Exploring the Scriptures June 24, 2012 Mark 4:35-41 and Calm by Blair Odney

In his book, “The Perfect ,” Sebastian Junger recounts the story of a natural disaster off the coast of Massachusetts in the fall of 1991. In 2000, the book became a movie starring George Clooney. The death toll was 13 and damage was estimated at $200 million, most which occurred when waves up to 10 meters struck the coastline from Canada to Florida and down to Puerto Rico. A buoy off the coast of Nova Scotia reported a wave height of 30 meters, the highest ever recorded in the province's offshore waters...basically the height of ten story building. Imagine meeting a wall of water 100 feet high..

So what made this storm so “perfect”? Junger got the phrase “perfect storm” from a retired meteorologist who said the storm’s intensity was caused by a perfect alignment of several factors; such a convergence of weather conditions occurs only once every 50 to 100 years.

This perfect storm began on October 26, with the formation of a hurricane, a Category 2 tropical storm south of . This hurricane moved up the East Coast of the United States, losing power along the way, but on October 29, it collided with a cyclone moving down the coast from Nova Scotia. The cyclone, formed by a low-pressure front moving in from the Midwestern United States met a high-pressure front moving down from Northern Canada, which together absorbed the power of the first hurricane, increasing in intensity.

As if this unusual three-prong storm wasn’t bad enough, a second hurricane formed at the heart of all of it which made the whole mess even angrier. Eventually, the storm broke up over Nova Scotia, on Nov. 2, exactly one week after the formation of the first hurricane. The storm reached its peak on Oct. 30, along the Mid-Atlantic and Southern New England coast, with the most damage occurring in New Jersey and Massachusetts.

Since the publication of Junger’s book in 1997, the phrase “perfect storm” has become slang for any situation that is caused by an unusual combination of coincidental events.

A perfect storm is exactly what is brewing in the gospel of Mark. It happens to have a parallel illustration in the story that Stan read for us this morning, a story that is reported to have taken place on the Sea of Galilee. Up to this point in Mark’s gospel, Jesus has been teaching, he’s been preaching, he’s been healing and he’s stirring up quite a storm among the religious leaders and the common-folk alike.

In the story I just shared about that perfect storm in 1991, do you remember how it began? It began as a hurricane, a category 2 tropical storm, off the coast of Bermuda. Do you know what the name of that hurricane was? Hurricane Grace. No kidding. Hurricane Grace became the perfect storm in Junger’s novel and the subsequent movie.

Hurricane Grace. That’s what I’d call Jesus in the gospel of Mark. The stories recorded in this gospel report more of what Jesus did, rather than what he said, and up to this point in the story, on the Sea of Galilee, Jesus has been dispensing grace – healing, forgiveness, restoration to community life – which has been stirring up an equal amount trouble. Some might even say that the version of the Jesus events recorded in the Gospel of Mark could be described as the precursor to a perfect storm: the death of a Jewish peasant protestor of Rome because of what he did, and did again, and did over and over again. But let’s just stick to Hurricane Grace, a category 2 tropical storm in the lives of those Jesus touched.

As I think about the teens who graduate from high school this year, I’m imagining the potential of another perfect storm. Up to this point, their lives have been programmed without a break. They have had something to do every waking moment of their lives. Their presence, or lack of it, has been noticed by teachers, coaches, school band leaders, and guidance counselors for the past 12 years. Their parents have been on top of their every move before that. And now, they’re about to take their first steps into a world that doesn’t care whether they show up or not. Some are quite ready. Others are not at all. Some are set for smooth sailing, others are headed for a perfect storm. But I digress.

The disciples behave like any of us would. Even though they have journeyed with Jesus for the past number of weeks, watching all of the deeds he’s done, in complete faith in the God in whom he places complete trust. Then they hit the perfect storm, and they’re scared for themselves. They’re actually fair-weather friends. They go along with whatever Jesus does when the going goes well; they do all sorts of things sacrificially. But when the perfect storm hits, they cast all doubt.

They see Jesus asleep in the stern of the boat, wake him and yell, “don’t you care that we are perishing?” Rather than see the mighty calm and trust that has lulled him into sleep, they lose complete faith, they trust nothing. He doesn’t really care about us, they think. Fairweather friends. When the perfect storm hits, it’s every man, every woman for themselves.

Did Jesus calm the water, or did he model complete trust, so that the storm no longer controlled them? It’s a matter of perspective in my mind. In the movie “The Perfect Storm” George Clooney portrays the real life captain of the fishing vessel the . Women and children are on board when she sets sail for a day of sword fishing. When the perfect storm hits, Clooney and his crew do everything they can to get the most vulnerable off the ship. A helicopter is discharged only to be swamped by the waves. A second attempt is made and finally the women and children are lifted off the boat. The challenge now is to head for shore. The crew has no idea what they are facing; they just know they need to get home.

In my mind what happens in the movie is what is happening on the Sea of Galilee. The story says the waves and winds obeyed Jesus at his word. And perhaps that’s what happened. Could it be that the disciples saw in Jesus a perfect calm, a perfect trust in his relationship with the God he knew; regardless of the outcome? Hurricane Grace was storming in the hills and fields of Palestine. Could it be that Jesus example of calm - sleeping, when it was appropriate to sleep in the middle of Hurricane Grace - needed to be their own behavior? Maybe what was calmed was not the waves or the wind, but the disciples’ fearful reaction to storm weather on the horizon. Perhaps that’s what we need to see this morning.

Jesus is not going to protect us from our own perfect storms. What we can do is look to his faith, his trust, his profound spiritual practice of meditation and letting go, to accept what happens in trust, whatever the outcome. That’s what I remembered happened in the movie. Clooney needed to head home. The crew needed to head west not knowing a 30 meter wave was bearing down on them. Having battled the elements to get the women and children off the ship, Clooney simply looked west, with his crew, and headed in that direction. Going home was all he trusted, no matter the outcome.

Whether we perish, or whether we live, we are in the hands of life, the hands of love, the hands of God. The spiritual practice of placing our trust in a relationship with the God of all life, in those times over which we have no control, will help us sleep better at night. Even though someone who is afraid might wake us up, the spiritual practice of planting our tap root deeply into our relationship with God is what will sustain us in the winds and the waves of our perfect storms. Trust this. It’s true. Amen.