Skip to main content

Struggling Against the Wind - Part II

Last week I highlighted the story in Mark 6 where Jesus sends His disciples out across the lake while He stays on land. In the middle of the night, Jesus, who is still on land while the disciples are "far out to sea," sees them "struggling against the wind." Jesus does His walking on water thing and crosses the lake. He intends to walk right by His struggling disciples . . .

Honestly, I got a little stuck right there - He intended to walk right by His struggling disciples? What?! What kind of loving Savior does that?

It must be the kind who wasn't worried, who saw no cause for alarm. He knew they'd make it to the other side. He obviously intended to surprise them and meet them when they did; but as soon as He saw that they were afraid, He climbed into the boat and the winds died down. Jesus was going to walk right by them because He wasn't worried about them. The disciples were fine. Absolutely fine. But when Jesus saw that they were afraid, He went to them immediately.

I love the heart of Jesus here. He's not worried about the disciples (and He's not worried about you and whatever situation you're in). He knows they'll make it to the other side of the lake (as will you), but when He sees that He's frightened these grown men, He doesn't keep on walking past. He doesn't say to them, "hey guys, it's Me. Stop being such babies! Buck up. Get some backbone. Geez!" To the contrary, His heart goes out to them, and He immediately climbs into the boat and finishes the trip with them.
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

From The Very First Time

From the very first time I knew My love for you Would be a lasting love It is not a common affection My devotion to you Will span my lifetime It will not fail Your scent alone Lures me now As it lured me then I breathe deeply Of your sweet And tantalizing aroma Should I take in your fragrance Every moment of all my days yet to come I would not tire of it I run my fingers down the length Of your smooth dark loveliness There is no blemish No flaw in you I taste I cannot help myself I must My tongue lingers Could heaven be any sweeter? Oh yes From the very first time I knew Mon chocolat sucre Yes I knew My sweet chocolate My love for you will be a lasting love
3 comments
Read more

As A Child

“Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven." Matthew 18:3 Become like little children? Really? Children are definitely cute and innocent, but that pretty much covers the positive qualities. On the negative side, however, the list is quite a bit lengthier: demanding, dependent, self-centered, messy, often smelly, expensive, and embarrassingly honest. So why? WHY in the world would Jesus tell us to become like little children? WHY in the world would He want that? What was He thinking?! Well, He was a thirty-something year-old bachelor. Maybe He didn't really know what He was talking about when He said that. I mean, if we come to Him like little children, it's pretty much guaranteed to be messy. We're likely to be crabby, cranky. We might be downright angry. Prayer-ADD is hard to control on a good day. If we're not on top of it, if we don't have our list in front of us to focus our thoughts, we...
4 comments
Read more

The Hug That Said It All

I witnessed a hug the other day. Big deal, right? People see other people hug all the time. Yeah, but this was a hug that melted my heart. We attended a graduation party in honor of our nephew. It was held under a pavilion. There was quite a spread of food, and each table was loaded with decorations and favors (very nicely done, Ange!). Obviously a lot of work . . . a lot of love was poured into this party. As the evening wound down, many of us hung around to help clean up. That's the un-fun part of a party. The un-fun part of this party became even more un-fun when, in an attempt to dump a drum of trash into a plastic trash bag, wet, gooey, smelley garbage ended up on the concrete floor of the pavilion. It was rank and disgusting, but my sister-in-law (the afore mentioned "Ange.") cleaned up without complaint. When the graduate meandered by shortly thereafter, I jokingly told him, in a scolding voice, that he had better get down on his knees in gratitude for all his moth...
3 comments
Read more