The Gospel of Luke: Calming the Storm Luke 8: 22-25

If I had to pick my favorite Gospel it would be the Gospel of Luke. There was a time in the life of the church, where new believers would be encouraged to read the Gospel of John - though I could never quite understand why this is where we wanted folks new to the faith to start, since the Gospel of John, while beautifully written, often speaks in language that can be difficult to grasp. Others have been encouraged to read the Gospel of Mark - but everything happens so quickly in this Gospel (where the most frequently occurring word is ‘kai’ - ‘and’) that it is easy to skip right over something important. 

I love the Gospel of Luke because it focuses on the totality of Jesus’s ministry - from before his conception through his death and beyond - connecting seemlessly with the other books authored by Luke the Physician - Acts. It speaks of miracles and healings. Teaching and parables. All of Luke’s writings are pointing us towards a God who loved us enough to send a Savior.

For the next three weeks we are going to be exploring the Gospel of Luke together, picking up on some the key stories found within. Today we start in the eighth chapter of the Gospel with the the calming the sea.

One day, Jesus and his disciples ventured across the lake. However, while they were sailing a storm hit. Let’s pause here. When we say that the disciples were in a boat, I think many of us have grand visions of what a boat would look like during this time. We may not be thinking ocean liner or ark, but we are definitely thinking more than a modern fishing boat. But a fishing boat it was. One that would easily be swept up and take on water during a large storm. 

For my parents 30th wedding anniversary, our family ventured to the Outer Banks in North Carolina. It was truly a week full of family and celebration - from renewing their vows on the beach to renting a pontoon boat to watch the sunset one evening. If you have ever been on a pontoon boat - they also can take on water. If you want to steer clear of the spray, you are told not to sit in certain locations and even then you are probably going to get a little wet. That’s with the weather being good. Seeing what happened on a beautiful day in that pontoon boat, I would never want to be caught in one in a storm.

Yet the disciples found themselves in something probably equivalent in size, if just a bit larger and maybe with a lower level on it, then that pontoon boat. In a storm. Those disciples who had previous lives as fishermen would have known about life on the water - and they would also know about the power of the storm. The boat was taking on too much water and the knew that they were in danger. 

I think many of us know about the power of storms in our own lives as well. Perhaps it is a natural storm. I have shared with a few of you - that at an early age my brothers and I became avid shop-vac users, because my parents basement would flood when it rained too hard and too fast. We lost toys and photos and records and books, and quickly learned not to leave things in the basement that we were prizes possessions. 

For others of us, the storms we face aren’t ones from nature but ones from around us - storms of rock relationships, divorce, estranged family members. The storms that you know are coming - like when you have to go a family reunion where you know you will face the same people making the same hurtful comments, and the storms that completely take you by surprise. 

Still for others it may be the storms that we face within - addictions. Illness. Private struggles. Those things that we try to keep to ourselves, while the waves inside seem like they are breaking us apart. 

Jesus, too knew about storms. All sorts of storms. Just in the eighth chapter of the Gospel of Luke, we find him telling his disciples that his family is really those who listen and respond to the Word of God, as he is told that his family is looking for him. He heals a man possessed by demons and a woman who had been bleeding for twelve years. He raised a daughter from the dead. Jesus was seeing daily the effects of storms in people’s personal and communal lives. 

Here’s the problem church. All too often we let the story end there. We talk about the storm. And then stop. We forget the next part of the story. The part where the disciples recognized their need and went and got Jesus and he calmed the wind and the waves. The disciples thought they were going to drown and parish and Jesus brought peace. 

Friends, the storm is not the end of the story. Jesus is. Jesus who brings healing. Jesus who brings peace. The problem is that we often are only looking for Jesus to show up in a very particular way, and if things don’t turn out the way we want - then we assume that Jesus wasn’t there. We want the Jesus from this story, who stops the storm immediately, and no other way.

However, that isn’t always the way that Jesus’s peace works. I was recently talking to a friend who has had a rough year. Nothing has seemed to go the way she and her family had planned. Yet now, even with the midst of the storm still going on, she was able to say that Christ has been with her. In fact, if things would have went her way, then she would probably be even worse off then she could imagine. For her the peace of Christ was recognizing his presence in the fact that things didn’t go her way, and didn’t go her way for a reason far beyond her understanding. 

Often we read what happens next as Jesus accusing the disciples of not having faith, but what if instead Jesus is asking them, where is your faith located? Is it truly with me? The one who can calm the wind and the waves. The one who has perfect ways and perfect timing? Are you with me, even when the storms of life are raging, or are you swept away? Are you in awe and wonder of me because of what I have done or because you know who I am? 

Friends, the hope is this story is not located in the storm that no one wanted to be in. The hope is located in Jesus. Do we have confidence in the power and authority of Christ, even when the storms come rolling in? And in the midst of the storm, do we know who to cry out to? 

It is so easy for us to get caught up and lost in the storm, even as the church. And when our eyes get focused on the wind and the waves, it is hard for us to declare the hope in this passage and in our lives, even as the church. What storms are you facing in your life today? And do we proclaim more about the storm then about the Master over them? Let us cry out, again, O Church, to Jesus. Amen.