The disciples were rowing across the sea one night, when a tempest arose and threatened to engulf their little craft.
Jesus was also a passenger with them, and worn out with the work of the day was in one end of the boat, "asleep on a pillow," (Mark 4:38) even while the water was dashing over their sides. "And they awoke Him, and said unto Him, Master, do You not care that we perish? And He arose, and rebuked the wind, and said unto the sea, Peace, be still. And the wind ceased and there was a great calm. And He said unto them, Why are you so fearful? how is it that you have no faith?" (Mark 4:38-40)
Is it, then, an evidence of no faith for men to be alarmed when their boat is filling with water in a boisterous sea? Yes, for the Lord was with them. They thought they were about to drown, and that the Lord was about to drown with them. And He seemed to pay no heed to His danger nor to theirs.
They were thinking of themselves, but they had no conception of the Lord as other than themselves in such an extremity; no faith in His Divine mission and the power of His life.
Faith would have said, "The Lord is with us. His is the power of an endless life, and His is a Divine mission in the world which no fury of the elements can cut short."
Their unbelief suggested that the Lord was as helpless as they.
The lesson is for us. Whenever danger or trial comes we are to remember that God is alive. When circumstances would seem to overwhelm, and the enemy is raging, unbelief suggests that God is helpless, and that we must perish. But the believer who holds to the promises of God can no more perish than the Lord himself. God has pledged His own existence that His promises shall not fail nor desert one in trial. "For when God made promise to Abraham, because He could swear by no greater, He swore by himself." (Hebrews 6:13)
And this was that we might have "strong consolation" who flee to Him for refuge. "That by two immutable things, in which it was impossible for God to lie, we might have a strong consolation, who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope set before us." (Hebrews 6:18) It is just as impossible for God to forsake us in trouble, if we will but take His promises, as it was that Jesus should sink to the bottom of the sea before His work was done.
How the load of care and perplexity will roll aside if we but remember that God lives and that there is no danger of His perishing. This fact believed, there is but one question to be settled, "What is His will?"
And knowing that, the results and consequences may be left entirely with Him. He who has the power to work the good pleasure of His will in us has all power. "Neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be ableto separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." (Romans 8:38-39) "Where is the fury of the oppressor? He that is bent down shall speedily be loosed; and he shall not die and go down into the pit, neither shall his bread fail. For I am the Lord your God, which stills the sea, when the waves thereof roar: the Lord of hosts is His name." (Isaiah 51:14-15,RV,margin)
Through waves, and clouds, and storms,
He gently clears thy way;
Wait thou His time, so shall this night
Soon end in joyous day.
--John Wesley, Hymn: Through Waves and Clouds and Storms.
--Present Truth, November 14, 1895--Timeline: IV-26 (The Storm on the Lake)--Mark 4:38-40.