach, Mesach, and Abednego out of the flames…and the faith that turned the mega-storm into a mega-calm doesn’t know the meaning of those two words.