Matthew, Mark, and Luke each recount the time Jesus calmed a storm with a word when he was in a boat with his disciples on the Sea of Galilee. But Mark’s version includes a question the disciples put to Jesus in their panic.
“And a great windstorm arose, and the waves were breaking into the boat, so that the boat was already filling. But he was in the stern, asleep on the cushion. And they woke him and said to him, ‘Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?’”
Have you ever asked or thought that same question in the midst of a “storm” in your life? The disciples’ question was prompted by fear, but sorrow and grief can just as easily lead us to ask, “Jesus, don’t you care? Are you asleep and oblivious to my tears?”
Isaiah 53:3 answers. He was “a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief.” Jesus is no stranger to how it feels to live in a world under the curse. He lived in it Himself. In Jesus, we see the God who keeps count of our tossings and puts our tears in His bottle (Psalm 56:8) weep real tears (John 11:35). He has experienced sorrow and heartbreak and anguish personally and this is wonderfully encouraging news for us as we experience the same.
Kenny Clark will be preaching the second message in our Man of Sorrows series this Sunday, He Was Acquainted with Grief. Walt Harrah will be leading our sung worship. Would you pray for each as they prepare? And let’s ask “the God of all comfort” to “comfort us in all our affliction,” (2 Cor. 1:3-4) and that “through Christ we would share abundantly in comfort, too” (2 Cor. 1:5).
See you Sunday, Grace. Come hungry!
Song Link of the Week
Love Shines by Austin Stone Worship
My Savior wept my every tear
He groaned that I might sing
My thorny crown upon His head
My cross, His suffering