Daily Devotional For Saturday, January 27, 2024

Today, we continue our looking at nine miracles that Jesus did starting in Matthew 8. So, let’s pick up where we left off yesterday. Read Matthew 8:23-27, “Then He (Jesus) got into the boat and His disciples followed Him. (24) Suddenly a furious storm came up on the lake, so that the waves swept over the boat. But Jesus was sleeping. (25) The disciples went and woke Him, saying, “Lord, save us! We’re going to drown!” (26) He replied, “You of little faith, why are you so afraid?” Then He got up and rebuked the winds and the waves, and it was completely calm. (27) The men were amazed and asked, “What kind of man is this? Even the winds and the waves obey Him!” (ESV).

A lot of people love storms — the thunder and the lightning. I did up until a couple of years ago when while we were all taking Sunday afternoon naps after church and lunch, a storm came. Lightning hit our chimney and caused the bricks and their weight to come through the roof and ceiling into our bedroom closet. Anything electronic that was plugged in was fried. That bolt of lightning even fried every circuit board in our Tahoe in the garage. You could even see scorched marks on the walls that had wiring in them. Needless to say, we had to move out of the house for awhile. Our insurance got us some short-term living accommodations and then finally a long-term AirBNB the remainder. Now when a storm comes, I am very cautious.

This is just a reminder of how our sin destroyed God’s original creation. After God had created everything and put Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, He told this in Genesis 1:26, “Then God said, `Let Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth’” (ESV). We were suppose to have dominion and sovereignty over this. When sin entered, it then had sovereignty over us. How many people have died and property destroyed by earthquakes, hurricanes, tornadoes, landslides, floods, and etc.? 

At that very moment, God in His providence and foreknowledge already had a backup plan in place. Jesus would come two times: the first time would be to redeem humanity through His death on the cross and the second, to redeem nature through a 1,000 year reign on the earth after the 7-year Tribulation. 

And ever since humanity and nature has paid a huge price with sickness, illness, disease, deformity, suffering and death. And ever since humanity has been attempting to regain its sovereignty over nature. In our story in Matthew 8, Jesus and His disciples get in a boat to cross the Sea of Galilee. Some scholars feel they departed under the cloak of darkness.

And while out in the middle of the Sea of Galilee, a storm hit them. The Sea of Galilee sits in kind of a bowl. At 13 miles long and 8 miles wide, the sea sits at an elevation of 690 feet below sea level, with hills surrounding it. Some of the hills soar as high as 2,000 feet above the sea. Therefore, storms could from the West and catch you off guard even in the day time. They can come rolling in off the of the Mediterranean Sea and be sucked quickly down into this bowl that is 690 feet below sea level. Or storms could come from the East over mountains 2,000 high and be sucked down into this bowl. In those days, you did not have any warning or hint. By the time you saw it, it was too late. 

Mark 4:36 says this, "And leaving the crowd, they took Him with them in the boat, just as He was. And other boats were with Him” (ESV). So, out on this sea at night was more than Jesus and His disciples in a boat. There were many others also. The text tells us that Jesus’ disciples were with Him in a boat. The Greek New Testament word translated as disciple is [μαθητής, mathetes] and it simply refers to someone who is a “follower.” Nothing super deep here.

Yet, when we look a the New Testament, we see there were actually four types of “followers” or disciples of Jesus (see John MacArthtur, The MacArthur New Testament Commentary, "Matthew 8," p.37): (a) You had those who were curious. Like many people today, who get enamored with some motivational speaker, they follow out of being fascinated or intrigued and then down the road, stop. This type would never surrender their life to Jesus. We see this first kind in John 6:53, 60, 66, “So Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in you . . . (60) When many of His disciples heard it, they said, “This is a hard saying; who can listen to it? , , , (66) After this many of His disciples turned back and no longer walked with Him” (ESV).

(b) There were those who followed Jesus who were intellectually convinced of Jesus’ deity, diving message and power. We see this in Nicodemus In John 3:2, “This man (Nicodemus) came to Jesus by night and said to Him, “Rabbi, we know that You are a teacher come from God, for no one can do these signs that You do unless God is with him” (ESV).

(c) A third type of follower of Jesus we would call “secret believers.” We see this in a man described as Joseph of Arimathea. Look at Matthew 27:57-58, “When it was evening, there came a rich man from Arimathea, named Joseph, who also was a disciple of Jesus. (58) He went to Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus. Then Pilate ordered it to be given to him” (ESV). At this point, Joseph was not a committed follower of Jesus. 

(d) A fourth type of follower of Jesus we would call the genuine, sincere and committed followers of Jesus. This would be the 12 and others. As I said earlier, the Sea of Galilee lies just over 600 feet below sea level, near the northern end of the Jordan River. Mt. Hermon rises 9,200 feet to the north, and strong northerly winds often plummet down the upper Jordan valley with great force. When they meet the warmer air over the Galilee basin, the intensity is increased. Hitting the cliffs on the eastern shore, the winds swirl and twist, causing the waters beneath them to churn violently. The fact that they come quickly and with little warning makes the storms all the more dangerous and frightening.

Matthew used the Greek New Testament word [σεισμός, seisms] to describe this storm. This is where we get our English word seismic, seismology and seismograph. This word describes something that is so intense that it literally shakes violent whatever it hits. Have you ever  accidentally shake a cup of fluid so that it is all over the inside of the glass and/or comes out of the glass? Mark adds a little more here in Mark 4:37, “And a great windstorm arose, and the waves were breaking into the boat, so that the boat was already filling” (ESV). So, the water in the sea was shaking so violently that water was coming into the boat filling it. 

The amazing thing in all of this is that Jesus was dead asleep. How? The writers seem to want us to conclude that from a long day of doing miracles, healings and teaching, Jesus was exhausted. So here was God in human flesh dead asleep, which also affirms His deity and humanity. Mark 8:38 says, “But He was in the stern, asleep on the cushion. And they woke Him and said to Him, “Teacher, do You not care that we are perishing?” (ESV). Everyone is soaking wet, including Jesus. 

Without realizing it, this was planned by God. As experienced fishermen on this same sea, the disciples probably had done everything they knew from experience, but it was not working. It has been said, “Sometimes you don’t know that Jesus is all you need until you realize Jesus is all you have.” The very same Jesus who had done all these healings earlier that day, maybe He can do something. Look at their reaction in Matthew 8:25, "The disciples went and woke Him, saying, “Lord, save us! We’re going to drown!” (ESV).

What are the lessons for us from this story?

1. God loves it when His children or anyone cries out to Him to be saved. Such a person gets a huge help. Those who do not, do not have any divine help. 
2. Even the strongest, committed, and faithful Christian panic in certain times. When life squeezes us, we can forget God. 

(a) David writes this in Psalm 10:1, “Why, O LORD, do You stand far away? Why do You hide Yourself in times of trouble?” (ESV). Even the prophet Isaiah, struggled one time in his life with this. 

(b) Look at Isaiah 51:9, “Awake, awake, put on strength, O arm of the LORD; awake, as in days of old, the generations of long ago. Was it not you who cut Rahab in pieces, who pierced the dragon?” (ESV).

(c) John the Baptizer, the forerunner of the Messiah, Jesus, sent his disciples to ask Jesus this in Matthew 11:3, “. . . and said to him, “Are you the One who is to come, or shall we look for another?” (ESV).

3. Jesus’ response to His disciples is unusual. Look at verse 26,  “He replied, “You of little faith, why are you so afraid?” Fear cause us to be timid and cowardly with God. 

(a) The Greek New Testament word translated as “afraid” is [δειλός, deilos], which is not the usual word in Greek for fear or afraid. It literally means “to be timid or cowardly.” They obviously had every reason to be afraid and timid with their boat filling up with water in the middle of the sea at night. What seems to be implied is that the disciples are wondering, “Why isn’t Jesus afraid and just as much a coward as we are?”

(b) We see their lack of faith in Jesus in Mark 4:38, “But He was in the stern, asleep on the cushion. And they woke Him and said to Him, “Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?” (ESV). They accuse Jesus of being insensitive and uncaring. Do you ever feel that God is insensitive to your pain and you conclude He simply does not care.

(c) Jesus response to them gives us the answer to their fear in verse 26, “Why are you afraid, O you of little faith?” (ESV). They were timid and fearful because they did not have faith in Jesus. Here they are, they have seen 3-4 miracles already. It is as if Jesus was saying to them, “After all you have seen Me do, you still have doubts and fears?”

(d) Even if the disciples had drowned, Jesus had the power to restore all of their lives. What this tells us is that faith is like a muscle — it needs strengthening. All of us can doubt, question God and think God has abandoned us. This is why we need to ask Jesus what His disciples asked Him in Luke 17:5, “The apostles said to the Lord, `Increase our faith!’” (ESV).

(e) So, when you find your faith drowning the “boat of life” due to the storms of life, we all need to pray what a father said to Jesus in Mark 9, when he brought his demon possessed son to Jesus to heal. Jesus asked him did he believe that Jesus could his son. What the father said to Jesus is what we should say to Jesus in these troubled waters in Mark 9:24, “I believe; help my unbelief!” (ESV). I believe that if we do this, then our timid and cowardly faith will grow and increase. 

(f) The disciples did initially believe Jesus cared about them in their crisis, do you? We see this in their and our reaction to Jesus. It is amazing our finkle we can be. After Jesus called the storm, the disciples' reaction was this in Matthew 8:27,  “What sort of man is this, that even winds and sea obey him?” (ESV). "Man?" They still saw Jesus just as an ordinary man or person -- on the level of the. It won't be until Matthew 16:13-16, where Jesus asked His disciples, "Who do people say I am?" Then He asked them,"Who do you say I am?" Peter immediately shouts out, "You're the Christ. The Messiah. The Savior for the world." When life comes at you, who is Jesus to you?

Scripture To Meditate On: 1 Peter 5:7, “Casting all your anxieties on Him, because He cares for you” (ESV). 

Prayer To Pray: “Dear Jesus, there are times I doubt You. When life comes at me, I wonder, “Where is God?” Jesus, forgive me for my lack of faith, my timidity when it comes to trusting You. God, You have all power — even over nature — please help me to have faith over my nature to doubt and to be fearful. In Jesus’ name, Amen!”