Optimist Roundtable

By Martha Sykes

“God moves in a mysterious way, His wonders to perform; He plants His footsteps in the sea, and rides upon the storm.” This words are from a poet by the name is William Cowper and as I was reading about Jesus calming the storm in Mark, chapter 4, and watching the news about hurricane Ida approaching Louisiana, I couldn’t help but pray for God to calm that storm for our neighbors in the south!!

In this scripture, Jesus had just spent a long day beside the Sea of Galilee teaching a crowd of people about the kingdom of God. As evening approached, He said to His disciples, “ Let’s go over to the other side”. So they all climbed into a boat and started their trip across the sea.

Then all of a sudden, a furious and very windy storm began to rock their boat!!
I’ve read that such a storm as this is very common in the Sea of Galilee. Even though it is a small body of water, it is over a hundred feet deep. It is said that because of the mountains around the sea that the winds get very violent!! One minute it may be calm and the next minute a storm can suddenly appear. The boats back then had low sides also so we can imagine how frightening this storm was for the disciples. This was at night so that made it all the more scary.

As for Jesus, as this familiar story tells us, He fell asleep, and the disciples were afraid they might not survive. They were so scared that they woke Jesus and asked, “ Teacher, do you not care if we perish?” This question that the disciples asked makes us wonder if we at times when a sudden storm arises in our lives, do we ask that same question. When a crisis or difficulty suddenly shows up, we turn to our Savior and maybe we ask , “ Jesus, do you care? Why is this happening to us?”

Every believer goes through a time when we are so overwhelmed with the storms of this life that we feel helpless and our faith causes us to cry out to Jesus just like those disciples in that boat!! We may think He is sleeping but we are reminded in scripture, that He never slum ears or sleeps. Abraham Lincoln once said,” I have been driven many times upon my knees by the overwhelming conviction that I had nowhere else to go”.
In this world we live in today, storms of all kinds surround us, but it is our decision every day to trust our

Heavenly Father to take our fears away and pray for His power to give us His peace!
We know that He cares!!