Sermon - Ephiphany IV 2022 - Matthew 8:23-27

Christ Calming the Storm, Juan de Flandes, circa 1500

Do you believe that Jesus is real and that He’s God and that He has authority over all this creation? Today’s lessons show us that those things are all true. Our readings also show us that we sometimes have a hard time believing it. Thus, the epiphany we have today is that Jesus has authority over creation.

In our Old Testament lesson we heard the familiar story of rebellious Jonah fleeing from the Lord and getting on a ship going the opposite direction he was supposed to go. Because God is the Master of creation, “the Lord hurled a great wind upon the sea, and there was a mighty tempest on the sea, so that the ship threatened to break up.” But where was Jonah? Asleep in the belly of the ship!

Apparently Jonah did not know the Proverbs too well. Proverbs 6 says that if you get caught in a snare by speaking foolishly with your neighbor, immediately go to your neighbor and fix the situation. “Give your eyes no sleep and your eyelids no slumber; save yourself like a gazelle from the hand of the hunter, like a bird from the hand of the fowler.” The same applies to God! When you get caught in your sins, don’t just lie down and sleep, but go quickly and beg repentance lest He strikes you down forever!

It’s incredible that the pagans on the boat knew better what to do than Jonah, and they didn’t even yet know the true God worth praying to. The captain rebuked Jonah: “What do you mean, you sleeper? Arise, call out to your god! Perhaps the god will give a thought to us, that we may not perish.” When Jonah told them that his God was the only true God and explained the situation, and that they’d have to throw him overboard, the sailors were so kind that they at first refused to throw him overboard and tried to get back to dry land if at all possible.

But when it became obvious they weren’t going to make it back to land, before they cast Jonah overboard, they prayed to the true God Jonah had told them about: “O Lord, let us not perish for this man's life, and lay not on us innocent blood, for you, O Lord, have done as it pleased you.” When Jonah had been tossed and the sea ceased its raging, these previously pagan sailors “feared the Lord exceedingly, and they offered a sacrifice to the Lord and made vows.”

It’s a remarkable story because Jonah was the Israelite meant to evangelize the Ninevites and bring them to faith. He refused, ran away from God, but then came across the kindest pagans who converted to the true faith and were more faithful and pious than he! God, who is Master over all creation, caused a storm to arise which was meant to bring about repentance. Because of this storm the pagan sailors repented and became Christians and Jonah went to Nineveh and the Ninevites repented and became Christians. With a sad irony, the only one who didn’t repent was Jonah, since the book ended with Jonah angry that 120,000 Ninevites repented and were saved.

God used that powerful storm to bring about the salvation of many thousands of people. Similarly, Jesus stilled the storm in Matthew not just to save a few disciples on the boat, but to teach Christians throughout all the centuries that Jesus has authority over creation and we have nothing to fear but God alone. 

The similarities between Jonah’s storm and Jesus’ storm are uncanny, but perhaps what’s most noticeable are the dissimilarities. Jonah got in a boat to run away from God, but first Jesus got in the boat and then “His disciples followed Him.” When the terrible storm arises Jonah sleeps because He doesn’t want to deal with God, but Jesus sleeps because He knows that He has nothing to fear since He has authority over the seas. Instead of pagan sailors praying, the Israelite sailors pray. Jonah ends the storm by being cast into the deep for three days and three nights, whereas Jesus simply rebukes the storm, (although later on Jesus would spend three days in the belly of the deep in order to ultimately rescue us from something much greater than a storm: sin and death).

Perhaps the most important differences are between Jonah’s and Jesus’ sleep, and the fear of the sailors and the disciples. When Jonah slept it was because He was trying to run away from God and hide and ignore his problems. But Jesus slept because He had absolutely no fear or anxiety. Jesus knew Psalm 127: “It is in vain that you rise up early and go late to rest, eating the bread of anxious toil; for he gives to his beloved sleep.” Or Proverbs 3: “If you lie down, you will not be afraid; when you lie down, your sleep will be sweet. Do not be afraid of sudden terror or of the ruin of the wicked, when it comes, for the LORD will be your confidence and will keep your foot from being caught.” Jesus sleeps because He has absolute certainty His heavenly Father will guard and keep Him amidst all peril.

In Jonah it says the sailors “feared the Lord exceedingly.” That’s a great thing, because to fear the Lord is to have faith in Him. “We should fear, love, and trust in God above all things.” But when the disciples were afraid, Jesus gently rebuked them: “Why are you afraid, O you of little faith?” The difference is that the disciples weren’t fearing the Lord, they were fearing the storm and the loss of their lives. At the very least the disciples did pray to Jesus when they were panicking, so they aren’t no-faithers, they’re just little-faithers.

Now that we’ve unpacked this text, there’s a lot of applications for us here today! The big overarching application is that of fear. There’s only One we are to fear above all things, and that’s our Lord and Savior. When we say that we have faith in God, that means that we trust Him to care for us and protect us from all dangers. See how God protected the men on the boat with Jonah from the storm! See how God protected the disciples on the boat with Jesus! God cares for you no less than He did them. Fear God, and teach your heart to fear nothing else.

So the first application: For decades now there have been people urging fear because of “overpopulation.” For a while it was  global-cooling, then it was global-warming, now I think they just call it climate-change. Either way, the fear is that unless we do certain things then our world’s climate will alter such that many people, perhaps everyone, dies. I’m not going to debate the scientific theories behind their claims, I’m just going to point out that Jesus is Master over all of His creation. He’s going to take care of us and this world will endure until the appointed time comes. 

I’m not saying we shouldn’t try to reduce pollution and such things, those are good discussions to have and Christians can disagree on which is the best way. But what Jesus is teaching us is that He has authority over this world and will protect us. We don’t have to fear this world ending because we drive the wrong car or eat the wrong food. 

The second obvious application is that which we’ve all been living through for two years now: fear of death, Covid. Again, our Lord teaches us not to fear, since He is Lord over all this creation and all things are subject to His authority, including viruses like Covid. On top of that, Jesus doesn’t just have authority over death but He’s destroyed death by dying and rising! As a Christian there really is no reason to fear death at all. Since Christ has died to forgive your sins, and suffered your penalty of death, you only have an eternity of life awaiting you! 

So let us learn from Jesus to have no anxiety in the midst of life’s many storms. Let us learn from the sailors that when storms arise we ought to calmly pray to God and ask for deliverance. Let us learn that Jesus has authority over all creation, and therefore He is the only One worth fearing. What a grand thing it is to know that while many storms are raging, a great calm of peace may dwell in our hearts through faith in Jesus.