No Time for Panic
Luke 8:22-25
Gettysburg Presbyterian Church
Rev. Daniel T. Hans
February 3, 2008

(Context – This past week I announced my resignation as Pastor/Head of Staff to take a new position as Pastor/Head of Staff at Second Presbyterian Church in Lexington, KY)

A husband and wife were in bed.  She thought she heard a noise and awakened her husband saying, “There’s a burglar downstairs.”  He groaned and rolled over, but she insisted there was a burglar in the house.  Finally, he got up, went downstairs, and, sure enough, there was burglar, climbing out the window. The husband ran over to the window, grabbed the burglar’s leg, pulled him back into the room and said, “Oh no you don’t.  You stay right here until my wife sees you.  She’s been looking for you for 20 years!”
Fear has the power to control us if we let fear exercise its power over us.
Our passage this morning, as well as this message, is about fear - fear as it invades our lives when we face present challenges and future uncertainties.

I

Luke 8 presents a series of actions done by Jesus that follow his parable about the four soils, the four types of lives into which faith is planted.
Jesus taught with amazing wisdom and acted with the amazing power.
In Luke 8 we hear about Jesus liberating an insane man who was thought to be possessed by demons, healing a woman plagued for 12 years with a bleeding discharge, and restoring to life an apparently dead girl. Initiating this series of dramatic actions is an incident in which Jesus calms a violent storm that threatens his disciples. 

Only in the storm scene does Luke give us the reaction of the disciples to all that is happening.  In the face of demons, disease, and death not a word is mentioned about the disciples’ reaction.  However, in the storm scene, when the disciples themselves are threatened, we hear of their reaction. And their reaction is one of panic. How typically human of the disciples; and how typically like us!  Like the disciples, we can look with calm, cool reserve when hardship and uncertainty befall others; but when we struggle in life and face transition, our faith panics as fear takes over.

II

Let’s take a closer look at what happens out in that boat.  Of Jesus’ 12 disciples, four of them, Peter, Andrew, James and John, are seasoned fishermen who have sailed the Sea of Galilee much of their lives and have been out on the water in some pretty nasty storms.  It may have been the size of this storm or its suddenness that frightened the disciples.  Fishermen know that storms arise but they are never quite ready when a particular storm arrives.  Likewise, congregations know that change is constant but they are never quite ready when a major change crashes upon them.
Additionally, the disciples may have been surprised, startled, frightened that any storm assaulted them. Having seen a preview of Jesus’ power shown in his earlier healings, they may have expected smooth sailing with Jesus.
“Walk with Jesus and the path will be smooth and trouble-free.”  Some people believe and preach that.

Where the disciples got that idea is a puzzle!  Jesus has already told them that following him is no easy task as he is no safe Savior, no calming Christ.
In C.S. Lewis’ book The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe from which the movie Narnia was made, before the children meet Aslan the lion, who is the Christ-figure in the story, they ask Mr. And Mrs. Beaver about the lion.
“Then isn’t he safe?” Lucy wants to know.  “Safe?” says Mr. Beaver. “Don’t you hear what Mrs. Beaver tells you?  Who said anything about safe?  Of course he isn’t safe.  But he’s good.”  Following Jesus is not the safe and easy way to live, but it is the good and meaningful way to live.  It is a mistaken notion to think that faith in God and following Jesus brings smooth sailing in life.  Stormy uncertainties abound!

III

Finding themselves in such a storm even though Jesus is onboard may have startled the disciples and rattled their faith. The fact that Jesus is sound asleep sure doesn’t help matters.  Jesus asleep in the storm reveals that there will be times in following him when circumstances arise that leave us wondering if God is not asleep at the back of the boat, unconcerned about what is happening around us.  A newborn is thrown into a trash can; a teenager turns his schoolyard into a killing field; an angry mob in Kenya steals food and medicine from an orphanage where 30 children are barely getting by; or, far less severe yet no less startling, a pastor of 20 years announces his resignation.  Given life’s uncertainties, who doesn’t become fearful and wonder if God is asleep in the back of the boat?

In Matthew’s and Mark’s versions of this scene, Jesus poses a question that we need to hear.  “Why are you afraid?”  Notice, he doesn’t say- “Don’t be afraid.” It’s okay to be afraid at times.  In times of strain and uncertainty, Jesus challenges us to ask ourselves- why are we afraid?  Up to this point in the gospel accounts, Jesus has given his disciples a look at a new way of living. He has tried to open their eyes to what life can be when God is present and is trusted.  And yet, out there on the lake, the disciples’ retreat from hope in what can be into fear of what is.

In his play Overlaid Robertson Davie presents Pop, a 70-year old farmer in rural Canada who shares his farmhouse with his daughter Ethel, her husband and child.  On Saturday afternoons, Pop puts on his battered old top hat and his white gloves and sits down to listen to the radio broadcast from the New York Metropolitan Opera.  Pop soon faces a decision- what to do with the $1200 he just received from a paid-up life insurance policy.  He decides to spend it all on a trip to the Met, complete with fine wines and food and interesting company.  Daughter Ethel is furious.  As always, she thinks the money should be spent on practical, conventional things the family needs.
She wants Pop to use the money to buy a large headstone for the family burial plot.  Pop pities his daughter for her lack of appreciation of anything but the practical and for her fear of taking risks.  He bellows out, “That’s what ails everybody around here - little, shriveled-up, peanut size souls!”
(Preaching, May/June, 98, p. 23)

I don’t know about you, but I can relate to daughter Ethel.  I know that Jesus’ disciples could relate to her.  Fear can paralyze our hopes of what can be and suffocate our dreams of what might be.   Be it fear of losing a loved one or fear of getting cancer or fear of losing certain abilities or fear of ending up senile in a nursing home or fear of being alone or fear of failure or even fear of success or fear of change.  Any of those things can cripple us emotionally and spiritually.

IV

A sign of good news in this scene on the lake is that Jesus’ followers cry out for help in the midst of their fear.  They don’t ignore the threat and pretend not to be afraid.  They are honest about their situation.  A snake owner put live mice in the snake’s cage for food for his pet. Once he put in a little white mouse while the snake was asleep in the sawdust.  The mouse realized it had a big problem.  Terrified about being swallowed alive, as the snake slept the mouse worked furiously to cover up the snake with sawdust until the snake was no longer visible.  Then the mouse relaxed. (Laura Chick, Leadership)  Unlike the mouse, the disciples didn’t try to cover up their fears or pretend the challenges facing them did not exist.  They are honest about their situation.

They were much like the ship captain back in the days when great sailing ships carried expensive treasures across the seas.  One day the call came from the crow’s nest, “Pirate ship approaching and its sending a boarding party!”  The crew panicked, but the Captain assessed the situation and called to his First Mate, “Bring me my red shirt.”  He put on his red shirt and led his crew in a brave fight to repel the pirates.  Although some casualties occurred with the crew, they successfully fought off the pirates.  Later in the day, the crow’s nest called out, “Two pirate ships approaching and both are sending boarding parties!”  Again the crew trembled in fear and again the Captain assessed the situation and called to his First Mate, “Bring me my red shirt.”  He put on the red shirt and led the crew to fight off the pirates.  Oh, there were a few casualties among the crew but they repelled the pirates.
Weary from battle, the crew sat on the deck and an Ensign looked at the Captain and asked, “Sir, why did you call for your red shirt before the battle?” The Captain replied, “If I am wounded in battle, the red shirt does not show the blood and so you men will continue to fight unafraid.”  The crew sat in silence marveling at the courage of their Captain and with a confidence in him like never before.  Suddenly the crow’s nest called out, “Ten pirate ships approaching and all are sending boarding parties.”  The crew looked to their Captain with calm confidence in this man and awaited his usual command.  The Captain assessed the situation and then called to his First Mate, “Bring me my brown pants.”

No matter what challenges and uncertainties confront us, it is no time for panic, no time for brown pants.  God always has a bright future ahead for us if we will but weather the storm and move forward with hope.

V

Jesus’ disciples faced their fears.  But they didn’t face them alone.  And here is where faith is the great resource.  Weak and struggling though the disciples’ faith was, they nevertheless had faith as they called out to Jesus.  We can do the same.  Whatever struggles we face in life, whatever challenges we encounter, whatever changes are thrust upon us, we are not alone. 

Oh, it may seem that God is asleep in the back of the boat but call to God anyway.  God is there and he will act.  In the face of the power of a great storm, there is a greater power present- the power of God in Jesus Christ.  In the face of future uncertainty, there is a present certainty – the presence of God in Jesus Christ.

Luke doesn’t tell us how Jesus calmed the storm and we need not waste time trying to figure how he might have done it. Was it an amazing coincidence?
Was it a miracle?  Did it actually happen as written?  Those questions are not important and they miss the point.  The point is that where once a great storm produced great fear, the presence and power of Jesus transformed a great storm into a greater calm and changed a great fear into a greater amazement.

Our response to challenges confronting us is either panic or faith.  This is no time for panic; this is time for faith. Faith does not believe in God with the top of our minds as much as trust in God in the bottom of our hearts.  According to Scottish theologian John Baillie, “Jesus never had to say to people, ‘You think you do not believe in God, yet in the bottom of your hearts you know that you are surrounded by God’s holiness and love.’  Rather, he had to deal with people to whom he had to say, ‘You think you do believe in God, yet you refuse to trust Him in every hour and circumstance of need.’”                     (Our Knowledge of God, p. 124)

More than belief about God in the present, faith is trust in God with the future.  More than being limited by circumstances, faith is liberated by possibilities.  More than looking in the rear view mirror for a familiar past, faith looks through the windshield toward a promising future.  More than hiding from the winds of uncertainty, faith boldly faces the storms of change.  Faith is not shaped by fear, faith is shaped by hope.

The disciples learn one of the great lessons of faith.  It’s a lesson that we need to learn as well.  Simply put the lesson is this- Don’t look around in fear and don’t look back in anger, look ahead in amazement.  Be open to the amazing things God is doing and will do here at Gettysburg Presbyterian Church; and calm can come to our worst of storms.

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