RBWords

     I know that I have mentioned this phrase in the past, but it is so apt for the scene in today's gospel:  "Sometimes the Lord calms the storm, and sometimes the Lord lets the storm rage and calms his child!" The anxious question of the disciples in the boat is one of the classic prayers of all time! "Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?"  There is a storm raging, the boat is tossing and taking on water.  The disciples are probably bailing frantically and Jesus is asleep on a cushion at the back of the boat!  They have to wake him up!  Then all he does is look around and say to the storm, "Quiet! Be still!"  The answer to their prayer, however, is not in calming the storm, but in Jesus' question:  "Why are you terrified?  Do you not yet have faith." How would we answer that question: "Yeah? Well....!"  I wonder if Jesus went back to the cushion to resume his nap!

     It would be easy for us to say, "Well, of course Jesus wasn't going to let them all drown.  That would mean the end of the gospel!"  But we aren't in that boat at that moment.  We are in our own boat with all its challenges.  Did we invite Jesus to come along?  Are we confident that no matter what happens, we will be safe?  Will we "hedge"  our faith bet and wake him up?  I dare say most of us wonder how the Lord can sleep in the midst of our storms.  Perhaps we do have faith, but we would prefer what WE think is Jesus' full and undivided attention in the storm.  For most of us I suspect it is a combination of bailing and believing!  AMEN