Safe In The Storm

Transcript

Alright thank you very much, and hello again dear radio friends. How in the world are you? Doing all right today? This is your good friend Dr. Cook and I’m glad to be back with you. What a joy it is to share, day by day, from God’s Word. I just enjoy it so much and I appreciate the privilege that is granted to me, by the heavenly Father, of sharing from His Word and talking with you. I pray that there may be something just specially to meet your need today. God grant that it might be so. We’re looking at the fourth chapter of Mark and we come now to verse 35, says, “The same day, when evening had come”, he said, “let us pass over unto the side”, that’s the other side of the sea of Galilee, “and when they had sent away the multitude they took Him even as He was in the ship, and there were also with Him other little ships, and there arose a great storm of wind, and the waves beat into the ship, so that it was now full” Ever been in a small boat when it was in danger of sinking? It was full of water? Tell you, that will upset you. “And He was in the hinder part of the ship, asleep on a pillow, on they awoke Him and said, ‘Master, carest Thou not that we perish’”? Don’t you care about us? We’re going to drown. “He arose and rebuked the wind, and said unto the sea, ‘Peace, be still’”. The wind ceased and there was a great calm, and He said unto them, “Why are you so fearful? How is it that you have no faith?” “They feared exceedingly and said one to another, ‘What manner of man is this, that even the wind and the sea obey Him”?

Well, it’s a thrill to see the Lord Jesus in action isn’t it? Interestingly enough, they had gotten accustomed to His miraculous power in dealing with demons, and sickness, disease of all kinds, lame situations, the blind, the deaf, they’d seen all at happen, but now they were in a situation where they were in the grip of the forces of nature, and they couldn’t do anything about it, and they panicked, which leads me to say, it is possible for you to be religiously oriented in certain things and to panic in the presence of others, if you don’t realize that Jesus is Lord of it all. He’s Lord over the forces that you cannot control. I can remember being afraid of thunder and lightning as a very small boy, and I think it was my Aunt Molly, we called her Aunt Molly, actually we figured out she was sort of a 42nd cousin once removed. Dear lady that took pity on a motherless boy, and helped give him a home and during some of those years, but I remember that she explained to me that, “you don’t have to be afraid of the thunder and lightning because God is in charge of that and He’s probably just moving a few things around up there in Heaven”, she said with a chuckle. Well the next time a rain came, they tell me, I ran over to her and I said, “Oh Auntie, God’s rolling His wheelbarrows around”. I haven’t been particularly afraid of thunder and lightning since that. I tried to stay out from under any trees when is a lightning storm, because that’s a quick ticket to glory you know, you don’t want to do that, but I think it does make a difference, doesn’t it? When you realize that when you are up against forces the forces of nature for example, where you don’t have any control, you are consciously in the care of your loving heavenly father, and He’s not going to drop you.

That was literally born out to me on one occasion when, in the old days I was flying in the DC-3, flying westward from, I think had taken off from Des Moines or someplace and was supposed to, the plane was supposed to land out in Nebraska. I had a meeting there with the Palermo brothers, and I was supposed to land at a certain airport and go to a meeting. The problem was that we ran into some very stormy, turbulent weather and with it icing conditions. Now, the old DC-3s  had a rubber boot that was mechanically activated on the front leading edge of the wing to break off pieces of ice that might form on the front edge, but most of those old DC-3’s didn’t have any heating elements anyplace else in the wing , to melt the ice and so we got heavy, heavy icing conditions, and that the plane was just simply, it just staggering through the air. Well I just, I opened my New Testament, read a few verses and turned over and went to sleep, and woke up with the sun brightly shining and great pieces of ice, two inches thick and more, breaking off the fuselage and breaking off the portion of the wing, and the sun was shining brightly, and we were about to land in Denver, and I had had a nice nap. The pilot came walking back, he then was visibly shaken. He said to somebody in my hearing, he said, “We were just that close to stalling out”, he said, “I had all I could do to keep the plane flying”, he said, “we almost stalled out and crashed”. Well I didn’t know it and I didn’t need to know it. See, you don’t have to know everything that’s happening in order to trust Jesus. Will you remember that?

You don’t have to know, nor indeed to understand, everything that’s happening in order to trust Jesus. You are in His hand, and He said, “My father who gave them me is greater than I am. No man is able to pluck them out of His hands”. So, you’re doubly held safe in the pierced hand and in the hand that holds the pierced hand, your heavenly father. Oh, that’s so great to know. Do you know that? Have you thought about it long enough, so that you really know it or are you just sort of keep it on the edge of your mind? The difference between real peace under pressure on one hand, or stress under pressure, is to know that Jesus, your blessed Lord, is in control. All right, well there it was they said, don’t you care that were we’re drowning? Of course He cared, and I suppose it’s perfectly human to question whether God has forgotten you. Read the Old Testament. You’ll find the Old Testament Saints very frequently saying, “Lord have you forgotten to be gracious”? Did you forget? Don’t you remember us? Well that’s human I guess, and all through the Bible you find people falling into that particular trait. The fact is yes, God does remember, No, He doesn’t forget. I’ve said so often on these broadcasts. God hasn’t brought you this far to dump you now. No, He’s not going to let go of you, He’s going to see you through. The keyword beloved is through, “When thou passest through the waters, they shall not overflow thee and through the fire thou shalt not be burned”. God brings you through, “Ye, though I walk through the Valley, I will fear no evil”. God’s keyword is go on through with Him. Amen?

Well, there it is, so they woke Him, and you can’t blame them for being upset, because if you’ve ever been out in the water in a small craft that was in danger of being swamped, you know that it’s serious business. You grab whatever you can, whether it’s somebody’s hat or a coffee can or whatever, and you bail like everything, and try to get the keep the water out, and so they were busy, they were trying somehow to keep afloat, and He was asleep ,and so the typical response was, ‘Don’t you care?’. Well the songwriter has put that to music. My father used to sing it after supper, many a time, when I’d be washing the dishes. He and I living together in a little rented room in Toledo, Ohio. I was going to high school. I was chief cook and bottle washer, and he would sit down in his little rocker and he would pick out one of his hundred songbooks or more, and turn to the pages and he’d tune-up his little cracked tenor voiced, “Do so me do”, you know. Never sang on pitch. Always sang in between the cracks, but oh how he loved God, and he would sing, ‘Does Jesus care, when my heart is pained too deeply for mirth or song’, and so on. ‘Oh, yes He cares. I know He cares. His heart is touched with my grief, when the days are weary, the long nights dreary, I know my Savior cares’”. He would sing that and his face would light up and once in a while he look over to me and smile and say, “Hallelujah, my boy”. That’s part of the memories I have.

Yes, you can know that He’s able to take care of you even when the boat is in danger of being swamped. Now, interestingly enough the answer, He answered their cry of course by rebuking the wind and the waves and there was a great calm. I think He spoke kindly to them. I think He said, you know be quiet. Peace, be still, and then He said in a question. Why are you so fearful? How is it that you have no faith? You see, the point is you are unsinkable of Jesus is in the boat with you. That’s the point. What you and I need to settle is this: are we in the will of God, is the Lord with us, are we in His blessing, are we doing His bidding? If we are, if you’re in the will of God and you’re in the blessing of God, and you’re trusting in the living son of God, you are absolutely unsinkable. No question about it. God is going to see you through, and the key there is how is it that you have no faith? See, they had their eyes on the storm.

Same thing happened to Simon Peter when he saw the Lord Jesus on another occasion, walking on the water, he said, “If would be Thou bid me come to Thee on the waves”, and Jesus said, come on. I’m sure Peter must have said, “Me and my big mouth”, at that moment but he was as good as his word. “He went on out and he began to walk on the water to come to Jesus, but when he saw the wind and the waves boisterous, he was afraid and beginning to sink, he cried, ‘Lord, save me’”. You find that story Matthew 14, I think, and Jesus stretched forth His hand and caught him and said, ‘Oh little faith why did you doubt”? To have complete confidence in Jesus keeps the boat afloat. Don’t ask me how it works, I don’t know. I only know this, that complete confidence in the Lord Jesus Christ keeps your little craft, your life, your life boat, your project, your ministry, you afloat, You’re unsinkable if you’re in the will of God. Hallelujah! Aren’t you glad that’s so?

Well it said, “They feared exceedingly”, said, “What kind of a man is this? Even the wind and the sea obey Him”. It’s strange how people reason. They had seen demons cast out, which is probably one of the hardest things in all the universe to do from our point of view, but when it came to managing the weather, they were absolutely impressed. They took one thing for granted, the feeding of people, the healing of disease, the rebuking of demonic power, they just took that for granted. That didn’t amaze them, but when I had to do with the weather then they were impressed. Strange. You and I need to change our point of view so we realize that God does some very important things, and incidentally now and then, He takes a hand in the weather. See, the weather is one thing. You can always put up an umbrella, but the power of Satan is something that takes that divine intervention that requires a great deal more power. Doesn’t it? Trust your loving heavenly Father, trust your Almighty Savior today, and may He give to you that sublime faith that realizes that you’re unsinkable when Jesus is in the boat.

Dear Father today, give us that sublime realization, that with Christ in the vessel, we can smile at the storm. Amen.

Till I meet you once again by way of radio, walk with the King today and be a blessing!