God in the Boat (Part 1)

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Thanks for tuning in to No Compromise Radio with pastor and author, Dr. Mike Avendrop.

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Today on No Compromise Radio, we'll be hearing Pastor Mike open the Word of God in a recent message he preached at Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston, Massachusetts.

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Now let's join Pastor Mike in progress as he preaches through the scriptures verse by verse with No Compromise.

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Years ago, Renaissance Entertainment of Orlando thought they'd come up with a new ride, a theme ride in an amusement park.

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It was called Ego Trip, a ride about you. And they wanted to sell this, and here's what the marketing piece said.

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As paparazzi snap away and adoring fans call their names, riders will attend their own movie premieres.

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They'll visit an art museum where they'll view paintings of themselves as done by Picasso, Warhol, and Van Gogh.

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They'll attend a political rally where they'll be urged to run for president and a sporting event where they'll be praised for their athletic prowess.

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Finally, they'll enjoy a ticker tape parade in their honor. Afterward, ego -stroked riders will proceed to the gift shop where they can buy all sorts of stuff emblazoned with their images.

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What's everyone's favorite subject? Themselves, said Renaissance president

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John Banowski. Thinking like that is very prevalent in society, and it slipped into the church.

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What's everyone's favorite subject? Themselves. And you can even read the

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Bible looking through the lens of yourself and see a distorted image of Jesus.

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For instance, you can see Jesus walking on water and think the passage is all about if you keep your eyes on Jesus, you'll never go underwater figuratively.

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You can look at Jesus calming the storm on the sea and say the point of the passage is

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Jesus can calm the storms in your life. Now last week I made a statement about my own devotional life, trying to read the

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Gospels every morning. And then this week I read a J .I. Packer quote, and I thought it was fascinating.

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He said, we can correct wooliness of view as to what Christian commitment involves by stressing the need for constant meditation on the four

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Gospels over and above the rest of our Bible reading, for Gospel study enables us both to keep our

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Lord in clear view and to hold before our minds the relational frame of discipleship to Him.

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He's talking about reading the Gospels. The doctrines on which our discipleship rests are the clearest in the epistles, but the nature of discipleship itself is most vividly portrayed in the

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Gospels. Some Christians seem to prefer the epistles as if this were a mark of growing up spiritually.

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But really this attitude is a very bad sign, suggesting that we are more interested in theological notions than in fellowship with the

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Lord Jesus in person. And then J .I. said, we should think rather of the theology of the epistles as preparing us to understand better the disciple relationship with Christ that is set forth in the

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Gospels. And we should never let ourselves forget that the four Gospels are, as has often and rightly been said, the most wonderful books on earth.

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So since I said that last week, something close to that but not as eloquent, and then I read that this week, I thought that was a sign from God.

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And so open your Bible to the Gospel of Mark, please, chapter one. Mark chapter one.

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In light of what's going on this week and thinking about that and then all kinds of issues floating around the church, we're going to deviate from 1

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Corinthians today. We should be back there next week. I plotted it out so I think we can finish 1

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Corinthians by the end of 2021. No, sorry, 2012, dyslexic there.

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And today we're going to take a short detour because I want us to focus on the person of Christ. I've been studying chapter four and chapter six of Mark the last three or four days and I've just been taken up with Christ, how great he is, what a great king, sovereign

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Lord that I, that we would be able to worship such a God, to call him

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Lord and Master and Savior. And so I want us to get out of the troubles of Corinth for a while and then move over into the focus, the focal point of our worship,

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Christ Jesus the Lord. I think you'll be encouraged, I think you'll be motivated, and here's the great thing.

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I'm after everyone today with the message, that is it's addressed to everyone, but I'm particularly looking for the younger people.

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The first generation who's taught orthodoxy, they keep it. The second generation, they just assume orthodoxy, and then the third generation, they lose it.

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So the older ones here are orthodox in their beliefs, the younger ones, I don't want you to assume it.

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And this passage today in chapter four and then the passage in chapter six will remind you of something.

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And here's what it's going to remind you of. Chapter one, verse one. Everything in Mark needs to be read in light of the first sentence.

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He doesn't beat around the bush, he doesn't pull any punches, he gets straight to the issue.

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What is the theme of the gospel of Mark? The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the

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Son of God. Everything in this book is to let you see Jesus is

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God. He's God incarnate. He's the only way of salvation, Jesus is Lord.

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Now tonight when Pastor Steve is preaching from John, John's gospel is more, let me tell you that Jesus is

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God. Let me make it very clear by words, Jesus is the great I am, the seven

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I am's. Mark has a different approach. Instead of telling you explicitly Jesus is God, Mark says, let me show you by Christ actions that Jesus is

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God, that Jesus is the God man. And so today we're going to have a passage in chapter four and then a passage in chapter six that require no action.

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When you preach, oftentimes you call people to do something. When you're in the congregation, you like sermons that have five points, three points,

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I need to do this, this, and this. Well, it's interesting, many Christian sermons should not tell you to do anything.

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There should be no how -tos, there should be no commands to respond with action, with hands, with labor.

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This is after your mind. This is to teach you. There's no response to this except to say,

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I assent, I believe, I worship, I adore. There's no to -do steps. I think that is a good way to look at the gospel of Mark.

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Years ago, I was in Scotland, and I asked Sinclair Ferguson, who at the time was the pastor of St.

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George's Tron Church in Edinburgh, and I said, I've been preaching through the gospel of Mark, and I'm having a hard time coming up with practical application, 16 chapters, how do you tell people to do things every single week in light of Mark's gospel?

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And then he said to me, can't you just show people the wonders of Christ Jesus every week and ask them to do nothing?

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To ask them just to look and observe and to behold and to worship and to think properly about?

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What was I to say? I said, okay, that's good advice. And so that's exactly what we'll do today. Two passages in Mark, chapter 4 and chapter 6, that highlight

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Christ as the Son of God, that both include the Sea of Galilee, and your only response is going to be,

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I believe it, I affirm that. I remember that Jesus is such a great

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God, worthy of my awe, wonder, and praise. God in human flesh.

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Now I was given this before I walked up. I usually have these size waters up here. I was just given this size water.

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So I don't know if that's a sign as well, but I've never drank water from one of these spray guns up here, so here we go.

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I wish I felt better in the way that I could enthusiastically tell you about this passage because in my mind at least, the last three or four days as I studied

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Christ, I just thought, this is the best. Jesus is great.

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When you watch him and you see what he does, how he does it, people talk about, well, you know,

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I'm caught up with money, I'm caught up with football, I'm caught up with all kinds of other things. This is gonna be a good recalibration for us because if you're a

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Christian and you believe that the word of God is true, you look at this and you'll say, oh, that I could be called a child of this

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God. This is amazing. So two passages from Mark, both trying to drive you to say

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Jesus is the Messiah and he is worthy of my reverence, astonishment, and submission.

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Let's go to chapter four, please, for the first one. Chapter four, verses 35 through 41.

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As we look at Jesus the King, the Son of God. Mark is going to give us history, but it's a theological history.

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And so when you read a gospel like Mark, you say to yourself, yes, I'm learning historical facts, these are things that happen in history, they happen in time, but they're written in a way to teach me theology.

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So they are theological history, and we'll see that very clear here. Mark chapter four, 35 to 41.

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Jesus ruling over nature with his power, doing things that only

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God could do. And Mark writes in a very vivid style, he writes in a very personal style.

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Sometimes he writes so fast he forgets, he doesn't, let's rephrase that. He writes so fast that he omits details, but not here.

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He has actually more details than the Luke account and then the Matthew account. And chapter four, verse 35 says, on that day, by the way, that busy day, that day that Pharisees called him a blasphemer, that day

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Mary and his brothers tried to kidnap him because he was religiously off his rocker in their mind.

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That day he taught the parables by the sea, he taught more by the house. On that day, when evening had come, he said to them, let us go across to the other side.

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And it was the language of urgency, of decisiveness, let us go to the other side.

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So he's on the west side, now let's go over to the east side. Why? To rest?

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That could have been a possibility because it was a very busy day. To minister? That's certainly a possibility, and it's true because he will go over to the other side and cast out demons out of the men there.

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But I think mostly, primarily, Jesus is going to send the disciples out for a wanna -council time.

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This is going to be an object lesson. This is going to be Jesus teaching them about God.

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It's one thing to see him perform miracles in front of other people and say, yes, that's true, but now when you personally have to recognize face -to -face that Jesus is the

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Son of God, that's another thing. And so this is going to be a field trip, a very interesting field trip.

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And leaving the crowd, verse 36, they took him with them in the boat, I don't miss any word here, just as he was, and the other boats were with him.

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So Jesus is on the boat teaching, remember the crowds were pressing him in, he's on the boat teaching, and now they usher him from that boat, probably over into another boat, and he doesn't go on to shore.

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What does the text say? Just as he was. That's most likely what happened, from one boat to another boat without going to shore.

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And this is going to be an easy trip. This is a day trip for the disciples. Peter a fisherman,

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Andrew a fisherman, they did this for a living, and this is just like getting up in the morning saying, today

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I'll drive to Solomon Pond Mall. No big deal, just an outing. Other boats were with him, it says.

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Remember they all tried to get close to Jesus, but we're not going to hear again from these other boats. They're probably driven back by the storm.

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And, verse 37, notice how this language is very abruptly stated, and a great windstorm arose, and the waves were breaking into the boat, so that the boat was already filling.

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I mean how bad could it be? This is just some little lake, right? But those of you who have been to the

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Sea of Galilee know that violent storms can literally come down. You've got

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Mount Hermon 30 miles north, 9 ,200 feet. You've got the Sea of Galilee about 700 feet below sea level, and when the hot and the cold air put together, it happens quickly.

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It's like a hurricane effect. It's like a squall. And so the great windstorm arose.

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It was sudden, it was violent, it was dangerous. Luke said it came down. It was a furious squall, and again you could translate the

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Greek word as hurricane. The Arabic people would translate this as a sharqiyah, sharqiyah with the root word shark.

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As sharks are violent, as sharks are urgent and sudden in their attack, so too this squall comes right down, churning, whipping waves everywhere.

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Matthew says, behold, to show how fast this was happening, how rapidly this was happening, reminiscent of Jonah 1, and the

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Lord hurled a great wind on the sea, and there was a great storm on the sea so that the ship was about to break up.

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Violent gusts, probably rain everywhere. Matthew translates this as a shaking, as an earthquake, so it's like there's an earthquake in the water.

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How many people have felt earthquakes? Look to the person to your left and say, I've felt an earthquake, just kidding. Earthquakes are shaking, they're sudden.

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I'll never forget the one, I think Haley was about five months old, and by the time I figured out what was going on in Los Angeles, I can't remember the year, 91, 92, and the big one at 4 .35

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a .m., by the time I figured out what was going on and could get out of the bed because it was shaking and all the books falling down,

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Kim was already outside holding Haley safely, and I was sitting there, I mean, it's just shaking, it's like till the water is shaking.

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I've never been in a boat while there's an earthquake, but that was the idea here.

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It was all divinely planned, it was perfectly planned, this was the perfect storm. What else was happening?

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Look at the text, and the waves were breaking over the boat. It's an imperfect tense, constantly, continually breaking over the boat.

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To what degree? Just how bad was it? So much that the boat was already filling up, it was like the boat was getting erased from the waves, it was by the waves just sinking.

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Verse 38, but he was in the stern. The only place in all the

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Bible where we see Jesus sleeping. Of course he slept, he was fully manned, but this is the only time described in the

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Bible, this account. Asleep on the cushion, they usually had one special cushion that you would give to a person who wasn't really a fisherman, who weren't, they weren't really kind of the old salts and they didn't go out on the boats very often, so they got a special cushion so they could sit, and he was using that to sleep on.

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This morning I was thinking about that Christmas song, sleep in heavenly peace, the lyrics go.

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Jesus is sleeping, and these are the fishermen, these are the people who know about being on a boat during a storm.

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And they woke him and said, certainly loudly, because he was loud with all the sounds of the hurricane -like squall, teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?

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The Greek is, he himself was in the stern. Sleeping is at the end of the sentence, so you know this is a very dramatic effect.

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It's been hot outside most likely, he's preaching all day. Preaching makes you tired by the way, he has to sleep.

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He's laying on that cushion. Fully man, wouldn't you say he's fully man, there is a man sleeping on a cushion.

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He's tired. Fully human. And he had to be fully human to be our substitute.

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Man for man. He had to be fully human to be our representative. Man of men.

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Don't you care that we're perishing? Lenski said the fact that these disciples should turn to Jesus for help is astounding.

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A number of them were expert sailors who knew all about handling a boat, and who had been in many violent storms on this lake.

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And they're not saying, Jesus, you're perishing, Jesus, we're perishing. This is a panic attack, heart is pumping, adrenaline is going, we're close to death.

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Yelling most likely, shouting. And he awoke, verse 39, and rebuked this wind, and said to the sea, peace, be still.

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And the wind ceased, and there was a great calm. With impolite uncouthness, they wake him up.

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And I don't know about you, but when I wake up, when I'm super tired, sometimes on Sunday I'll go home and I'll take a nap after I preach, and then when

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I wake up from a nap, I think it's Monday, and I think I've overslept my preaching time on Sunday night.

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Here, Jesus wakes up and he's ready to go, he has his bearings, there's no sign of him being startled, amazed, discombobulated.

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Not at all, just two sublime words come out, peace, still. No incense, no bells, no

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Latin, he just commands. Now remember,

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Mark's writing all this because he wants you to know that only God could do this. Who else could do this?

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And now he uses language, peace, be still, be quiet, be silent, be muzzled.

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You know what kind of language this is? I'll tell you what kind of language it is. It's exorcism language. This is the language of exorcism.

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Be silent, that's what peace means. Now just go with me if you would back to 125, chapter 1, verse 25.

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But Jesus rebuked him saying, be silent and come out of him. This is the language of exorcism.

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It's technical language for a Jewish exorcism. It's as if the sea is demon -possessed, and who can get demons out but God, and who can still a storm but God himself.

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Be quiet, be gagged, be still.

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The word be still, you can go back to Mark 4 if you'd like. It means to be still and to stay still.

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It's a pit bull of a storm, and Jesus says, I'm going to put a muzzle on you, and it's going to stay on you.

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And as instantaneously as when Jesus cast a demon out, and they're either in the person or they're out of the person, he cast them out immediately and instantaneously.

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Now he rebukes with the same kind of language, the sea and the wind, and instantaneously and immediately it's still.

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With words, this is not gradual, slowly dying down, slowly ceasing.

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We go from Lake Chaos to Lake Placid in a second.

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Both sea and wind, Jesus commands, because if you commanded just the wind or the sea alone, it wouldn't all stop.

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And one minute we have Jesus showing his humanity on the cushion, sleeping, and now he shows his deity rebuking the wind and the sea.

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Colossians 1 says, for by Jesus all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth. With the thrones, dominions, rulers, authorities, all things have been created by him and for him, and he is before all things, and in him all things hold together.

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Now the liberals will say this, you can't have Jesus being the real God and the only way to heaven in our pluralistic society, so the liberals say, so we have to change it a little bit.

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Get the supernatural thing out of it, so Jesus really didn't calm the sea, he calmed the sea and the storm in the disciples' hearts.

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They were fearful and he needed to calm their fears. That's inadequate as far as I'm concerned, that's not what

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Mark is trying to say. The point is Mark's saying Jesus is the son of God, look at how powerful he is, he speaks and it's done.

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That's the point of the language, Jesus does what only God can do. So if you ever teach this, by the way, to kids and say, you know what, here's

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Jesus, he calms the storm, when you have a lot of troubles in your life, Jesus can calm those storms in your life too.

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Don't do that, because as bad as it is for liberals to say it, now we become not liberal in the reading, but we become liberal in the application.

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Has nothing to do with us, this is Jesus showing himself as God, emphasizing

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Jesus' power. Listen to Psalm 107 for a moment, he made the storm be still, talking about the

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Lord, and the waves of the sea were hushed. The Lord, Yahweh, did that, who is

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Jesus, Yahweh. He said to them,

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Mark chapter 4 verse 40, there's usually a reason for his disclosure or there's a response to it.

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He talks to them and he says, why are you so afraid, have you still no faith? Why are you losing heart?

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Don't be showing cowardice, why are you so timid?

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That's where we get NAS is better there, don't be so timid. You know,

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Jesus is still God of the universe, whether he's sleeping or not, still upholding the universe while he's asleep, don't be fearful.

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By the way, the storm has stopped, the storm's going to kill them,

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Jesus, don't you care, we're going to perish. Now the storm has stopped but they're afraid, why?

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Because as my old pastor would say, there's only one thing more frightening than having the storm outside cease and that is having the holy

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God of the universe inside your boat and you know you're sinful because he's holy. People say,

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I just want Jesus near me, I just want him close to me. One man said, this passage is all about teaching that Jesus wants a personal relationship with each person.

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I'm all for personal relationships, but here the closer Jesus gets and the more you see him for how holy he is, the more afraid you get.

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Sometimes close isn't too good. No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Abendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston.

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Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible teaching church firmly committed to unleashing the life -transforming power of God's word through verse -by -verse exposition of the sacred text.

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Please come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 8 .30 and 11 a .m. and Sunday evenings at 6 p .m.

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We're right on Route 110 in West Boylston, Massachusetts. You can check us out online at bbcchurch .org

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or by phone at 508 -835 -3400. The thoughts and opinions expressed on No Compromise Radio do not necessarily reflect those of WVNE, its staff, or management.