WHEN GOD NEEDS TO BE AWAKENED

FRIDAY AFTER FIRST SUNDAY IN LENT 2015

Today is Mark 4:21-41 with Bishop Wright focusing on verses 35-41. In verses 21-34 Jesus tells a few more parables and then gets in a boat with his disciples. The new naval recruits find themselves in a storm with Jesus fast asleep in the stern. Panicked they cry out to Jesus, “Wake up—don’t you care about us?!” There are many points to this story. First, we are still early in the Gospel and this event shows that Jesus is “Lord over all.” Mark continues to invite us to accept that Jesus is God. In fact after Jesus calmed the storm, the text says the disciples were even more afraid, “Who on earth (or perhaps heaven) were they in this boat with?”

The life application is fairly easy to connect. We go through storms and Jesus has power over them all—so have faith in Jesus. But what of God sleeping in a storm? The Bible says the God neither slumbers nor sleeps (cf. Psalm 121:4). We with all our theorizing, speak of a God who is omnipresent. Yet a review of the Bible shows people telling God to “wake up” all the time. Consider the Psalms: 7:6, 35:23, 44:23, 59:5 and even Isaiah in 51:9. And we too cry out, “Wake-up God!”

But perhaps, and this might seem a bit harsh, it is we who need to wake-up. Speaking for myself I need to wake-up and purge out of my brain bad theology. I have this ridiculous theology that says believing in Jesus means we all live happily ever after…like life is some sort of a Disney movie. Where on earth did I get that from? I am not the only one. I have friends who are not Christians, who when something bad happens, immediately ask, “Where is your God?” Where did they get that from?

So what is good theology? I think to answer that question we need to keep reading Mark’s Gospel and look at Jesus’ life. Jesus, God, at every turn confronts and defeats evil. Jesus, God, at every turn offers his love to people, but does not browbeat them—when they reject him, he moves on. Jesus, God, at every turn ultimately is victorious…but his journey is far from a Disney movie. You might object, you might say that he rose from the dead and ascended to heaven. True he did. But if you look at the last few verses of Matthew’s Gospel, as Jesus is ascending to heaven, the text says, some still did not believe (cf. 28:17). Could you imagine dying on a Cross, rising to new life, and ascending…and people still are asleep to who he is…not a Disney ending. So as I continue into Lent I am wondering what else I need to wake up about.