Proper 7 : Mark 4:35-41 Julian Whitney
“Who is this guy?” This is quite a common phrase. It’s generally very positive; showing a pleasant surprise when finding, when discovering a new quality in someone you already know. It doesn’t mean that you don’t know that person; that would be, “Who is THIS guy?” It is that you are happy to discover something new in someone you already know; “Who IS this guy?” At this point in their journey, didn’t the disciples know who Jesus was? They were questioning, ““Teacher, don’t you care if we drown?” Of course Jesus cared, he loved his friends, his followers, his disciples. He was not worried about the storm. Maybe he was thinking;
“After a storm comes a calm”
嵐（あらし）のあとに凪（なぎ）が来る
難事（なんじ）のあとの慶次（けいじ）
So Jesus performed his twelfth miracle, twelve out of thirty-seven!
Sorry, I have been watching too much football and tennis!
This got me to thinking about Jesus’ miracles; thirty-seven according to Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.
I read each passage and began to separate them;
Water into Wine =GIVING
Healing of the son at Carpaneum = HEALING
Driving out demons in Carpaneum =CLEANSING
Then I stopped categorising as I realised that in every miracle, Jesus was helping. By calming the storm he was helping his friends.
Maybe this was also a way of showing his friends, his disciples, who he was.
Question: “Who is this guy?”
Answer: “The Son of God.”
Perhaps it takes a storm for us to know the Love of God, to accept Christ as our Saviour. Perhaps we need miracles?
I am a member of the Self Isolation-Choir; a group of more than fifteen-hundred people from over thirty countries. In remembrance of the late Prince Phillip, husband to Queen Elizabeth the second, we used the internet to record Eternal Father, Strong to Save and send that to Queen Elizabeth, to show that we shared in her grieving and we remembered her husband, and honoured his memory.
On June the tenth the hymn was performed, and every members’ face is shown. I sent the link to my mother and she said; “Fifteen hundred people, all in this singing, and all their faces on my iPad? It’s a miracle!” This wonderful group, the Self Isolation-Choir, was founded by the Royal School of Church Music is primarily for (but not necessarily exclusive to) Christians, we welcome all. My mother thinks it to be miraculous! It has helped hundreds, maybe thousands of people through this pandemic. We sang about those in peril, that is danger, on the sea.
Jesus helped his disciples, his friends, during that storm on the sea over two thousand years ago. He took a nap, had a little sleep, despite the storm. He was calm and relaxed, so he told the wind and water to be the same. He believes in us and will help us to make miracles.
Let’s follow him and calm today’s troubled waters
