{"id":260,"date":"2014-03-30T09:48:53","date_gmt":"2014-03-30T09:48:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/parkwood.org\/blog\/?p=260"},"modified":"2015-03-03T18:44:39","modified_gmt":"2015-03-03T18:44:39","slug":"a-sabbath-pause-4","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/parkwood.dreamhosters.com\/blog\/a-sabbath-pause-4\/","title":{"rendered":"A Sabbath Pause #4"},"content":{"rendered":"

“One day Jesus said to His disciples, ‘Let’s go over to the other side of the lake.’ So they got into a boat and set out. As they sailed, He fell asleep. A squall came down on the lake, so that the boat was being swamped, and they were in great danger. The disciples went and woke Him, saying, ‘Master, Master, we’re going to drown!’ He got up and rebuked the wind and the raging waters; the storm subsided, and all was calm. ‘Where is your faith?’ He asked His disciples. In fear and amazement they asked one another, ‘Who is this? He commands even the winds and the water, and they obey Him.”<\/em> (Luke 8:22-25)<\/p>\n

This is the fourth Sabbath observance on our walk through this lenten time of remembrance. Sabbath is a time to rest and to experience the peace of God that comes as a result of His sacrifice. The Scripture above is a great meditation for today as we see Jesus calming the storm. He has certainly come to give us peace in the storms of this world.\u00a0 Isaiah called the Messiah the “Prince of Peace” (Isaiah 9:6).\u00a0 When the angels announced His birth to the shepherds they said, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among men whom He is pleased.” (Luke 2:14).<\/p>\n

The disciples knew this about Jesus but when it came to the practical application to their lives there seemed to be a disconnect.\u00a0 For many of us this can be true.\u00a0 It’s not a matter of not knowing who God is.\u00a0 We know that He is The Prince of Peace and our Refuge and Strength.\u00a0 But when the storms of life come down upon our personal boat…we panic.\u00a0 In our story Jesus did not seem to concerned with the situation.\u00a0\u00a0 In fact, the Scripture tells us that He was sleeping.\u00a0 He is the model of “peace” in the midst of the storm.\u00a0 Once awakened by the stressed out disciples, Jesus calms the storm but, He was calm before that.\u00a0 We should remember that every physical miracle that Jesus did revealed a deeper spiritual truth.\u00a0 The calming of the sea was a revelation of what He already does in our spirits…He brings peace in the midst of the storm.\u00a0 What He is saying to the disciples is the same thing that He said to Joshua and David, “Do not fear, I am with you!”<\/p>\n

After the sea calmed the disciples recognized that Jesus was the One who comes with the authority to bring peace!\u00a0 If Jesus is in the boat of your life…you’re going to be ok.\u00a0 Do you think these guys ever looked at a storm the same way again.\u00a0 I’m willing to bet that the fear factor was significantly less.\u00a0 Why?\u00a0 Because they had seen it.\u00a0 But, Jesus said, “Blessed are those who have not seen and still believe!” (John 20:29).<\/p>\n

Most of you have storms in your life right now or, at least, you can see something on the horizon.\u00a0 Know this today, Jesus comes to give you peace amidst the storm.\u00a0 The winds may still be blowing and your world may still be rocking but the Prince of Peace who has authority over all these things can calm your fear.\u00a0 The question is…do you have Jesus in your boat?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“One day Jesus said to His disciples, ‘Let’s go over to the other side of the lake.’ So they got into a boat and set out. As they sailed, He fell asleep. A squall came down on the lake, so … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[8,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-260","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-an-inconvenient-faith-2014-lenten-blog","category-all_posts"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/parkwood.dreamhosters.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/260","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/parkwood.dreamhosters.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/parkwood.dreamhosters.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/parkwood.dreamhosters.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/parkwood.dreamhosters.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=260"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/parkwood.dreamhosters.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/260\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":266,"href":"http:\/\/parkwood.dreamhosters.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/260\/revisions\/266"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/parkwood.dreamhosters.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=260"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/parkwood.dreamhosters.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=260"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/parkwood.dreamhosters.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=260"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}