Fear and Powerlessness

45 Right then, Jesus made his disciples get into a boat and go ahead to the other side of the lake, toward Bethsaida, while he dismissed the crowd. 46 After saying good-bye to them, Jesus went up onto a mountain to pray. 47 Evening came and the boat was in the middle of the lake, but he was alone on the land. 48 He saw his disciples struggling. They were trying to row forward, but the wind was blowing against them. Very early in the morning, he came to them, walking on the lake. He intended to pass by them. 49 When they saw him walking on the lake, they thought he was a ghost and they screamed.50 Seeing him was terrifying to all of them. Just then he spoke to them, “Be encouraged! It’s me. Don’t be afraid.” 51 He got into the boat, and the wind settled down. His disciples were so baffled they were beside themselves. 52 That’s because they hadn’t understood about the loaves. Their hearts had been changed so that they resisted God’s ways.

~ Mark 6:45-52, CEB

One thing we’ve learned time and again in recovery is the concept of powerlessness. I am only in control of the things I can legitimately control. I can’t control what goes on in the world around me, I can only control my response to it. I find freedom in accepting the world as it is, not as I would have it, while living the life I feel called to live. Nobody can take that away. No person and no law can stand in my way to live out my values and principles. I can reflect God’s love to the world around me in all situations. I don’t always do that, but by virtue of God’s transforming spirit within me, I have the capacity to do that. That’s my call.

Can we accept the world as it is even when it’s not as we wish it?

Fear says no. Faith says yes.

God's presence is perplexing

45 Right then, Jesus made his disciples get into a boat and go ahead to the other side of the lake, toward Bethsaida, while he dismissed the crowd. 46 After saying good-bye to them, Jesus went up onto a mountain to pray. 47 Evening came and the boat was in the middle of the lake, but he was alone on the land. 48 He saw his disciples struggling. They were trying to row forward, but the wind was blowing against them. Very early in the morning, he came to them, walking on the lake. He intended to pass by them. 49 When they saw him walking on the lake, they thought he was a ghost and they screamed.50 Seeing him was terrifying to all of them. Just then he spoke to them, “Be encouraged! It’s me. Don’t be afraid.” 51 He got into the boat, and the wind settled down. His disciples were so baffled they were beside themselves. 52 That’s because they hadn’t understood about the loaves. Their hearts had been changed so that they resisted God’s ways.

~ Mark 6:45-52, CEB

A few verses before these, Jesus broke a small amount of bread into enough pieces to feed five thousand people. That act was a sign of God’s kingdom breaking into the world through Jesus. The disciples noticed that a miracle happened, to be sure, but, according to these verses, they didn’t grasp the significance. They didn’t connect the action of the miracle to what it means for Jesus to be God in the flesh. Again, that’s understandable, it’s a pretty huge leap to make. But their inability to see and understand caused problems for them down the road. They couldn’t see God at work in the feeding story, and they can’t recognize God’s presence in Jesus as he walks on the water. What does this lead to? Bewilderment.

God’s presence truly is rather bewildering. When we see it or experience it, it’s hard to come up with a proper explanation. Sometimes things can be explained, and sometimes they can’t. Sometimes they are simply acts of God. Skepticism, in our day, is extremely popular. Some skepticism is a good thing. Too much, perhaps, leads to a certain hardness of the heart.

Do we have some responsibility for the ways in which we fail to recognize God’s action or see him at work? Possibly, though I’m not particularly fond of the blame game. I’ll say more on this tomorrow.

It's not easy to trust God during chaos

45 Right then, Jesus made his disciples get into a boat and go ahead to the other side of the lake, toward Bethsaida, while he dismissed the crowd. 46 After saying good-bye to them, Jesus went up onto a mountain to pray. 47 Evening came and the boat was in the middle of the lake, but he was alone on the land. 48 He saw his disciples struggling. They were trying to row forward, but the wind was blowing against them. Very early in the morning, he came to them, walking on the lake. He intended to pass by them. 49 When they saw him walking on the lake, they thought he was a ghost and they screamed.50 Seeing him was terrifying to all of them. Just then he spoke to them, “Be encouraged! It’s me. Don’t be afraid.” 51 He got into the boat, and the wind settled down. His disciples were so baffled they were beside themselves. 52 That’s because they hadn’t understood about the loaves. Their hearts had been changed so that they resisted God’s ways.

~ Mark 6:45-52, CEB

Here’s another boat/water story from Mark.

Jesus has done a few more miraculous healings since we last saw him on a boat with the disciples (not including the miracle on the boat itself). So, they should be even more clear as to who he is, what he has the capacity to do, etc. This passage, like the other, shows Jesus as someone more than human. Will the disciples be able to recognize that?

The focal point of this boat story is not Jesus calming the winds the disciples were up against but, instead, Jesus himself walking on the water. Evidently, they didn’t recognize him and thought he was a ghost. Their response? Fear. Once again. Even when they realized that the “ghost” was Jesus, they were still “beside themselves” and “baffled”. How could they not know or understand? Verse 52 says they hadn’t understood about the loaves. Just before this, Jesus had performed the famous miracle of feeding the five thousand, and I guess the disciples still didn’t quite grasp the nature of who he was. Because of that, they’re afraid. Because of that, it seems, their hearts became hard.

There’s a lot going on here, and we’ll look at it over a few days. The first thing that stands out to me is the disciples’ inability to recognize the true power of God and to submit to it, and trust it. Granted, I’m not sure I would have done any better in the circumstances. It’s not easy trust in God’s power when our lives are in chaos.

I mean, I have access to the whole story and I’m still no better at trust or managing fear.

There's no shame in being afraid

35 Later that day, when evening came, Jesus said to them, “Let’s cross over to the other side of the lake.” 36 They left the crowd and took him in the boat just as he was. Other boats followed along. 37 Gale-force winds arose, and waves crashed against the boat so that the boat was swamped. 38 But Jesus was in the rear of the boat, sleeping on a pillow. They woke him up and said, “Teacher, don’t you care that we’re drowning?” 39 He got up and gave orders to the wind, and he said to the lake, “Silence! Be still!” The wind settled down and there was a great calm. 40 Jesus asked them, “Why are you frightened? Don’t you have faith yet?” 41 Overcome with awe, they said to each other, “Who then is this? Even the wind and the sea obey him!”

~ Mark 4:35-41, CEB

What were the disciples supposed to do? I mean, the boat is on the lake, in the middle of a storm, about to capsize, and Jesus implies that their response, fear, is the wrong response. Why is that wrong? Wouldn’t we be afraid in the same situation?

Yes, absolutely, but here’s the thing: we’re not in their situation. By this point in the story, the disciples (many of them, anyway) have seen Jesus at work. They’ve seen his miracles, and the things he’s capable of. They’ve seen enough to know that he is worth trusting, and that he is a very unique kind of prophet, at the very least. (Let’s give them some grace for not fully understanding he was God in the flesh. Let’s face it, that’s a hard conclusion to jump to). In other words, they should have some idea of who is in the boat (though let’s not be too harsh either, Jesus is one-of-a-kind). Perhaps their response should have been, “Jesus, we’ve seen the works of your hands, we know what you can do, would you please help us out of this jam?” Who can really say?

But my point is this: we don’t have Jesus in the flesh who we can reach over and wake up and ask to solve our problems. Our circumstances are different. So we need not shame ourselves over a “lack of faith” or some such thing when we experience fear and anxiety. Instead, we pause to prepare. Then, we go before God and community and open up about our fears. We don’t tell ourselves, “Well Jesus said just have more faith so I just need to have more faith.”

No, we don’t shame ourselves. We don’t tell ourselves we just need to do better. We rely on others. We practice seeing God through others. We take our fears to others and trust them to sit with us in our fear. Maybe this helps us with our fear, maybe it doesn’t, but it will at least provide us with a few moments where we are surrounded by God’s love.

Trusting God with our Fear

35 Later that day, when evening came, Jesus said to them, “Let’s cross over to the other side of the lake.” 36 They left the crowd and took him in the boat just as he was. Other boats followed along. 37 Gale-force winds arose, and waves crashed against the boat so that the boat was swamped. 38 But Jesus was in the rear of the boat, sleeping on a pillow. They woke him up and said, “Teacher, don’t you care that we’re drowning?” 39 He got up and gave orders to the wind, and he said to the lake, “Silence! Be still!” The wind settled down and there was a great calm. 40 Jesus asked them, “Why are you frightened? Don’t you have faith yet?” 41 Overcome with awe, they said to each other, “Who then is this? Even the wind and the sea obey him!”

~ Mark 4:35-41, CEB

Yesterday I wrote about fear and the fact that it is ever-present in my life. I’ve also spoken about this in weekend messages over the years. In those messages, specifically, we talked about the fact that faith gives us a new perspective on life. God provides us with an alternative to interpreting our lives and life events through the lens of fear (i.e. worst-case scenario thinking/planning). Instead, we have someone in whom we can place our trust and to whom we can submit our fears and anxieties. Now, as we said, this doesn’t mean fear and anxiety magically disappear, it just means that we have some responsibility to find our faith (in response to Jesus’ question) and make sure that these things are submitted to God. Too often we submit God to our fear, rather than the other way around.

Tomorrow I’ll share a story about what I mean and then unpack it over a couple of days.