Wednesday, February 02, 2011

Stilling of the Storm

On the road to Emmaus, Jesus explained to the two disciples (Luke 24) how the entire Old Testament was about Him and His work. Earlier He had told the Pharisees the same thing: "These are they which testify of Me" (John 5).

We recently studied the story from Mark 4, when Jesus stilled the storm for the fearful disciples whose boat was going down. The moral of that story is usually that God is more powerful than the storm. When Pastor teaches in Didache, his main point is that Jesus mercifully rescues those who have "no faith" and are accusing Him of not caring about them.

But there's something else too. Remember how Jesus went to the synagogue in Nazareth and preached from Isaiah (Luke 4) about the things the messiah would do? Remember how Jesus responded to John the Baptist (Matthew 11) about how to know whether He was the messiah? The Old Testament says thus-and-such; Jesus does thus-and-such; there's a clue that He's the one. The blind see; the deaf hear; the lame walk; the poor have the gospel preached to them.

Look at Psalm 107. Yahweh the Lord commands and raises the stormy wind which lifts up the waves of the sea. The sailors' hearts melt because of the trouble when their boat is pitching on high waves. The men in the boat are at their wits' end, declares the psalmist. Then they cry out to the Lord in their trouble, and He brings them out of their distresses. He calms the storm so that its waves are still. Then they are glad because they are quiet. So He guides them to their desired haven.

What did Jesus DO?
That is precisely what Yahweh does.
He is the one whom the prophets foretold ... and He does more than just the "short list" from that passage in Isaiah.

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