Pastor's Corner

for Sunday March 27th
He will get you to the other side.
Jesus said to his disciples, “Let’s cross to the other side of the lake.” (Mark 4:35) It had been a busy day for Jesus and so he soon fell asleep in the boat and a fierce storm arose and the disciples fearing that they would drown urgently woke Jesus saying, “Teacher, don’t you even care that we are going to drown?” Well, Jesus got up and calmed to storm and everyone felt a lot happier. The daily devotion “streams in the desert” makes two important points about this story that I would like to share with you. The first is that though these disciples were obeying Jesus clear instruction to cross the lake they ran into a life threatening storm! How often are we not puzzled by similar circumstances in our lives? We hear God clear instruction; we are obeying His clear teaching and next thing we know we are in the midst of a fierce storm that threatens to destroy us, and we wonder “Why is God allowing this to happen?! I’m doing what He wants! I just don’t understand.” And, we may even feel that this “obedience” thing just doesn’t work. Perhaps God is testing us to see if we obey Him so that life will be easy or because He is God and worthy of our obedience. Perhaps it’s a time of faith building. There are many possible explanations, but what ever happens, keep trusting!
The second thing we can draw from this story is that Jesus said “cross to the other side” not, “go into the middle and drown”! Jesus has a destiny for us and it’s not drowning in the middle, it’s reaching the other side! So no matter how frightening things may become know this: He will get you to the other side!
Pastor Don