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After: You are sitting with your upper back resting against the gunwale of Simon Peter’s fishing boat; you have your head tipped back, against the rail, and are looking up into the night sky. The moon is just on the wane from its fullness: its bright-white light flickers atop the waters; it illumines everything of the seaside as far as your eyes can see. The hills and gullies and folds of the earth are all a mixture of shadows and white light. Even still, there are plenty of stars overhead to watch with wonder. Some seem to pulse and twinkle. Others are just pinpoints of steady light. The air around you is warm and comfortable: that exact perfect temperature where it feels soft and sweet against your skin. All else is perfectly still. No breeze; not a breath. The only sound from the sea is when movements in the boat stir the hull. The sail was dropped well over an hour ago—in the middle of the storm—and so the mast stands stark, silhouetted, against the moonlight. Everything is just… perfect. Ringing the rim of the boat are the other eleven of the disciples of Jesus—all leaning against the gunwale—and, at the prow, sits Jesus, resting His head on the forward notch. He too is looking up into the starry, moonlit sky, enjoying the quiet peaceful air. You can see how He breathes slowly and smoothly. It looks like He’s almost falling off to sleep. Then… He leans forward. Beneath the calm of the night, your eyes meet. For a moment, it is as if He is studying you. Then… so lovingly… eyes wrinkling… He smiles. * * * * Before:
You are alternatingly throwing yourself to your knees—bailing water from the hull of the boat—and jumping to your feet to throw those buckets of water overboard. The moonlight only serves to faintly light the whole scene: of all twelve of you either desperately bailing, or trying to get the sail down and stowed, or violently retching over the edge of the boat. You have never experienced winds like these winds. What had started as moonlit whitecaps had progressed to sizable rollers had eventually become the scene around you: mountains of Galilean stormswells. The boat, from all directions, keeps lifting upon one wave and then--so suddenly—tumbling and flying down the other side… only to be picked up again and heaved in another direction. Land, it would seem, is entirely out of sight. All you can see are the summits and valleys of these endless successions of windtossed waves. All you can hear are your friends’ screams and the raging howl of the wind. Amidst the rapidly growing certainty that, in a very few minutes, you will all be in the water, drowning, you are also thinking one other desperate thought: If only. If only you had not left Jesus on land—left Him to say goodbye to the crowds—He would be in the boat right now. If only you could make your way to the stern, wake Him up like last time, He would rise to His feet and calm the storm instantly. If only Jesus was somehow here, and not up on the mountainside, looking down at you, you would be alright. Oh… If only… A massive wave then rises above the portside. You lean with the others as it seems to suck you upward, passing over and beneath you. The boat, sideways, then tumbles along its back edge. You are all holding on for dear life. And then… in the valley between that breaker and the next… before another wave is ready to come pummel you… you see something. No, you see Someone. Lit up by the milky moonlight, steadily standing amidst the waves, there is a Person balancing His weight—atop the waters. He is looking right at you. By the light of the moon, He nods His head; smiles.
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"What is there left to say? If God is for us, who can be against us? He that did not hesitate to spare his own Son but gave him up for us all—can we not trust such a God to give us, with him, everything else that we can need?
"Who would dare to accuse us, whom God has chosen? The judge himself has declared us free from sin. Who is in a position to condemn? Only Christ, and Christ died for us, Christ rose for us, Christ reigns in power for us, Christ prays for us! "Can anything separate us from the love of Christ? Can trouble, pain or persecution? Can lack of clothes and food, danger to life and limb, the threat of force of arms? Indeed some of us know the truth of the ancient text: ‘For your sake we are killed all day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter’. "No, in all these things we win an overwhelming victory through him who has proved his love for us. "I have become absolutely convinced that neither death nor life, neither messenger of Heaven nor monarch of earth, neither what happens today nor what may happen tomorrow, neither a power from on high nor a power from below, nor anything else in God’s whole world has any power to separate us from the love of God in Jesus Christ our Lord!" (Romans 8:31-39, Phillips) Your sense of walking through life alone is your wrongest sense. Jesus hems you in, both behind and before.
Remember: Fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God; I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you with my righteous right hand. (Is. 41:10) For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Rom. 8:38,39) The Lord your God is in your midst, a mighty one who will save; he will rejoice over you with gladness; he will quiet you by his love; he will exult over you with loud singing. (Zeph. 3:17) And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever, even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you. (Jn. 14:16,17) It is the Lord who goes before you. He will be with you; he will not leave you or forsake you. Do not fear or be dismayed. (Deut. 31:8) Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid. (Jn. 14:27) The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear The Lord is the stronghold of my life; of whom shall I be afraid? (Ps. 27:1) My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. (Ps. 73:26) (And I could keep going and going!) |
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