The 1^st United Methodist Church of Napa

June 25, 2006

3^rd Sunday after Pentecost

Scripture Readings:

Psalter – Psalm 107: 23-31¹

²³Some went down to the sea in ships, doing business on the mighty waters; ²⁴they saw the

deeds of the LORD, his wondrous works in the deep. ²⁵For he commanded and raised the stormy

wind, which lifted up the waves of the sea. ²⁶They mounted up to heaven, they went down to the

depths; their courage melted away in their calamity; ²⁷they reeled and staggered like drunkards,

and were at their wits’ end. ²⁸Then they cried to the LORD in their trouble, and he brought them

out from their distress; ²⁹he made the storm be still, and the waves of the sea were hushed.

³⁰Then they were glad because they had quiet, and he brought them to their desired haven. ³¹Let

them thank the LORD for his steadfast love, for his wonderful works to humankind.

Gospel – Mark 4: 35-41²

³⁵On that day, when evening had come, he said to them, “Let us go across to the other side.” ³⁶And leaving the crowd behind, they took him with them in the boat, just as he was. Other boats were with him. ³⁷A great windstorm arose, and the waves beat into the boat, so that the boat was already being swamped. ³⁸But he was in the stern, asleep on the cushion; and they woke him up and said to him, “Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?” ³⁹He woke up and rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, “Peace! Be still!” Then the wind ceased, and there was a dead calm. ⁴⁰He said to them, “Why are you afraid? Have you still no faith?” ⁴¹And they were filled with great awe and said to one another, “Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?”

"Let's Go Across to the Other Side."

One of my favorite T-shirts (…and, yes, I have many!) shows a picture of white-water river rafters on the front; on the back it says, simply, "The journey is the destination." Another favorite T-shirt of mine has the picture of a sea kayaker crossing a serene and beautiful stretch of water, and beneath it is the caption: "The road to heaven may not be a road at all." Either way it remains fitting for us to view our lives as Christians as an adventuresome journey – "followers of the Way" as those first Christians were often called. Enlightened teaching, a rich tradition, truthful education, deeply personal spiritual experience, passionate social witness, confrontation with evil, spirit-filled worship, community and peace-filled rest…are all part of being "on the Way." So it's true: day in and day out we who are Christians are not supposed to just stay where we are. Change is part of who we are. Ultimately, however, the shalom of Christian life is found in the person of Jesus himself. In him we discover the power to be made whole, the strength to live healthy lifestyles, the courage to receive and to give comfort in a spirit of well-being.³

In the ancient world many cultures shared some version of this story of a huge struggle between God and the forces of chaos and evil – with evil often represented in water. God ultimately triumphs, subduing the water, as we hear in today's psalm. Controlling water was then a clear sign of God's power. In its context, then, Jesus' supposed ability to control the sea is clear evidence – at least in this storyteller's mind – that Jesus is divinely empowered.

A lot of people are afraid of water. When I go kayaking – especially off the coast or in San Francisco Bay – my wife is quite happy to keep her feet firmly planted on the shore. Her mother didn't swim and didn't teach her girls to swim; in fact if Martha and her sisters got any further into the water at Carolina Beach than about midcalf, she would yell at them to come back in where it was safe. I was taught to swim at about the same time that I learned to walk, so I'm not afraid of water. I have a healthy respect of its power, don't get me wrong, and I've had my share of close calls in big waves and powerful surf. I've tried to help Martha overcome her fears of water (She's still not convinced that a sailboat isn't meant to sail upright!). With her mind she trusts me; I was even able to take her SCUBA⁴ diving on our honeymoon – but that's been the last time. Something deeper within her is still afraid. Her fear is stronger than her trust. I can remember those first lessons with my dad over me, his hand under my body as he said gently, "I've got you. I've got you," even as he was letting me go. At some point trust in him overcame my fear, and then I came to trust in myself and could swim on my own.

Nature can be truly terrifying – as we've seen in tsunamis and hurricanes –

because it's so clearly beyond our power to control. In the Bible storms are used as metaphors for the trials of the righteous. Again and again we're told of the faithful who went down into the very depths, their courage melting away, lurching and staggering like drunks, and at their wits’ end.⁵ Today's story puts the disciples in literal danger from these forces of nature and challenges them to trust in Jesus.

As those who choose to follow Jesus you and I are repeatedly asked to journey to the other side of life, to go from here to another place, a place where we may not be known or may not know others. When Jesus suggests, "Let's go across to the other side," here in this story, nobody's quite sure why. Later we find him, in that episode of the man with the "unclean spirit,"⁶ encouraging others to live as if they, too, knew the power of the Holy Spirit. Then he crosses the sea,⁷ yet again, unconcerned about whether or not the journey is making a whole lot of sense. At peace with himself, Jesus can go back and forth across the same body of water a hundred times.

The same thing could be true in our own lives. There's a whole lot of pushing and shoving going on in the church right now. One side wants to be fully inclusive and welcoming of all people; the other side says that there ought to be limits to our hospitality. One side says that the "word of God" is bigger than the Bible; the other side says that their Bible is the Word of God. We should be able to tolerate this back and forth – the surprises and the invitations to go places we've never been before, to leave our traditions behind while we explore a new way of being the church, even come back to some of those traditions that still hold power and meaning for us.

We can do this if, deep within us, we're as sure as Jesus was that we ultimately go with the shalom that is the very source of our life together. Trouble comes when we lose sight of the goal or begin to doubt that our journey is taking us any closer to God. Then each step becomes filled with fear or anger, each journey becomes a desperate end in itself, each experience taken out of the context of our journey until it quite literally becomes a life or death struggle.

Doubt about our direction has another effect, too. We then tend to become totally self-absorbed – nothing reaches us from the outside anymore and everybody out there seems like the enemy. Cries for help from our sisters and brothers who live on the margins of life, then, go unheard. Refugees and immigrants, gays and lesbians, the homeless and the impoverished, the disabled and the different are refused entrance.

Jesus simply said, "Let's go across to the other side." But, like some of us, those who first journeyed with Jesus had no sense of direction, so they didn't feel safe and even challenged whether or not Jesus knew what he was doing – if he cared at all if they lived or died. The one who had first showed them the way became somebody to complain to, somebody to blame, somebody to abuse and criticize. These followers, many of them fishermen, had already learned how to read the signs of wind and weather. They know what they can endure and survive. But this storm is far beyond their control; in fact things are way out of control and when that happens you know you're in serious trouble.

Until recently we thought that we were in control. But now the neighborhood's changing; the whole world is changing, and people who once came to our church don't come anymore. At first we thought we could control this storm of change, batten down the hatches with our doctrines and traditions, and ride out the heavy seas. We sent our pastors to seminars, even went to some ourselves, hoping to recapture what we once had and find help to "grow the church" again, but nothing seems to have worked.

You'd think that Jesus would care that we're dying – here in the church – in this once safe place, in the boat that we built to survive the storms of life. But he's asleep, for God's sake, there in the back of the church, among the used Christmas candles and last-year's Sunday School curricula, among the dusty Bibles and old hymnals. Why doesn't he wake up and save us?

And all the while, what do you suppose Jesus is dreaming about, as he sleeps there in the back of the boat? We may never know, but I can imagine. Maybe he remembers other voyages that he's made, when he'd felt lost himself in the wilderness, out of control, in the wonder of sand, sea and sky. Eugene O'Neill, that prize-winning American playwright whose parents and older brother all died within three years of one another, could still write this about just such a long day's journey into the night:

I lay on the bowsprit…[and] became drunk with the beauty and singing rhythm of it, and for a moment, I lost myself – actually lost my life. I was set free! I dissolved in the sea, became white sails and flying spray….I belonged, without past or future, within peace and unity and a wild joy, within something greater.⁸

O'Neill's memory ought to remind us of moments when we dared to lose control, to even risk dying, that we might become one with "something greater."

So when the rebuke came it came from Jesus. He quieted the fears of his companions. He knew where they all were going, and why, so he didn't quite know what to make of those who'd come so far with him, spent so much time with him, and yet still didn't seem to believe in him.

His invitation to us remains the same. We're not left in our comfortable corners of "but-we've-always-done-it-this-way" kinds of thinking. We're asked to take a new journey with Jesus to new places and new times, with new insights and new wisdom that's appropriate for the 21^st century, to travel back and forth from one place to another, and yet all the while knowing that the real journey is the journey of faith. When we find ourselves overly anxious, fearful and uncertain in the midst of the brief episodes of daily life, isn't it a time to calm the storms, to comfort each other, and to restore the context of community which is essential to making any journey together?

I think so. What do you think?

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