Well, good morning everyone. If you would open your Bibles
with me to Mark chapter four, pick up our study in Mark after
a few weeks off. Before we begin, let's bow before
our Lord together in prayer. Our Father, how thankful, unspeakably thankful we are that
you've given us one more opportunity to be able to meet together and
to worship your matchless name. To hear of your darling son and
to worship him. Father, I pray this morning that
you would give us the spirit of worship. That you would enable
us for this time to forget about the cares and the goings on of
this life. And Father, enable us to worship.
Enable our hearts to be fed and comforted and edified and lifted
up through the preaching of your son, the gospel of our Lord Jesus
Christ. Father, how we thank you for
this place, how we thank you for this family of believers
that you've called together. Father, we ask your continued
blessing upon us, how thankful we are for your blessings to
us over all these many, many years. And we pray that you'd
not leave us alone now. We pray, Father, that you'd cause
us to love one another, to be a help and an encouragement one
to another. And what we pray for ourselves,
Father, we pray for all of your people, whether they might be
meeting together today, Father, bless them for your great namesake,
for the good of your people. Father, we pray for the world
in which we live. We pray especially for our country
that, Father, you would, in mercy and grace, that you'd protect
us, that you'd not give us what we deserve. Father, that you'd
be with our leaders to lead this country in a right way, that
you'd protect the freedoms that we have so long enjoyed in this
land. And Father, we dare not forget
to pray for your people that you've brought into the time
of trouble and trial. There are many right now, Father,
who need you especially. We pray for your hand of healing
and comfort upon them, pray that you would deliver them And Father,
we pray you give them a special portion of your presence until
you see fit to deliver them. And all these things we ask in
that name which is above every name, the name of our Lord Jesus
Christ, amen. Now I've titled our lesson this
morning, A Lesson for the Storms of Life. Every believer is on
a voyage. We're on a voyage from here to
eternity, on our way to glory. If you look at verse 35, that's
the picture we have here. And the same day when the even
was come, he saith unto them, let us pass over unto the other
side. And that's what every believer
is doing right now, isn't it? We're passing over to the other
side. And while we're on our way, on
this voyage, passing over to the other side, I know this,
I don't know how long the voyage is gonna be, but I know it's
gonna be rough. There's gonna be plenty of storms and trouble
and trial along this voyage because that's what the Lord's promised
us, isn't it? In his word, in this world you shall have tribulation.
And our text this morning gives us some help. Something that
we can remember, something that will help us in the midst of
the storm. just like these disciples find
themselves in this particular voyage. Let's read our text,
and then I'll come back and make a few comments. Mark 4, verse
35. In the same day when the even
was come, he saith unto them, let us pass over unto the other
side. And when they had sent away the multitude, they took
him even as he was in the ship, and there were also with him
other little ships. And there arose a great storm
of wind, And the waves beat into the ship so that it was now full.
And he was in the hinder part of the ship, asleep on a pillow. And they awake him and say unto
him, master, carest thou not 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?
and they feared exceedingly and said one to another, what manner
of man is this that even the wind and the sea obey him? Now I think we need to start
when we look at this story by looking at the Savior. That's
where we should always start with every passage of scripture
and every situation, we should always start with Christ. And
that's especially true when we're in times of storm and the deep,
deep waters. So the first thing I see is this.
The Lord Jesus Christ is a real man. Now this was a great storm
that they were in. The boat was being violently
tossed by the waves. The boat was filling up with
water. The disciples who were experienced sailors, experienced
fishermen, were sure the boat was gonna sink. And the master
was sound asleep. He was so tired that the storm
and the tossing of that boat didn't even wake him up. Now
you remember back through this chapter, the Lord had been teaching
and preaching all day long. And for those of you who have
never preached, there's no tired like you get after you have attempted
to preach the gospel of God's grace. It's exhausting. Our Lord
was tired after all that because he was a real man. Now that's
very important that he was a real man because the salvation of
sinners hangs upon it. The only way the Lord Jesus could
be the savior of sinners is if he became a real man. See, the
savior must be the God man. He must be 100% God and 100%
man. The math of that doesn't add
up, does it? That's heavenly arithmetic. He's 100% God and
100% man. You see, God can't suffer and
die to pay for sin, can he? But a man can. God can't be the
representative of sinful men and establish righteousness for
them because he's got a different nature than we do. He's not a
man. But a man can establish righteousness.
Since by man came death, by man also can come life. By man came
sin, by another man, another representative man, can come
righteousness. But now a man who is a son of
Adam, he can't establish righteousness, can he? Because we're sinners. Through and through, all we are
is sin. That's all we can do. But the
God-man can establish righteousness because God's holy, because God's
righteous. A son of Adam can't suffer and
die to pay for sin and satisfy God's justice because the death
of a man That doesn't satisfy God's justice. Our blood cannot
atone for sin because our blood is filled with sin. But the God
man can. See any any Savior from sin. He must be God. So that he can
satisfy God. But he's gotta be a man so he
can be our representative so he can be our substitute and
the Lord Jesus was truly a man. He was exhausted from all that
he'd done And even that storm didn't wake him up. But here's
the second thing. The Lord Jesus Christ is truly
God. In verse 35, he saith unto them,
let us pass over under the other side. Now that wasn't a suggestion. That was a commandment because
God gives commandments and the disciples obey. They got in the
ship and started going to the other side because that's what
the master told them to do. God is to be obeyed. Now you
might think, well Frank, you're making too much of that. Look
at the next commandment he gives, verse 39. And he arose from his
sleep after they woke him up and rebuked the wind and said
unto the sea, peace be still. And the wind ceased and there
was a great calm. The Lord Jesus has power over
creation. He has power over the laws of
nature. He can suspend the laws of nature. The wind didn't, you know, start
slowing down and eventually, you know, become a breeze, you
know, three, four, five hours later, the wind stopped instantly
when he rebuked it. The sea quit all the big waves
and just was calm as a lake. The storm stopped instantly. Now only God can do that. He
gave commandment to the sea to stop and it stopped. In verse
41, the disciples asked, what manner of man is this? That even
the wind and the sea obey him. What manner of man is this? He's
God. This man is God. Now again, the only way the Lord
Jesus Christ can save sinners is if he's God. The Lord Jesus
is God. It's not like he's God. He's
not God-like. He's not, you know, God-decaffeinated. He is God. He is God. And since he is truly God, this
man has the power and the right to redeem sinners from their
sin. That's the man who is asleep
in this boat. He's both God and man, the God-man. Here's the third thing I see
about our Savior. The Lord Jesus had perfect faith. Now, this
was a bad storm. I mean bad. The disciples, they
were experienced fishermen. They'd been on this sea many
times. They'd been in storms on this sea many times. These
men grew up on this sea. They knew all about it. They'd
seen storms before, and they just wouldn't get all worked
up about something that they thought they could handle. They
wouldn't get so worked up about something and say, yeah, we've
been through a storm this bad before. This was such a bad storm, they
were scared to death. They were sure that boat was
going to the bottom of the sea. Yet the Lord Jesus was fast asleep. He wasn't one bit concerned.
The disciples said, don't you care we perish? I mean, we're
perishing. They were just so convinced they
were gonna perish. But the master wasn't concerned
one bit because he trusted his father perfectly. Now again,
this is not just some doctrinal characteristic about the Savior,
you know, we like to talk about. The salvation of sinners depends
upon the perfect faith of the Lord Jesus Christ. Salvation
can only be accomplished by his perfect faith, his perfect faithfulness. Let me show you that, a couple
of scriptures. Romans chapter three. Romans chapter three. Let's begin reading in verse
20. Therefore, by the deeds of the law, there shall no flesh
be justified in his sight, for by the law is the knowledge of
sin. But now the righteousness of God without the law, without
your obedience to the law is manifested, being witnessed by
the law and the prophets, even the righteousness of God, which
is by faith of Jesus Christ. Unto all and upon all them that
believe, for there is no difference. The righteousness of God is accomplished
by the faith of Jesus Christ, by the faithfulness of Christ
to obey the law for his people. That is his faithfulness. Look
over Galatians chapter two. How is a sinner ever gonna be
justified? And justified, you remember,
means being made without sin. How can you and me be made without
sin? It's only by the faithfulness
of Christ. It can't be by our faithfulness.
And I'll show you that here later on towards the end of the lesson.
It can't be by our faithfulness. It's got to be by the faithfulness
of Christ. This is what Paul says, Galatians
2, verse 16. Knowing that a man is not justified
by the works of the law, by his works of the law, but by the
faith of Jesus Christ. Even we have believed in Jesus
Christ that we might be justified by the faith of Christ, the faithfulness
of Christ, and not by our works of the law. For by the works
of the law shall no flesh be justified. Now justification
is accomplished by the faithfulness of Jesus Christ. And it's received
by us through faith in Christ, through God-given faith in Christ.
Now look across the page here, Galatians chapter, or the next
page, Galatians chapter three. From eternity, almighty God has
made a promise to sinners. His promise, his covenant of
grace, his promise to save them, his promise to justify them,
his promise to make them righteous, his promise to glorify them together
with his son. Now, how can God promise salvation
to sinners who are never gonna do anything but sin? How can
God make a promise to save sinners who will never believe him, who
will never come to him unless he draws them and gives them
faith? How can he make that promise? It's because of the faithfulness
of Christ to do all of the saving for them. Galatians 3 verse 22. But the scripture hath concluded
all under sin, that the promise, the promise of God, the promise
of justification, the promise of salvation by faith of Jesus
Christ might be given to them that believe. God can make that
promise to his people that he's going to justify. He's going
to redeem them. He's going to glorify them together
with him because of the faith of Jesus Christ, the faithfulness
of Christ to do everything that it takes to save sinners like
you and me. Now, this is not in this story
of the storm. The master is sound asleep. This
is not giving us just a story of, oh, this is perfect faith,
and you ought to have faith like this. Well, we ought to, but
we don't. I mean, let's just be honest.
We ought to, but we don't. But here's what this is really
teaching us. Our salvation depends on the
faith of Christ, and his faith is perfect. then salvation to him is perfect
too, isn't it? All right, here's the fourth thing. The Lord Jesus
is always tender and compassionate with his weak, sinful people.
After he calmed the storm in verse 40, he said unto them,
why are you so fearful? How is it that you have no faith? You and I are so hardhearted
and were so self-righteous, you and me would have blasted those
disciples for their fear. Let's be honest, we would. I
actually heard a person ask one time, talking about a heartbroken
widow, just lost her husband, made this statement. Wonder why
she's so sad. Where's her faith? That is how hard-hearted our
nature is. but not the Lord. You know, if
anybody had reason to blast the disciples for their faithlessness,
well, they're right there with the master in the boat. It would
have been the Lord, wouldn't it? But he didn't. Now he rebuked
them, but his rebuke is always tender and compassionate. He
always remembers our frame. He remembers that we're dust
and he's always tender and compassionate with his weak, erring people. Now he'll correct. And he'll
rebuke, but it's always tender. It's always compassionate and
always for our good. And you know, to the believer,
you know, the believer is a child of God, the child of God. That tender rebuke is all it
takes to just absolutely break our heart. Janice. grandmother or great-grandmother,
I can't remember which one, but one of the grandchildren would
act up. She'd look at him and say, aren't
you pretty? And that's all it would take.
That's all it would take for that child. You know why? They
loved their grandmother. The same thing's true of a believer.
Peter, Peter denied even knowing the Lord and swore it with an
oath. And all it took to break Peter's
heart was a look from the master as he was going to be crucified. All it took was a look. After
the Lord's resurrection, all it took to break Peter's heart
again, the Lord didn't have to bring it up. Peter, remember
how you did this and bring in front of all the disciples and
rehash how he denied the Lord three times and oh, how you promised
you'd die with me, but look what you did, Peter. All it took for
the Lord. to break Peter's heart and set
Peter on the path that the Lord would have him to do in preaching
the gospel is ask Peter, Peter, do you love me? It broke Peter's
heart. That's all it takes for a child,
isn't it? That's how our Lord is tender
and compassionate with his weak, sinful people. Isn't that a relief? That's a relief, isn't it? Then
here's the fifth thing. Everything, everything without
exception that the Lord does is for the good of his elect.
Everything. The Lord told his disciples,
let's get in this boat and go to the other side. Now there's
lots of reasons that the Lord said that, but the primary reason
is this. You know who's on the other side
of that sea? There's a demon possessed man. possessed by a
legion of demons who's over there on the other side of the sea.
And Lord's making this trip because he's going to go over there and
save one of his own. He's going to go over there and
find one of his own and set them free. That's the reason God does
everything he does. Every event in Providence, every
event of history, everything that happens in this world is
God working things together so that his elect will come to Christ,
so that they'll believe him, so that they'll be fed, so that
they'll be taught, so that they'll be preserved, and ultimately
come to him in glory. Everything, whether we think
it's painful, whether we think it's significant or insignificant,
it doesn't matter. Everything the Lord does is for
the salvation and preservation of his people. And the same thing
is true of our trials, our trials. You know, the Lord sends trials,
I suppose, for many reasons, but I'm sure, I'm convinced of
this, that this is the primary reason the Lord sends His children
trials, so that we'll learn more about Him. We'll learn. He's promised He's faithful,
and you know what you find out in a trial? God's faithful. The
Lord sends us trials so we learn He's got the power. He's got
the power to deliver. He's got the power to comfort.
So we learn more. The more we learn about Him,
the more fully we'll trust Him. That's why the Lord sends trials.
The Lord sends us trials to teach us something. To soften our hearts. so that
we don't say about one of our sisters, who's a broken-hearted
widow, wonder where her faith is. He breaks our heart and softens
our heart so we don't think that way. He teaches us something,
so instead of being harshly judgmental and self-righteous about one
of our bereaved brothers or sisters, the Lord's taught us something
we can use to help them, to be a help to them. Once you've been through a trial,
And there's no earthly comfort for it. I mean, no earthly comfort
for it whatsoever. But the Lord comforts you in
that trial. Now you can go to a brother or sister who's in
that very same trial and say, now you look to Christ, he's
gonna comfort you. He comforts his people. Once
you've been in a trial that there is absolutely no earthly deliverance
from, and the Lord delivers you, you can go one of your brothers
and sisters and say, now I don't know when he's gonna do it, but
the Lord will deliver you. You just wait on the Lord. That's
one of the hardest things for us to do, is wait. Wait on the
Lord. But you wait on Him. He'll deliver
you. Once you've been through a trial,
and you look back on it, and you say, oh, the Lord was with
me. His presence was with me in that
trial. Just comforted my heart. You can go to your brothers and
sisters who are in a time of trial and say, now the Lord's
gonna be with you. The Lord is going to be with you. I always,
always, I mean, I can't remember a time I did not believe this.
As long as I've ever understood language, I have believed that
God's grace is sufficient. I saw it in God's word. I heard
the preacher say it. Must be true. Must be true. And then, The Lord brought me
into the midst of the storm. And his grace was sufficient.
Now I know what. Now and now I can tell you. God's
grace is going to be sufficient for whatever it is that he sends
you. Let me show you that in Psalm
57. This is one of the many things
that David learned that Lord taught him so he could write
this down and help you and me. Psalm 57. Remember our point
is this, everything God does is for the good of his elect. Psalm 57 verse two. I will cry unto God most high,
unto God that performeth all things for me. He shall send
from heaven and save me from the reproach of him that would
swallow me up. God shall send forth his mercy and his truth. So I'll cry unto God most high,
unto God that performeth all things for me. He's not performing
and doing things to me. He's performing all things for
me. For my eternal good. And every
believer can say the same thing that David said there. Everything
God does is for me. If I'm one of his children, everything
he does is for me. It's for my eternal salvation. and my good, and that includes
the painful trials that he sees. They're for our good. All right,
that's the Savior who was in the ship. Now let's look at some
pictures of you and me, believers who are in times of trial and
trouble. Number one is this. Faith in Christ and obedience
to Christ will not exempt us from trials. You know, we need
to guard against this presumptuous and self-righteous attitude to
think that, oh, one of our brethren, they must've done something wrong
because God sent this horrible trial to them. That's why he
sent this trial, because they've done something so wrong. That
is so self-righteous. You know, if the Lord sent us
a trial, every time we did something wrong, our trials would never
end. I mean, they just destroy us.
That's not why the Lord sends trials. I know He does do things
to correct us, but it's not to punish our sin. Trials cannot
be a punishment for our sin. Because if Christ our Savior
suffered for us, He took all the punishment for our sin already.
There's no punishment left for our sin. Now there's correction,
but never punishment for our sin. The disciples did not find
themselves in this storm because they'd done something wrong and
been disobedient. Actually, you know why they found
themselves in that storm? Because they were obedient and
got in the boat when the Lord told them to get in the boat.
They were in this trial because they believed Christ. Christ
told him, let's go to the other side. I mean, they believed him.
We'll go. I trust him. I believe him. Whatever
he says, go, I'll go. They were in this trial, not
because they were disobedient, because they were obedient. They're
in this trial, not because they didn't have faith, but because
they did have faith in Christ. Isn't the same thing true of
Job? God said, Job's upright, but
he's still sinning. So it wasn't because Job had
done anything wrong exactly. Like I said a little while ago,
the Lord sends us trials to teach us to trust him more fully. Now there are no question as
other things he's accomplishing through the trial for us, for
people around us. I mean, you and I just can't
imagine the hand of God and what he's accomplishing and everything
that he's doing. But like I said earlier, I know
this, the Lord sends us trials to teach us to trust him. If the disciples had never found
themselves in this storm, they never would have known what manner
of man this is, that the wind and the waves would make his
voice. He taught them, didn't he? Trials teach us to trust
the Lord. All right, number two. Every believer has faith. If
you're a believer, it's because you, the very definition of the
word, you believe Christ. Every believer has faith. but our faith is nothing to brag
about. In verse 40, the Lord said unto
them, why are ye so fearful? How is it that you have no faith? Boy, in our faith, it's weak
at best, isn't it? And many times to us, it seems
like I've got no faith at all. No faith, which is the very phrase
that the Savior used there. Why is it you have no faith?
Oh, ye of little faith. I would warn us, don't be too
hard on ourselves, and especially on others, when it seems like
that's true, that we have no faith. Now, I can't stress this
strongly enough, there's never an excuse to have weak faith. There's never an excuse for us
to act like we have no faith. But let's not be too hard on
folks who have weak faith, because that's all you and me have too,
Our faith is weak at best. And one of the reasons that the
Lord sends us trials is to strengthen our faith, to strengthen our
trust in Him. After the Lord puts me in the
depths, after He puts me in that storm, the boat's filling up
with water, and I'm sure it's going down, and the Lord delivers
me, see, now I can learn to trust Him. I can learn to trust His
power. Now I can learn to trust His
grace is sufficient. that he bears me up and comforts
my heart even in the worst of trials. And here's the reason our faith
should not be so weak. The Lord is with his people in
every trial. Now the Lord was with the disciples
in the ship. Now let me ask you, what did
they have to worry about? if the Lord is with them. And
you know what? If you're a believer, the Lord
will be with you too. He will. You know how I know
that? He promised he would. He said, I will never leave you
nor forsake you. Then really, I never have anything
to fear because the Lord's with me. I don't fear. because my heavenly father is
the very one that sent the trial and he's the one that's controlling
it too. And he's promised he'll never do anything bad to me.
Everything he's doing is for me. Isn't that what David said?
I don't have any reason to fear because not only is the Lord
with me, he cares for me. He cares what happens to me.
He cares for me. Peter said that, first Peter
five, verse seven, cast all your care Why? For he careth for you. He cares
for you. I don't have anything to fear.
Because while the man, Christ Jesus, did sleep, our God never
slumbers or sleeps. Not sneaking by him because he's
fallen asleep. He's always controlling and directing
all things. I just trust him to do it. I don't have to fear because
the Lord of the storm is gonna speak peace to my heart sooner
or later. Now the Lord may give peace by
stopping the storm like he did here. He spoke and the wind and
the waves immediately ceased. But you know, he may speak peace
to your heart and your heart will be at peace even though
the storm around you is still raging. You know, he has the
power to do that. And he has the compassion to
do that for his people, to speak peace to the heart, even though
the storm is still raging. And this is what you'll find,
that the Lord speaking peace to your heart, even though the
storm is still raging around you, that is more special and
more peaceful than if the Lord stopped the storm for you. Put that in your lunch bucket.
Take that to work with you tomorrow. Take that home with you this
afternoon. Think about this. When the Lord
speaks peace to your heart and gives your heart peace and calmness,
even though the storm is still raging, that's more special and
a greater blessing that the Lord made the storm stop. All right,
hope the Lord blessed that to you.