In The Midst Of Your Storm | Mark 6:45-52

INTRODUCTION

Have you been in the midst of a storm?

Last year we were travelling in our car and suddenly, without warning we headed into a storm. The wind was very heavy and within no time it started raining cats and dogs. We were on a highway and we could not see beyond our windscreen. It is dark, it is raining, and we have no visibility. We finally had to put the car to the side and wait for around 10 minutes for the storm to pass away.

How many of you are a little nervous when you are flying? Maybe that aeroplane took off very smoothly but in mid-flight, the pilot puts on the seat belt sign and announces that you are facing turbulence or a storm. Now you are landing in a headwind. You cannot see anything out of the window and the aeroplane lands with a bang. A journey that started so normally ended up in fear.

I suspect that storms are a part of life. It’s not all of life. Sometimes it’s a season of life, sometimes it is a storm that comes and then passes, and then we have these moments of calm and relative tranquillity, peace, and then as time goes on additional storms.

• Are you in some kind of storm this morning?
• Are you in a situation where all of a sudden life turned upside down?

Mark 6:45-52

⁴⁵Immediately Jesus made his disciples get into the boat and go on ahead of him to Bethsaida, while he dismissed the crowd. ⁴⁶After leaving them, he went up on a mountainside to pray.

⁴⁷Later that night, the boat was in the middle of the lake, and he was alone on land. ⁴⁸He saw the disciples straining at the oars, because the wind was against them. Shortly before dawn he went out to them, walking on the lake. He was about to pass by them, ⁴⁹but when they saw him walking on the lake, they thought he was a ghost. They cried out, ⁵⁰because they all saw him and were terrified.

Immediately he spoke to them and said, “Take courage! It is I. Don’t be afraid.” ⁵¹Then he climbed into the boat with them, and the wind died down. They were completely amazed, ⁵²for they had not understood about the loaves; their hearts were hardened.

In this sermon we are going to look at the disciples in the storm and see:

1. The Descent.
2. The Despair.
3. The Delay.
4. The Deliverance.

1. The Descent.

The first thing we’re going to notice about this passage and specifically about the disciples is what see as the descent. Just before this event, Jesus fed 5000 men. Now it’s quite likely that the place where Jesus fed the thousands was in a hilly area and now they have descended to sea level. But that’s really not the point. I am talking about the mountaintop experiences, the high-faith experiences the disciples had and especially with Jesus feeding the 5000 men with 5 loaves and 2 fish.

They are coming off from some kind of an emotional high, some kind of spiritual pinnacle where they have experienced one glorious view of God after another. In this gospel, they have seen Him work in ways that are clearly of God.

Jesus healed the demon-possessed man; Mk. 1, 5.

Jesus healed a man with leprosy; Mk. 1

Jesus healed many with various diseases; Mk 1.

Jesus healed a dead girl and a sick woman; Mk. 5.

They have seen Jesus feed the 5000 men; Mk. 6.

The Lord does allow us these moments where we just get to stand back and say praise God. But then I also see that there are times when Jesus says okay, we’ve got to move on. You can’t live forever on yesterday’s miracle. God says, “It’s time to come down off these mountaintop experiences and He compels them into the boat.”

Mark 6:44-45

The number of the men who had eaten was five thousand. Immediately Jesus made his disciples get into the boat and go on ahead of him to Bethsaida, while he dismissed the crowd.

Jesus acts forcefully. He constrained, by force is what the word means.

Some may have asked why did you leave the Master alone, and they may have responded with well, “Well, He left us no choice. He just sent us to the sea and left us alone.”

APPLICATION

Do you know, in our Christian life, God doesn’t always give us a choice? Often times He just presents the next thing before us, we don’t get to choose.

Joseph doesn’t choose Egypt. It is, in a sense, chosen for him.

Daniel doesn’t choose Babylon or the lion’s den. It is chosen for him.

The only choice left for them is, “Am I going to trust God or not?”

APPLICATION

You’re often let with no choice about cancer, no choice about an unfaithful spouse, no choice about a wayward child, no choice about the death of a loved one, a lost job, a broken relationship, yet God is providentially doing the choosing, and in our journey with Him, this often brings about a journey into a storm.

They’re off their spiritual mountaintop.  The first thing that we see in this passage is the descent. They’re in this boat and now look what that brings. It actually brings despair.

2. Despair

Mark 6:47

⁴⁷Later that night, the boat was in the middle of the lake, and he was alone on land. ⁴⁸He saw the disciples straining at the oars, because the wind was against them.

Now, let me ask you a question:

• Who is it that actually created the need?
• Who knowingly placed them in a situation?
• Who knowingly places the disciples in a position where they are going to be in great need?
• Is Jesus omniscient? Yes.
• Does He know about the storm that they’re going to face when He puts them into the boat? Yes.

Well, Jesus knows well about the storm, and yet the disciples now find themselves in a position of great despair. They are ‘straining’ at the oars. They’re in the middle of toiling. It means to vex with grievous pains of body or mind, to torment, distressed.

Mark records the time Jesus came to the disciples in the boat. Jesus came before dawn.

Dawn – the appearance of light in the sky before sunrise.

That means the whole night they were out in the storm. It is dark, raining, and the boat is swinging.

Why Is It That At Times God Places Us In Darkness?

Do you know, for a believer there are some advantages to darkness? Darkness helps us in many ways:

Darkness Forces Us To Remember.

Listen, when you are in a time of darkness, you have no light, it forces you to remember.

I remember what do I know to be true about God.

I remember what has God revealed to me in the light that I now lean on in the darkness.

ILLUSTRATION

Nowadays we have very less power cuts or load shedding, even if we have a shutdown, almost all our homes have the UPS.

During a load-shedding, don’t many of you know your way around in the darkness? I mean how many of you can just reach for a key or walk to the doorknob in the dark? In the darkness, I know my way around. In darkness, I remember what is familiar to me.

Do you know what darkness does? It forces us to remember.

Isaiah 50:10

Who among you fears the Lord

and obeys the word of his servant?

Let the one who walks in the dark,

who has no light,

trust in the name of the Lord

and rely on their God.

Rely on their God –  that means lean upon “their God.”

There may well be times when God says I’m going to remove some light that you’ve come to rely upon. What is it that you know about that He revealed it to you in the light? What is that that you can lean upon God in the darkness?

Darkness forces us to remember. What else does darkness do?

Darkness Focuses Our Attention.

ILLUSTRATION

Do you know one of the things that darkness does? In the darkness, the pupil of your eye begins to just expand or dilate allowing as much light as possible to get into the retina. We start to see things that in the light we may have just casually passed by.

We start to notice things that in a normal circumstance of life we may have just kind of casually glossed right over, and God says, “Do you know, I’m going to put you in a time of darkness right now, and you’re going to be so attuned to what I’m doing. You’re going to see things now in the dark that you may have never been able to see in the light.”

Darkness forces us to remember.

Darkness Focuses Our Attention.

And what else does darkness do? Well, sometimes, darkness also fans our fears.

Darkness Fans our Fears.

When it is dark, we start to imagine things. We start to think there are things.

You know darkness causes us I think at times to play that what-if game.

What if this happens? Well, what if this happens?

We start to ask all of these different scenarios running through our mind, the what ifs of life.

The disciples were asking what if we don’t make it?

What if we never see Jesus again?

What if water starts coming into the boat? What if?…

And you and I do the same thing. We run these scenarios through our mind.

What is it that we have to do at those moments in darkness? Okay, stop thinking of the what-if scenario and start to think the what-is reality.

What is the reality?

Exodus 15:2

“The Lord is my strength and my defense;

he has become my salvation.

He is my God, and I will praise him,

my father’s God, and I will exalt him.

Psalm 62:2

Truly he is my rock and my salvation;

he is my fortress, I will never be shaken.

Psalm 91:2

I will say of the Lord, “He is my refuge and my fortress,

my God, in whom I trust.”

Psalm 23:4

Even though I walk through the darkest valley,

I will fear no evil, for you are with me;

your rod and your staff, they comfort me.

If you are in a time of darkness, stop thinking the what-if scenario and start living in the what-is reality.

Well, we see a couple things.

The descent.

The despair

Notice the delay.

3. The Delay

Mark 6:46-48

⁴⁶After leaving them, he went up on a mountainside to pray.

⁴⁷Later that night, the boat was in the middle of the lake, and he was alone on land. ⁴⁸He saw the disciples straining at the oars, because the wind was against them. Shortly before dawn he went out to them, walking on the lake.

Jesus went first of all alone into a mountain to pray. Jesus prayed. And we understand that Jesus knew there is an urgency to their request.

Mark notes Jesus praying at only three points in his ministry (1:35; 6:45; 14:35–39). Each prayer is at night and in a lonely place, each finds the disciples removed from him and failing to understand his mission, and in each Jesus faces a formative decision or crisis. Here Jesus is praying to express his divine Sonship rather than a Jewish freedom fighter after the feeding of the multitude. (James Edwards, The Pillar NT Commentary).

Although Jesus delayed responding to His disciples, it does not mean that He was unaware of their need. He simply knew it wasn’t yet the right time. He knows that they have a need, but He doesn’t respond immediately.

I don’t know what you’re like, but sometimes I am an over-responder. In other words, I see a need, and rather than saying okay, let’s wait, I want to address the need. Let’s fix everything.

But God in His wisdom doesn’t always do what I do. God in His wisdom sees the disciples toiling and He pauses, He waits.

Jesus is aware of your need, your trial, your distress, your circumstances. You may be toiling, but He is aware, He is simply waiting; waiting for the right moment to bring deliverance. Deliverance will come not a moment too soon, not a moment too late. Just don’t mistake His delay as denial.

Why would the Lord wait?

Isaiah 30:18

Yet the Lord longs to be gracious to you;

therefore he will rise up to show you compassion.

For the Lord is a God of justice.

Blessed are all who wait for him!

The LORD will wait:

• So that he might be gracious to you.
• God waits so that he might show you compassion.
• So that he might bring you justice.
• God waits so that he might bless you.

Blessed are all who wait for him! There’s a reward for all those that wait for Him.

Listen, are you in the midst of a storm? Jesus Christ is aware of your need. He is very concerned about you. He is delaying not because He is an uncaring or unaware God. God is waiting so that he can be gracious to you, he can show compassion to you, he can give you justice, and he can bless you.

We see the descent, the despair, the delay, now the deliverance.

4. The Deliverance

Mark 6:48-50

⁴⁸He saw the disciples straining at the oars, because the wind was against them. Shortly before dawn he went out to them, walking on the lake. He was about to pass by them, ⁴⁹but when they saw him walking on the lake, they thought he was a ghost. They cried out, ⁵⁰because they all saw him and were terrified.

Jesus was walking on top of their challenge, literally on top of the water. He is not calling out from the shore. He is not calling out to them from waist-deep water. He is walking to them on top of the water. Make no mistake about it. Jesus is walking on the sea. Storm cannot stop him, rain cannot stop him, the sea is not a challenge for Jesus.

Jesus is actually demonstrating who He is. He is God and he is walking on the lake. There’s only one other person that can do that, and that is God. See how beautifully Mark shows that Jesus is God. “John declares Jesus is the Son of God. Mark shows Jesus as the Son of God by what Jesus does.” (James Edwards, The Pillar NT Commentary).

Job 9:8

He alone stretches out the heavens

and treads on the waves of the sea.

Isaiah 43:16

This is what the Lord says—

he who made a way through the sea,

a path through the mighty waters,

Jesus walks on water to His disciples. He is walking on top of the very thing that is their travail, the very thing that is their fear. This is the very thing that Jesus is now conquering, demonstrating I am on top of your fear.

He is bigger than their trial:

• He’s bigger than yours and mine as well.
• He’s bigger than the loss of your loved one.
• He’s bigger than the loss of your health.
• Bigger than the loss of income or relationship or family or future, or whatever.
• He is bigger than your trial.

Then He waits for the disciples to see Him. They thought they had seen a ghost.

Job 9:11

When he passes me, I cannot see him

When he goes by, I cannot perceive him.

Now there’s no delay. Notice the words that are used next.

Mark 6:48b

Immediately he spoke to them and said, “Take courage! It is I. Don’t be afraid.”

Immediately is one of the words in this gospel of Mark: Jesus works immediately, Satan too works immediately.

Mark 1:12 –  After baptism, immediately the Spirit sent him out into the wilderness.

Mark 1:30 – Simon’s mother-in-law was in bed with fever, they immediately told Jesus.

Mark 1:42 – Immediately the leprosy left him.

Mark 2:8 – Immediately Jesus knew what the teachers of the law were thinking.

Mark 2:12 – Immediately the paralysed man rose up, took his bed, and went.

Mark 5:29 – Immediately her bleeding stopped.

Mark 5:42 – Immediately Jairus’ daughter stood up.

Mark 3:15 – Satan comes immediately and takes away the word.

In this passage: Immediately Jesus sent the disciples on the boat and immediately he spoke to them on the sea.

“Take courage! It is I. Don’t be afraid.”

Jesus reveals Himself to His disciples in two ways in this passage.

The first thing that He does is He reveals His name. Jesus reveals His name, “It is I.”

James R. Edwards in his commentary wrote, “When Jesus said it is ‘I,’ in the Greek “it is I” Ego Eimi, is identical with God’s self-disclosure to Moses.

When Moses asks God, “Who should I say that sent me?” I AM, God reveals Himself to Moses. This Jesus not only walks in God’s stead, He also takes His name. The first way that Jesus reveals Himself to His disciples is He says I AM.

V48 He was about to pass by them

Second: He reveals His glory.

He desired to pass them by.

Does that phrase ever trouble you? The disciples are toiling in the ship, and they’re not making any progress and they’re afraid, and now Jesus is walking, and He’s just like kind of walking on the water, and He’s about to pass them by.

Have you ever thought like, “There are times when I feel like Jesus is passing me by. I’m in the middle of the sea, and the winds are raging against me and sometimes it feels like You just pass me right by?”

Where else in reference to God do we find that expression “passed by?” When Moses wanted to see the glory of God, God said:

Exodus 33:22

²²When my glory passes by, I will put you in a cleft in the rock and cover you with my hand until I have passed by. ²³Then I will remove my hand and you will see my back; but my face must not be seen.”

Elijah had been fleeing for his life into the wilderness, and there the Bible records:

1 Kings 19:11

The Lord said, “Go out and stand on the mountain in the presence of the Lord, for the Lord is about to pass by.”

When God passed by, God is revealing something about Himself to His servants. Jesus desired for His disciples to get a glimpse of the glory of God in the midst of the storm.

In the Old Testament God seems to vail His glory, but now in the New Testament Jesus is boldly declaring it. He says it is Me, and as John wrote, “they beheld His glory.”

And then He speaks a word of comfort. “Be of good cheer: it is I; be not afraid.”

Listen, Jesus already saw them when they were toiling. He’s on the mountain praying. So, He knows them, He goes walking to them, He waits for them to see Him. They cry out for fear, and then He just reassures in the middle of the storm. He’s not yet in the boat, but He gives them a word. “It’s Me, don’t be afraid, it is I,” and then He comes to them, and then He climbs into the boat, into their circumstance, into their reality, into their fear, and now all is well because Jesus is in the boat.

Only when Jesus joins the disciples in the boat does the storm abate. Being with Jesus (3:14) is not simply a theoretical truth; it has practical and existential consequences, one of which is the safety and peace of disciples. If separation from Jesus brings the disciples into distress, Jesus’ presence with them overcomes storms in their

Do you know what He’s doing? He’s delivering them not a moment too late and not a moment too soon. He climbs the boat and the wind died down.

This passage closes in a strange way. It closes with a disappointment, to be quite honest.

Mark 6:51

⁵¹Then he climbed into the boat with them, and the wind died down. They were completely amazed, ⁵²for they had not understood about the loaves; their hearts were hardened.

The passage ends with this strange disappointment: The hearts of the disciples were hardened.

Hardened hearts last appeared at the synagogue in Capernaum when Jesus healed the man with a deformed hand (3:5). There it occurred with reference to ostensible “outsiders” — members of the synagogue, Pharisees, and Herodians; here it occurs of “insiders,” of Jesus’ own disciples. Hardness of the heart is a lack of faith. Faith in this gospel is not just a decision to follow Jesus but to trust in Jesus at all times. Discipleship is more endangered by lack of faith and hardness of heart than by external dangers.

The disciples had seen God work in ways that few have seen, but faith is not the automatic response. They would eventually get it.

They witnessed Jesus take a boy’s picnic lunch and turn it into a buffet for thousands. What is it that He couldn’t do?

Let me ask you the same:

What is it that He cannot do? With man, this is impossible, but with God, all things are possible.

CONCLUSION

So, where are you headed? For some, you may be headed into a storm. Some are already there. Many, when faced with the storm, do what a lot of the animal kingdom does and that is they head in the opposite direction.

ILLUSTRATION

The buffalo or the bison is unique among animals in that when a storm comes, whether it be a heavy snowstorm, a thick squall, a buffalo actually turns its head to the storm and begins to actually charge into the storm. Cows, their close relatives huddle together and run away from the storm. The other animals are heading in the opposite direction but not the buffalo. It actually embraces the storm. And interestingly enough, it also gets out of the storm sooner than the animals that are fleeing it. It faces the storm and as the storm comes, it’s moving, and it actually passes the storm in a way that the others do not.

I don’t know where you are today, but you may be trying to run away from your storm, and in fact, you may actually be prolonging that which the Lord wants you to learn if you actually just face the storm.

There is Someone who’s going to meet you there. He knows you’re there. He’s seeing you toiling. He’s praying at that very moment, and at just the right time He will meet you in the midst of your storm.

Embrace God’s Sovereignty in Life’s Descent:

In the descent from the mountaintop experiences, recognize that life often transitions from spiritual highs to challenging lows. God sometimes leads us into storms without giving us a choice. Embrace the truth that, just like Joseph and Daniel, God’s providence guides us even when circumstances seem beyond our control.

APPLICATION

In times of unexpected challenges, trust that God is sovereign over your circumstances. Seek to discern His leading and choose to rely on His wisdom, even when you don’t have a clear choice.

Find God’s Presence in the Midst of Despair:

Just as darkness can force us to remember and focus our attention, view challenging times as opportunities to draw nearer to God. In the storm of despair, remember the promises and truths revealed in the light. Let the darkness of trials redirect your attention to the comforting presence of God.

APPLICATION

When facing difficult circumstances, intentionally recall the truths about God’s character and promises. Allow the challenges to deepen your reliance on Him, finding comfort in His steadfast love and faithfulness.

Be Patient in Delays:

Understand that God’s delay in responding to your needs doesn’t signify unawareness or indifference. His delays are purposeful, often aimed at revealing His glory and teaching us valuable lessons. Trust that His timing is perfect, even if it may seem delayed from our perspective.

APPLICATION

When faced with delays or unanswered prayers, exercise patience and trust in God’s perfect timing. Use the waiting period to grow in faith and seek His will, recognizing that His plan is unfolding in His appointed time.

God Delivers at the Right time.

In the midst of life’s storms, Jesus reveals Himself as the sovereign God who walks on water. He brings deliverance not a moment too soon or too late. As He climbs into the boat, recognize that His presence transforms fear into peace. Jesus is not distant; He is with you in the midst of your storms.

APPLICATION

When confronted with challenges, actively seek the presence of Christ. Trust in His ability to bring deliverance and peace. Invite Him into your circumstances, acknowledging that He is bigger than any trial, and let His presence bring calm in the midst of the storm.