Stay in the Boat with Jesus

Thank you, Brother Keith. Didn't he do a good job for us? What a blessing. Appreciate you folks so much, and thank you again for your partnership in the gospel. You mean so much to us. I said that this morning, but I truly mean that. And something that I meant to say this morning, and this, I can't promise this would always be true.

Go ahead and turn to Mark 4, if you would, is that at the present time with Anchored in Truth Ministries being located in our church and centered in our church, we have giving from individuals in our church, and from our church that is substantial enough that it covers all of our administrative and personnel expense for the home office, so that every penny you give to Anchored in Truth literally gets to the field. And I can't promise you that forever. As a matter of fact, it's right for all of us to share in those expenses, 'cause it takes those things. It's something we begin to learn as God just grew and grew and grew.

Our mission's arm and our mission's footprint around the world is that those missionaries need health insurance, and they need support in various ways, and they need help with education, and all that costs money. And so, but right now we're able to cover all of that so that all the funds from all of our partnership churches get directly to the field. But anyway, I want you to look at Mark 4, and we'll look at verses 35 through 41. And this is a narrative of the storm that came against Jesus and the disciples in the boat.

And yet be careful not giving these things four legs and run off with them, but none other than the esteemed expositor, J.C. Ryle in his commentary said, there are obviously spiritual truths here that come out of this story that apply to our lives today. And this has been a narrative that spoke to me years and years ago about the challenges we face, and I wanna make it twofold, the challenges you face as an individual believer going on with Christ. And the challenges a church family faces corporately or as a body, as you as a church continue on for Christ.

Now I told your pastor I was gonna preach this even though I believe for you guys, I kind of used the figure of a bell curve in church life. And I don't mean this any other way than just to say it. And very honestly, that if I have any special gift, it's the gift of discernment when it comes to churches. I just seem to be able to see where church is, where they're going, and what's probably coming next. Now I don't mean that prophetically or absolutely, but with Christ the next five people, I tell what's gonna happen, it may be wrong, okay?

But I'm just saying through the years, it's been unbelievable how almost exactly consistent churches are that go through the trials of becoming biblically spiritually healthy churches. They have to go through certain things. And you've already done a bunch of that. And to that you ought to say, praise the Lord. Amen, we've gotten over that bell curve to a great extent. I know that you have. So much of what I'm gonna say is to affirm you. Though there may be some curve balls coming for you. There may be some challenges coming for you. And there may be some storms like these men faced on this day coming for you.

And certainly as individual Christians, Pam and I have had a series of challenging trials and storms in our own walk with the Lord. And mostly due to people that we love so dearly, growing critically ill, dementia and passing away, and people that we've known forever. That's a difficult storm. So let's look at this and let's draw from the text encouragement and strengthening. And for you guys as a church, a strong affirmation of the path that you're on and that you need to stay on. Mark chapter four, verse 35. On that day when evening came, he said to them, let us go over to the other side.

Leaving the crowd, they took him along with them in the boat just as he was and the other boats were with him. And there arose a fierce gale of wind. And the waves were breaking over the boat so much that the boat was already filling up. Jesus himself was in the stern asleep on the cushion. Now I don't know how he's sleeping in the boat and it's filling up with water. But if you're the incarnate son of God, you can work that out. And they woke him, this is astonishing, and said to him, teacher, do you not care that we're perishing? And he got up and rebuked the wind and said to the sea, hush, be still.

And the wind died down and it became perfectly calm. And he said to them, why are you afraid? How is it that you have no faith? And they became very much afraid and said to one another, who then is this that even the wind and the sea obey him? Now no one, no one individual and no individual church is exempt from the storms of this life. They're gonna be storms. And when the storms hit the boat of your life or the storms hit the boat, you call your church. Satan comes against you with those crashing waves of justifications.

And those howling winds of rationalizations, trying to move you from being mooered and anchored in the word of God and staying with Jesus in the storm. He'll give you every justification possible. He'll give you every rationalization you can imagine. And it's like the raging of the sea against the boat of your life and the howling of the winds. And it's very difficult, but here's what you must do. You must do with these disciples almost did not do.

You must stay in the boat with Jesus. 'Cause I know when this crashing happened and that boat is filling up, as powerful and wonderful as God used him as he matured him and discipled him, I guarantee the apostle Peter was like this right here. Jesus in the boat, but it was getting bad. It's filling up with water. We gotta go swim it and try to make it on our own. And Peter almost dove in and did the baddest dog paddle. You ever seen somebody dog paddle? It's a whole lot of energy and you get almost nowhere.

And that's what happens when you dive in on your own, neglect the word of God, lose your faith, get in the flesh, start to compromise because this is a really difficult situation and you're just burning a lot of energy and you're going nowhere for yourself or for the glory of God. So when the storm hits our lives, when a storm hits our churches, we stay in the boat with Jesus. We keep our faith. We say what's safe the scriptures and see him get us safe to the other side. Now three things I wanna say here about this storm from this narrative. First of all, these storms are predicted. Why are we shocked by the Chris? Why are we amazed?

We're down here in Satan controlled territory. Satan is the God of this world. The entire systems of the world function according to Satan. And the moment you become a committed Christian and the moment you become a church that wants to be thoroughly biblical, glory of God focus, Christ honoring, Bible saturated as a church. The moment you do that, you crash right into the vicious current of this entire world. A collision course is coming. You're gonna face some storms. These storms are predicted. Now look at these men on this day who faced this storm. First of all, notice that these are converted men.

Converted, it says in verse 35, on that day when evening came, he said to them, who is the them? Well, it's the apostles. It's the inner core of the disciples. These are truly genuine converted men. These are predicted. It's a day when he had spent teaching the parables and explaining these parables to these disciples. And Jesus is exhausted and Jesus needs some rest. I'm so glad that's in the Bible, Brother Chris, because he wants to get on a boat and sleep from Capernaum over to the shore of Gerizins. That's what he's doing. He's getting away from the people.

By the way, now square this up in your theology, these people needed healing and he could heal them. These people needed saving and he could save them. These people needed instruction and he could instruct them. But he was a human and he needed to rest. And he wanted to get in a boat, get away from the people for a while so he could restore himself. And that's true for all of his, true for your pastor and staff. Now you twist their arm a little bit from there and they say, you get the rest you need 'cause we don't want you burning out. We want strong Bible preaching for the next 25 years.

If you're gonna have that, if you're gonna be 64 like I am and still have some passion, you gotta have elders that take care of you physically and help you that way. And I know that's your heart. So make sure you treat your pastor the way Jesus wanted to be treated. Give me some time away from time to time. You know, by the fact 11 times the gospel records that Jesus got away from the people to rest 11 times. Thank you for showing us something there. Well, these are converted men. Jesus is tired. He said, let's get in the boat. Let's go to the other side.

Not only are they converted men who went right into this violent storm, these are committed men. Look at verse 36. Leaving the crowd, they took him along with them in the boat just as he was in other boats were with them. So how does that, how do we know they're committed men because they obey Jesus? That's it. If you obey Jesus, you're committed. And in verse 35, he said, let's get in the boat. And they're gonna go from Capernaum over to Gerizins. And then in verse 36, they're getting in the boat. They obey the Lord. So here these guys are, they get in the boat.

And the moment these converted men who are committed men do what Jesus says to do, the storm hits. And we got a lot of goofy and silly clown theology out there today. And you can see it on TV all the time or on the internet, wherever you're gonna watch these guys. And they would try to teach you that if you're right with God and you got the right formula, it's just gonna be health, wealth, and wonderful, and everything's gonna always be good. And if you go into a crisis, you're not plugging in the right formula. God don't want you to face anything.

And these men on this day, the moment these converted, committed men obey Jesus, the storm hits their life. Brother Chris, I think that's one of the hardest things maybe for new Christians. And I know it's really difficult for me. I wasn't raised in church and I became a Christian. And as a freshman in colleges, fell in love with the word of God. And I just knew that if I could help churches learn the word of God obey the Lord of God, they would love me for it. And I found terrible opposition to that in the churches, in the churches that did not want to be biblical.

And you hear phrases like, I don't care what the Bible says, we're not doing that. I mean from church leaders. So that's a part of the process. Jesus had been teaching these men the word. He brought them aside as his leaders and explained the parables to them. And now it was time for the practical test. He was telling them what they needed to do. He was telling them to look to him and rely on him. Now he's putting them in a real life situation where they had to choose, dive in and swim it on your own or stay in the boat with Jesus.

I.e. follow him, keep your faith, follow the word of God, stand on the truth of the word of God in this situation. Romans 10, 17 says, faith comes by hearing and hearing the word of Christ. Your faith will be tested and it's tested for your good and to build you. Now did Jesus know the storm was coming? Absolutely. It was a part of this day's curriculum. I read the story of an English artist by the name of Joseph Turner and he was painting a portrait of a ship caught in a violent storm and his friend who was a pastor came by and looked in the door of his painting shop and saw that portrait he had just painted.

And he said, "Joseph, that is so powerful. "You caught the vividness and the brilliance "of the lightning and the pounding of the waves. "It looks so real. "How did you capture that on canvas?" And Joseph Turner said, "Well, some months ago, "I hired a fisherman to take me out in the storm." And I said, "Just strap me to the mast." He said, "I wanna feel the sting of the beads of rain. "I wanna feel the splash of the waves.

"I wanna feel the howling wind." And he said, "Having experienced the storm, "now I can come in and portray it on the canvas "with reality I could not before." Brothers and sisters, there are things you'll learn about God, about his wisdom and his beauty and his power that you'll learn by trusting him in the storm that you can learn no other way. And a church builds these markers, these benchmarks, if you will, these beach heads even, of standing on the truth and doing what God says.

I remember your earliest days when y'all were just getting started and I mean, you just started and wham, y'all were in right into a fierce gale of wind and storm. But you know what y'all did? You stayed in the boat Jesus. And you learn things and you begin to learn God will come through, God will protect us and he'll grow us through these things. I've never gone through a storm even though I was innocent of some of the attacks and the malicious slander that came against me. There were still so many things Jeff Novellitt in his heart had to repent of. God grows us even more the innocent victim, amen? We never get through.

But here's what happens, when the storm comes, he said, "Lord, I'm just trying to obey you." And look what happened. I've seen plenty of marriages, far too many than I wanna think about where the husband and the wife were going all with God, full of the Holy Spirit trying to serve the Lord and their spouse left them over it. And you have to stay in the boat with Jesus. Know that God's got a purpose. You know God's greater than your marriage. He's greater than your family. We stay with Jesus no matter what. If your family forsakes you, if your spouse forsakes you, if whoever forsakes you, stay in the boat with Jesus.

So these storms are predicted. Many think storms only come when we're disobedient. Now that is true, the Bible teaches a disciplining of God sometimes when we're disobedient, but the storms come to those who are genuinely obedient also. Jesus said in Matthew 15, 20, "Not blessed are you if men persecute you, "but blessed are you when men persecute you for my sake." And that's gonna happen in Brookhaven, Mississippi. And it's gonna happen primarily and most of the time through other so-called religious people.

You're gonna call you a cult maybe, or call you kind of radical, or y'all are Calvinist, or whatever crazy thing they wanna label you with to try to make you diminished. Jesus said, "Blessed are you." That means well off on the right track, good for you. Luke 15, 20 says, "If they persecuted me, "they will also persecute you." You're gonna have some of those storms. We try to teach our young people to approach the relationship with the opposite sex with what we call a Christian-Geiger relationship.

And then in God's will, and if it's the right time in their life, then maybe a Christian courtship, and then Christian engagement, then Christian marriage, and not just date like the world dates. You know what that means? That means some of our teenagers don't even have a relationship all the way through high school. That means sometimes they have to stay at home by themselves on the weekend. But you stay in the boat with Jesus. You say, "I'm gonna do what God wants me to do." And the Bible says a good wife comes from the Lord, a prudent wife comes from the Lord. The Lord's got your spouse. You do what the Lord's called you to do.

You stay in the boat with Jesus. It's painful though. Well, these storms are predicted, and let's go to Roman numeral number two, which is that these storms are painful. This isn't just your average little storm that these men face. Look at verse 37, painful storm. "And there arose a fierce gale of wind, and the waves are breaking over the boat, the boats filling up with water." Actually that phrase, fierce gale of wind, Matthew translates it to a sea quake. He uses a word that means an earthquake in the water. Just the most violent kind of picture, if you will, situation.

Now the Sea of Galilee that they're on is about 13 and a half miles wide, and about seven are long and about seven miles wide. And the Sea of Galilee is rained by these steep mountains, and there's narrow mountain passages around most of the lake. And what will happen sometimes is the cold mountain air will rust down between the narrow mountain passages and collide with the warm moist air coming up off the Sea of Galilee, and it will erupt in a violent whirling windstorm as powerful as it is unpredictable. They say they'll just pop up immediately. You don't even know they're coming.

I heard about a folks in a tour group going around the Sea of Galilee, and as they're in their bus going around, they ask the tour guide, have you ever seen one of those quick erupting windstorms like the Bible talks about, and the driver of the bus said, I've only seen one of them, and I never wanna see another one. This wasn't just a little storm. It was a piercing, painful, and difficult storm. And that's the way it often happens in our life. Once you sell out to Jesus Christ, once you get serious as an individual or as a church, I'm telling you, here's what's gonna happen. Satan will shoot from his slumber.

He'll leap from his, what place he's relaxing in, and he'll place the best guns he's got on the boat of your life, and he'll crash against your life. With all of these justifications and all these rascalsations, why it's not gonna work, it's not gonna turn out, this is a real difficult thing. We've gotta do what we know to do here instead of trusting the word of God and staying in the boat with Jesus. A painful storm. Your flesh will say just what some of these guys said in verse 38.

Jesus himself was in the stern asleep on the cushion, and they woke and said to him, "Teacher, do you not care that we're perishing?" Your flesh will say, "Lord, do you not see what I'm going through? Do you not see what my spouse is doing? Do you not see what these people are doing to me? Do you not see what these people are saying and it's not true?

Do you not see the hardship I'm suffering through with this disease and these difficulties as if he doesn't care?" That's an astounding thing to say to the one who's gonna go to the cross very quickly and die for them. (chuckles) Sir Francis Drake was a great explorer back in the ancient days of sailing vessels who explored the world, and I think he was coming in from his fifth worldwide voyage back to Great Britain, and he was bringing his ship up the Thames River, and I've been by the Thames River many times there in London, and it's relatively small. It's not much of a river compared to a lot of our rivers in America.

Sir Francis Drake brings his mighty global sailing ship in the Thames River, and all of a sudden a storm erupts, and then literally Sir Francis Drake's boat starts to sink in the Thames River. An onlooker said that Sir Francis Drake, the great British explorer, shook his fist toward God in heaven and said, "I, the one who have braved and tamed the seven seas now come home to be drowned in a ditch." The point of the story is, storms come sometimes when we least expect them, and from the place we least expected them. There's that storm of what you might call fickle friendships. My goodness, I've been through a lot of those.

Brother Chris, it's a challenge, but it's a blessing when you finally learn you have to let God pick your friends. I picked out a friend years ago, and literally he'd been one of the top three or four most prominent professional men in the whole shows area, very highly respected and esteemed, seemed to have a great and strong faith, and he and I began to travel a lot of places, and he would teach with me, and his family and I, and our family would go on vacations, supported me and defended me in every way with such a dear friend.

And then one day, he made the statement to the elders of the church, he was an elder himself, that he ought to have a certain position on the ministerial staff. Just kind of shocked us, we never even thought about that. What had happened, he had been mourning that for a long time, that was his plan. It's called the Idol of Unmet Expectation. He was expecting something, he didn't get it. And the elders prayed about it and said, we just don't think that's God's will. And immediately he turned on me.

Started passing out leaflets to people, explaining that I wasn't a man of God, and I wasn't teaching the word of God, and that we were a cult and just awful things. And did all he could to ruin my ministry. Now what are you gonna do in those situations? I mean, he had a powerful platform, and I had given it to him, I had given him that place. That's a difficult and painful storm to bear.

When I was a youth director at our church, and that's where I started, associate pastor in charge of the youth program, I began to reform the youth department, it was very carnal and the kids just did anything and everything that was worldly and unscriptural, to be honest, and I had so much zeal, I had more zeal than had common sense, I guess. But I begin to teach that we need to change some things, and young people who say they know Christ don't need to go certain places and do certain things.

And boy, a lot of the parents got very angry at me, and some of them, one particular lady was particularly malicious and undermining, and that's a difficult storm to bear. Brother Chris Atby, I hadn't met a Christian two years. That was back when I thought, well, they're gonna love me if I teach their kids these things. And they hated me. Those things happen sometimes. I remember one Sunday, Pam, I remember this very well, when a lady in our church had been living in adultery, and nobody knew it, and she came public, and she just walked off from her husband one day.

And I remember when he was in church the next Sunday, he said, "You don't know how hard that was, "that was so painful." 'Cause I couldn't just say she's out of town visiting her mom. I had to say, for us, she's concerned our marriage is over. Those are painful storms to bear, and difficult storms. Well, this was a painful storm. It was a fierce gale of wind, not just a typical windy day or anything. But Roman number three, not only are the storms for your life and your church predicted, and not only are they painful, but praise God in the Lamb, they're all passing storms. They're not staying storms. They're all passing storms.

One of my professors, Dr. Phil Allison, in graduate school used to tell us that his wife's favorite verse was quote, "And it came to pass." She said, "Thank God it didn't come to stay. "Thank God it came to pass." Well, that's true of every obstacle and difficulty in your life, it is not going to stay. You just said, "Jesus told these apostles, "get in the boat." Now listen to me, get in the boat, we're going to the other side. And if Jesus tells you we're going to the other side, it doesn't matter what happens on the journey, you're getting to the other side. Has he not promised us we're gonna make it all the way home?

Of all that the Father gives me, I lose not one. What a powerful and beautiful promise that is. Well, that's our first point there, where it's a passing storm because of his promise, we're going to the other side. He said, "I'm going to prepare a place for you "in another part of the text." It doesn't matter how vicious the storm, how difficult the trial, how heartbreaking the situation, your Lord is gonna get you through it. He's promised to get you through it.

Philippians 1, 6 promises, "He who began a good work in you will perform it "until the day of Christ Jesus." But not only because of his promise, secondly, it's a passing storm because of his power. His power. This verse says here, verse 39, "He got up and rebuked the wind and said to the sea, "'Hush, be still.' "And the wind died down and it became perfectly calm." Now folks, I live on the Tennessee River. And there's a dam system, the Tennessee Valley Authority, and it's large reservoirs of water. And when a storm goes through there, it's gonna roll for several hours, just roll with waves. That's not what happened here.

The way the verses worded here in the original great get means instantly there was a stillness on the waters like the starry heavens on a summer's night. A miracle. That quick. I can't tell you as a pastor and as an individual how many times something has blown up. Attacks would come, difficult days would come, and Brother Chris right out of the blue, boom, God just blow it out. I had a staff member who was very, very popular, but I knew he was a very carnal. I knew he was very worldly. And he really attacked and undermined my ministry.

And about the time I thought, "I'm not gonna survive this, it's just too difficult." A woman came forward and said, "I've been committing adultery with that man "for several years." And he immediately had to be removed. And the whole storm was over. His attacks against me had no legs any longer. You don't know what God's gonna do. You stay in the boat with Jesus. Stay in the boat with Jesus. Don't bail out. Don't dive in and swim it in your own strength. Don't try to figure it out in your own understanding. Just say, "I don't know what's gonna happen.

"I don't know what is next, "but I'm staying in the boat with Jesus." There were so many seasons of my ministry where just the attacks and the difficulties just broke me down physically. I was just so weak. And the only strength I had was to grab myself by the nap of the neck and go back to the pulpit and preach again. That's all I knew to do. So when you're facing a trial and you're full of anxiety, you know, "What do I do next?" You do the next righteous thing. You do the next right thing. For ladies, that might be getting up and cooking breakfast the next morning. You do the next thing. And it might be doing the laundry next.

And then it might be, "I've gotta support my family. "I gotta go into work." You just do the next thing and watch God work and take care of his children. His promise and his power guarantees us that he will bring us through this. I told you about the particular lady in the youth program when I came to the youth guy who was militant against my ministry. No one knew this, but her precious little girl, her name was Susie. And I've got the family's permission to share this. Susie was a little, she was a cheerleader at the university. Tiny little girl. But she had developed uncurable terminal cancer and became sick very fast.

But in that sickness, she had a wonderful spiritual revival. Just became a flame for Christ. And literally, she went to churches all over the shelves there. And by the Christ, they were packed out. People stand out in the vestibule and in the hallways just to hear her talk about how God changed her life and how all need to commit their faith to Christ. A lot of people converted and her just sharing that testimony. She got sicker and was in Huntsville Hospital and it was my day to go visit the hospitals. And I went over to Huntsville Hospital. We didn't know that, but she would be deceased in less than a week. And I walked in there.

We've had this difficult relationship in the past 'cause it was her mom who so opposed my teaching in the youth program. I was kind of nervous. How's this gonna work? I hadn't really talked to her mom since those days. I hadn't really talked to Susie much. And I walked in the room and she's laying there and she's got a football sized tumor in her chest. I'll never forget this as long as I lived. And we were just talking kind of casually and she pushed herself up on the bed very weakly and set up and she pointed her finger at me.

She said, "You know those things you taught us in the youth group about how we need to be different in honor of Christ? Everything you taught was absolutely right with her mom sitting there watching. And she laid back down when she was asleep. You stay in the boat with Jesus. He'll get you through. He'll vindicate you. He'll get you safe to the other side. That's his power. Nobody could have planned that. Nobody could have scripted that. It's shocked to me. But God knows what he's doing. Well, if not his promise, get you through it. His power may just knock the storm out but sometimes his presence. Just his presence is enough.

In verse 38, the Bible says, "Jesus himself was in the stern asleep on the cushion." There's an emphatic emphasis there. It doesn't mean Jesus was. It means Jesus, he himself. Like these guys didn't really realize who it was that was in the boat. Do you realize who your savior is? He controls everything. And he loves you with an everlasting love. Sometimes his presence is simply enough. They had forgotten just who it was that was in the boat with them. And he is the master of every situation. When he's all you have, you'll find out he certainly is all you need.

I found this little story years ago and it really impacted me that there was a little girl who was, her daddy was a captain and he was captain in this large vessel. They were living in Liverpool, England and the family happened to be on that voyage. And one of them was a 12 year old daughter and they leave the harbor there at Liverpool and just get started on the journey in a fierce gale of wind hits the ship and it tips over heavily to one side. And the little 12 year old girl, the captain's daughter was already in bed and she tumbles out of bed onto the floor and her brothers and sisters kind of screaming.

They all look around and don't know what's going on and the little 12 year old girl said, "What's happening? What's happening, mommy?" She said, "I guess we're in a storm." And she said, "Well, is my father at the helm?" She said, "Yes, darling, your father's captain of the ship." And they say she crawled back up in that bed, pulled up her covers and went fast asleep. The old ship of Zion is kind of dead and scratched and paint may be fading, but Jesus is the captain. He's the captain of your life, your marriage, your home and your church. No matter what comes your way and what difficulty and what trial, you stay in the boat with Jesus.

Maybe that'd be something of a mantra when you're challenged with something individually or as a church. Someone said, "What are we gonna do?" Tell you what we're gonna do, we're gonna stay in the boat with Jesus. He'll see us safe to the other side. Now, some of you are sitting here and you're facing something of a silent trial. I know that. You're suffering and you're hurting in ways that Brother Chris, nobody told you, maybe just who knows. But I wanna charge you tonight to say, "Lord Jesus, I'm staying with you. I'm gonna find out what the scripture says for me to do, best to understand it, state it, and that's what I'm gonna do.

I'm gonna honor you." How many times when we've had a church discipline issue like you guys have had, and I've seen a whole family member stand when another family member was removed from church because that's what the book said. They were staying in the boat with Jesus. And we've seen glorious restorations of marriages and families by doing that. So you trust the Lord. His presence, his power, his promise is that he will get you through it. Can we bow just for a season of prayer together? Dear child of God, in this moment in your life, as you think about the difficulty and the challenge, first of all, for many of you, this is an affirmation.

You're standing, you're trusting the Lord. You're doing what the Word says to do. I wanna ask you to keep on keeping on. For some of you, maybe you're like, I think Peter probably was about to dive in and swim in on your own, in your own understanding, in your own strength, and you need to repent of that. Say, "God, I'm not diving in and trusting my wisdom. I'm gonna stay with you. Lord Jesus, we're staying in the boat with you. You promised to keep us safe all the way to the other side.

And Lord, may the end result be that this dear church will continue on the high track that it's on, bringing you the praise, the glory and the honor, and the individuals in the church will continue to live that kind of life that shows that you are faithful to your children. We pray these things in Jesus' name and for His sake. Amen.