Moving onward through the season of Pentecost, the 3rd Sunday of Pentecost readings are Job 38:1-11; 2 Corinthians 6:1-13 and Mark 4:35-41. The text selected to preach on is Mark 4:40 as Jesus says to His disciples, “Why are you so fearful? How is it that you have no faith?”

Both Mark 4 has the disciples and Job 38 has Job questioning God to answer why they are going through such tribulation. The discples are sinking in the lake and Job is replete with sufferings and tribulations. God’s answer is similar in both situations. He doesn’t provide an answer to their questions. Instead, the problem is the lack of faith in both the disciples and Job. What is meant by that?

Is Jesus reprimanding the disciples that they should have known that the sea would be calmed? If that were so, would it be a sin for us to be worried if we were on a boat sinking into the water? What would this say about those who were on the Titanic? The answer as to what Jesus meant is found in understanding the object of faith. It is not that God promises that everything will work out as we desire. Instead, the object of faith are the promises that He provides. Then is Jesus in error to reprimand the disciples for a lack of faith?

No. Instead, Jesus is remembering the promises of the Old Testament writing that foretold how the Messiah would die. From Psalm 22 He would be pierced in hands and feet; from Isaiah 53 He would be whipped, etc. etc. In other words, the disciples should have realized that Jesus would not die by drowning in the middle of a lake. Their trust in the promises of God as found in the Old Testament were indeed weak. The disciples’ faith was not trusting that the One Who was asleep in the boat was also the One Who had created the entire world. He would have no problem with a storm.

That same Jesus would now take on the storm of our sin and the curse of the Law. He would defeat not Poseidon or Neptune as gods of the sea but Satan as god of this world. And He would do so not by putting nails into Satan but by receiving nails into His flesh. In that way, the curse of the Law is removed from us and replaced with the forgiveness of sins and the robe of righteousness. And for those with faith, we are comforted by the Good News of that Gospel.