Not to Be Copied Or Republished Without Written Permission

Not to be copied or republished without written permission

PENTECOST 3 (B)June 21 2009

Asleep on the Cushion – Deep Trust

Grant Bullen

Asleep on the Cushion (Mark 4.35-41)

Have you ever been on a small boat caught in a storm? I have twice... and believe me, I’m no sailor! I oscillated between two emotions –panic and terror. Screaming,‘We’re all going to die!’ seemed appropriate to both modes. Thankfully, on both occasions, there was someone present who kept their head and did what was necessary to keep the boat afloat. Jesus, however, finding himself in this situation in today’s gospel, chooses an entirely different response. He nestles in the cushion in the stern... and sleeps like a baby! Surrounded by the chaos of wind and storm breaking over the boat... and the panic of his fellow travellers... Jesus sleeps!

Not surprisingly the disciples are outraged! They wake him yelling, “Teacher, don’t you care that we are perishing?” (38) It’s not actually in the text but I assume they’re also screaming ‘We’re all going to die! And the unstated challenge is ‘How can you sleep at a time like this? And it’s a damn good question... how can he sleep at a time like that?

The answer is revealed in what he says to the disciples, “Why are you afraid? Have you still no faith?” (40) The sleep is not an indication of exhaustion or a remarkably phlegmatic personality... it is the product of Jesus’ faith. And what’s that? Simply put... Jesus is unruffled by the storm because he has a deep trust in God – he believes completely that he is held in God’s hands, and that God will not let him down... whatever comes. That’s why he can sleep.

The Faith of Jesus

This is the faith of Jesus – he trusts in God’s care and God’s goodness... no matter what. We see this trust expressed throughout his teaching... like the well known lilies of the field piece. “Don’t worry about your life, what you’ll eat... what you’ll wear... your Father knows (what) you need.” (Luke 12.22-31) And we see it in the way he lived – the freedom, the lightness, the generosity... and the complete absence of anxiety... about anything!

In our age, where anxiety has reached epidemic proportions, where so many of us are dragged down by worry, this freedom of Jesus is wonderfully attractive. Every time I read today’s gospel, I see him there asleep while chaos rages all around... and I think, ‘That’s who I want to be! If only I could be like that.’

And the good news is that we can! God can heal us of our anxiety and usher us into a life of unimaginable freedom and lightness. The same antidote to worry we see operative in Jesus is available to you and me... And that antidote is trust in God! Trusting completely that we are held in God’s hands and that God will not let us down... whatever comes.

But we mustn’t be glib about this. This trust is not a superficial or easy matter... and it doesn’t come cheaply... Let’s look deeper.

Looking Deeper – Gethsemane

It is not true to say that Jesus never experienced anxiety. Think of the Garden of Gethsemane... where we see Jesus in the sweat of extreme terror. Trust has brought him this far, but now he faces the full and imminent horror... of arrest and cruel torture... (he knows what is waiting for him because he’s seen it dealt out to others)... of the slow agony of crucifixion, dying in exquisite pain over several days... and the birds coming to peck out your eyes while you’re still alive... the dogs to tear off your feet. (He’s not to know that his experience will be mercifully quick by comparison with the norm.) In the face of this darkness, Jesus is afraid and begs for another way. The temptation to run away must have been screaming in his ears.

But in an awesome demonstration of faith, his trust in God reasserts itself and holds. In the darkness of Gethsemane, Jesus says to God, ‘I accept from your hand whatever happens. Nothing can break our communion, however little I see or feel it;[1] I am ready to give myself to you, whatever the cost.’[2] This is trust of unfathomable depth! And he will need every scrap of it to get him through the coming day.

And that’s why I say we can’t be glib about our trust in God. A superficial ‘isn’t it all lovely’ faith isn’t going to get us through the darkness. And Gethsemane comes to all of us. Darkness comes repetitively in our lives – through the loss of people we love; through personal sickness or depression; through all manner of dead-ends in our hopes attached to family, marriage and career... and in that final moment when we face our own death. The superficial comfort that is the stuff of so much church life won’t be any use to us then. Only a deep and profound trust will suffice in such times.

So... how can we develop a deeper trust in God?

Travelling Deeper

Well... there’s good news and there’s bad news!

The good news is that we don’t achieve a deeper trust in God... but God does. This is the work of the Holy Spirit within us. Thankfully, this deepening does not depend on our own efforts! (Phew!!!) Even as we sit here today, the Spirit is at work in us, inexorably drawing us ever deeper.

The ‘bad’ news is, however, that the deepening is a painful process. The Holy Spirit carries us through darkness.

The easierpart can be done in the sunshine... It helps if we practise prayerful, attentive reflection on our life... watching and noting the many times when God does prove His/Her faithfulness... All those times when we find ourselves surprised by grace and new life... and we can look back and say, ‘I really didn’t need to worry about that!’ We collect a faith-album of all the times we’ve experienced God’s presence and leading through tough and scary life-storms.

But the path leads deeper than that. What we need to learn is a complete trust in God and in God alone. This only happens through painful relinquishment – through the loss of all those other hopes we gather around ourselves. One by one these beautiful dreams, these non-negotiable attachments that we trust in, are burned away from us... leaving only God. The Spirit wants to take us to that place of horror for a 21st century person – that dark place where we relinquish any hope that we can control our own life... that we are in charge of our ultimate destiny. It is the only way. The Spirit brings us to that place where we must say, ‘God you are my only hope, and I have no choice but to trust in you.’ When we say it and mean it, then we have come to the faith of Jesus... and then we will know true freedom.

Conclusion

I have friends who suffer from that terrible phobia about flying. They tell me that in an aeroplane, the anxiety says to them that unless they stress about it, unless they through their worry stay in control and keep the plane in the sky, they will crash and die. What a nightmare! But it is, if you think about it, only an extreme expression of what society has taught us to believe about our lives. ‘Unless we stay in control... unless we keep pushing and striving and worrying... it’ll all end in disaster.’ No wonder our age suffers so terribly from anxiety!

Meanwhile, Jesus is asleep in the cushion while the chaos rages around him. Why? Because God’s in control and he trusts in God completely! How wonderful if what Jesus says is true! How wonderful it would be to live like that! Bliss! But this sort of deep profound trust doesn’t come easy or cheap.

[1]And remember in that awful moment on the cross he loses contact with God. He can’t feel his Father’s presence any more. “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”

[2]Rowan Williams