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A Sermon by Donel McClellan
A Sermon by Donel McClellan Sleeping Through
Storms I can remember when I discovered the poet Stephen Crane while in high school.
I was taken by the simple clarity and bravado of his poetry. One of his poems
came to mind as I was reading this story from Mark of Jesus sleeping through a
storm. It is the question asked, not by Jesus, but by his disciples. "Teacher,
is it nothing to you that we’re going down?" Crane covers it in
five terse lines: A man said to the universe: The question asked in the midst of life’s stormy moments is this. Does the
universe know I exist? Is my life worth anything? Or am I like the spider,
exploring the bottom of the bathtub when the water is turned on swirling it down
the drain? A man said to the universe: That is Stephen Crane’s answer. It is existentially harsh and unyielding.
But it is, in a way, comforting because it is perfectly consistent with the cold
calculations of a secular scientistic society. Professor Paul Davies of Australia received the 1995 Templeton Prize for
progress in religion. He claims that science is of little threat to Christian
belief. And yet, he also says that if the Christian faith is to be credible to
modern people, we have got to get over the notion of an "interventionist
God," that is a God who hears, cares, and acts for our good. Such a God,
says Professor Davies, is not only an offense to reason, a rebel against the
laws of nature, but also incredible to modern skeptical people. Do we really
want a God who, from time to time, steps in, reaches out, and acts? I invite you
to keep that question before you as we encounter today’s gospel lesson, a
story about a God who hears, cares, and acts: This is one of four miracle stories employed by Mark to introduce the amazing
power and authority of Jesus. It is played off the disciples who are Mark’s
ancient equivalent of the twelve stooges. Someone suggested that in Mark, we
should pronounce it the—duh-sciples—in order to get the story
right. So here are Jesus and the duh-sciples in a boat. Remember that several of
them are professional fishers so boats ought to be no big deal. They are sailing
across the sea of Galilee and a storm comes up. The duh-sciples panic and
fear for their lives. They believe they are about to capsize and look for Jesus.
They find Jesus in the bow of the boat, head on a pillow, fast asleep. They
awaken him. "Teacher, is it nothing to you that we’re going down?" Jesus awakened, quells the wind and the waves and speaks harshly to the duh-sciples.
"Why are you such cowards? Don’t you have any faith at all?" The story begins with Jesus’ followers in panic and crisis. And it ends
with them in crisis and panic. They were in absolute awe, staggered. "Who is this, anyway?"
they asked. "Wind and sea at his beck and call!" So there you have it. Is it more terrifying to believe that the universe is
perfectly impersonal and God does not intervene in the affairs of human beings,
or to believe that God does sometimes act in surprising and powerful ways? Cindy and I have an ongoing and lively discussion with a very wise and
articulate member of this church who claims that he does not believe in an
active God. By this, I think he means that to allow the possibility that God
occasionally enters into human affairs and overturns the established laws of
physics and biology in order to save a person or persons would undermine the
structure and reliability of the universe itself. In other words, a supernatural
intervention by God into the natural world would make all of our science
unpredictable and unreliable. If eggs don’t fall down every time you drop
them, but sometimes fall up, then we have a problem of considerable gravity. On the other hand, we have all experienced changes in human attitudes and
behavior which literally astound us and invite us to consider that some
influence, let us call it the Holy Spirit, is at work. It is terrifying to
believe that God cannot respond to our cries when we are in peril. On the other
hand it is terrifying to consider a God who has that power but may or may not
choose to use it. This is the great dilemma of the will of God. How can we speak
of the will of God in a world of scientific reliability and a society which is
immune or deaf to the desires of God? Leslie Weatherhead, a great British Methodist minister wrote a profoundly
helpful little book near the end of World War II which is called simply The will
of God. Weatherhead divides the will of God into three components. These helped me
fit the theological concept into my experience of the world. The three are: 1) God’s intentional will, 2) God’s circumstantial will, and 3) God’s ultimate will. Dr. Weatherhead cautions us against imposing our assumptions about God’s
will upon his categories until he has explained them. The first category is God’s
intentional will. To understand this we must remove any concept of evil, pain
and destruction, for the intentional will of God is benevolent and good. This is
God’s dream for universe, for humanity and for each individual personally. God’s intentional will is a vision of relationship, love and wholeness.
Obviously, God’s intentional will is seldom seen here below. It is seldom seen
because human beings have not abided by God’s dream for them. They have sought
their own dreams, they have fought for their desires, they have harmed one
another and the earth itself in their attempt to gain wealth, status and power.
And the world itself contains capricious and destructive elements: storms,
floods, earthquakes, harmful bacterium and diseases. In this world which contains so much which runs counter to God’s
intentional will, the second aspect of God’s will comes into play. That is God’s
circumstantial will. To put it simply, this is Gods’s best option for us after
we have messed up. Given the circumstances we have created, there is still a
creative direction which God hopes for us. Finally, in spite of all obstacles, God has an ultimate will which, in God’s
time will serve to bring about God’s original intentional will. As an example, was it God’s will that Jesus was crucified? I think we can
agree that it was not God’s intentional will. God’s intentional will was
that people would listen to Jesus, accept his teaching and live in a loving
relationship with God and with one another. But that was not to be. Enemies rose up to challenge Jesus and eventually to
bring him to trial. In that situation, what was the circumstantial will of God?
It was that Jesus remain true to his teaching. It was not God’s will that
Jesus run away, or renounce what he believed, or bribe the officials to save him
from the death penalty. Nor did God suspend the laws of nature for Jesus. The
whips cut his flesh, the nails pierced his body, the suspension on the cross
collapsed his lungs and he died a very common, very physical death. But God’s
circumstantial will was not only that Jesus be subject to the laws of his land
and the physics of crucifixion, it was also that he face death in such a
courageous and unique way that death itself was transformed. God’s ultimate will is served by Jesus life and death, for Jesus’ death
provides a pathway back to God for wandering people. The church today is a
living part of the struggle for God’s ultimate will to come to pass. We work
for the day when love will overcome hate and war will be no more. So, does the universe care that we exist? Does God really number the hairs on
our heads as Jesus claimed? I believe that God does care and does reach out to
help us, not by upsetting the laws of nature, but by assuring us that we are not
alone. Storms arise. Cancer returns, accidents claim lives. Legal battles are lost
and families are harmed. People cast themselves headlong into destructive
addictions. Parents abuse children. Storms arise and we who are caught in the
middle are anxious with fear. We cry out, "Teacher, is it nothing to you
that we’re going down?" Jesus replies, "Quiet! Settle down!" In the midst of our chaos
there is a quiet center, and eye of calm in the middle of the storm. Jesus
speaks sharply, "Why are you such cowards? Don’t you have any faith at
all?" Faith is simply the understanding that we are held in God’s will by God’s
love. We need only quiet our fears to know that we are not alone and that God is
with us. A terrible tragedy engulfed a religion professor at Whitworth College. Gerald
Sittser lost his wife, mother and four-year-old daughter in a single car
accident. One by one, by the side of the road they died in his arms. Following
the accident Sittser chronicled the emptiness of his life. With candor and
matter of fact clarity he recalls the despair that threatened to overwhelm him—but
amazingly, never did. He survived because he believed in the ancient Christian
doctrine of grace. He believed in grace because he lived it. And he named the
book he later wrote, A Grace Disguised. He writes, ". . . [T]hough I experienced death, I also
experienced life in ways that I never thought possible before—not after the
darkness, as we might suppose, but in the darkness. I did not go through the
pain and come out the other side; instead, I lived in it and found within that
pain the grace to survive and eventually grow. I did not get over the loss of
my loved ones; rather I absorbed the loss into my life, like soil receives
decaying matter, until it became a part of who I am. Sorrow took up permanent
residence in my soul and enlarged it." Let me repeat that last line: "Sorrow took up permanent residence
in my soul and enlarged it." Where was God when Dr. Sittser’s wife, mother and child died? Where was God
while he fought despair and overwhelming grief? It appears that God was there,
closer than breathing, in the very center of the sorrow. Grace inhabits even our
pain and fear. Grace is in the center of the storm. Jesus knew that. The
disciples didn’t . . . yet. Gerald Sittser concludes: "To live in a world with grace is better by far than to live in a
world of absolute fairness. A fair world may make life nice for us, but only
as nice as we are. A world with grace will give us more than we deserve. It
will give us life, even in our suffering." With the disciples we are amazed and shaken by the depth of God’s love and
concern for us. They were in absolute awe, staggered. "Who is this,
anyway?" they asked. "Wind and sea at his beck and call!" Grace! Grace has the fist and the last word. Amen. 1. Poems of Stephen Crane,
selected by Gerald D. McDonald, Thomas Y. Cromwell Company, New York, 1964, p.
49 2. Paul Davies, Physics and the
Mind of God: The Templeton Prize Address, First Things 55
(August/September 1995):31-35. 3. Leslie D, Weather head, The
Will of God, Nashville, The Abington Press, 1944, 1972.
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