June 19, 2015
The followng is a homily based on the Scrpiture readings for Sunday, June 21.
Derecho. I had heard the word many times in Spanish, but never in English. Three years ago a derecho hit the Washington, D.C., area. I wasn’t here to see it hit, but I saw it coming in Ohio, when a huge wind swept through, pummeling everything with vicious rain, strewing leaves and branches all over the road like a rug. When it arrived here in D.C., it caused widespread damage and outages that lasted for days. If you ever wanted to know the power of a storm – the Italian word is tormenta – here it was!
For people like the ancient Jews, who lived in a desert dependent on water, vast areas of waters frightened them. This was where storms came from – whirlpools and monsters. They thought the dead lay at the bottom of oceans and seas. So the first reading, showing God containing the water, revealed to the Jews the power of God – who could contain relentless and raging waters.
In certain psalms in the Bible, God seems to use the storm to speak – his voice is like thunder, his power like lightning. But in our Scriptures today, God is not the storm but the voice from within the storm. In the first reading, God tells Job that he cannot question God’s power. But in the Gospel, Jesus shows us what God’s power is like.
We are surprised that men who grew up fishing on this lake are terrified. They must have been through storms a hundred times. But here they are, terrified, thinking they are going to die. “Do you not know we are perishing?” And, in the midst of their fear, in the midst of the waves and wind, Jesus tells them as he did so many times, “Do not be afraid. Do you not have any faith?”
Is it not the case that fear can drive us even to a kind of blindness? Jesus is sleeping right in front of them, but they cannot see him. They can only see their fear. “Do you not have faith?” Faith in what? Of course, faith in Jesus whom they have experienced personally, in miracles and parables, faith in the One who had showed them the undeniable presence of God.
But also faith in God’s abiding love. The God who speaks from the cloud is the God who sleeps in storms, and who speaks through every danger in our lives. The Jesus napping in the boat is the Jesus who is with us in our pain, in our confusion, in our fears, even in our deaths. Jesus shows us a God who is with us through everything in our lives. Often we only want a God who gives us a shortcut, a way out of trouble. But the Jesus sleeping in the boat is the Christ who will face death itself – with us and for us – and speak faith and trust throughout the ordeal. Do we not have faith that God is always with us?
Paul tells us that in Jesus’ death and resurrection, all who believe in him have passed through death already. The worst has already happened. Though we may be tested, and tested severely, the voice of Christ is unwavering: do not be afraid. I am here. You are with me; you are mine. I will never leave you.
Tornadoes, hurricanes, cyclones: they will come, and they will go. In our many fears we can think that Jesus is asleep, that God is not there. But it’s not Jesus who needs to be woken up. It is we who need to be awakened – to open our eyes and see how present God always is.