Where is Your Faith

February 5, 2006

Jack Hughes

If you have your Bibles, turn to Luke 8, where we are going to be looking at Jesus and His calming of the sea.

Most [of you] have probably heard of the SSEdmund Fitzgerald, which sank on November 10, 1975, on Lake Superior. (Gordon Lightfoot wrote a song about it, which kind of launched it into some fame.) The ship was a huge carrier, weighing in at 13,632 tons [when] empty. Its length was 729 feet. Now, if you can’t [picture] that [length] in your mind, imagine standing at one end of a football field looking all the way to the [other end], and then a whole [separate] football field after that, and then a half of one after that. That is a big boat.

On November 9, the Edmund Fitzgerald departed from Superior, Wisconsin, and headed for Detroit, Michigan. It was loaded down with 26,000 tons of ore and had 29 crewmembers [on board]. Nobody knows exactly what [caused the Fitzgerald to sink], but another ship, the Arthur M. Anderson, left shortly after [the Fitzgerald], traveling on a similar route. The National Weather Service predicted that the winds would be coming from the northeast, and if that had been the case, the Fitzgerald would have been fine. Around 2:45 p.m., however, the winds shifted and started blowing from the northwest, and blew hard at a steady 40 to 45 knots. Huge waves began to form on the lake.

The Anderson, which was behind the Fitzgerald, said that the waves started getting up to sixteen feet when the [crew] decided to change course and hug the shore to escape the larger seas. The Fitzgerald, [since it was] a larger ship, continued on its course. The Anderson and the Fitzgerald maintained radio contact [as the storm progressed]. The Fitzgerald started to report damage. The rails had been wiped off the deck by huge waves estimated to be 50-60 feet in height. The vents were also torn from the ship. Later that afternoon the Fitzgerald made radio contact with another ship, the Avafors, and said that they had a bad list and were taking heavy seas over the deck. Captain McSorely [of the Fitzgerald], who had forty-four years of experience on Lake Superior, said it was one of the worst seas he had ever been in. The Anderson was able to see the Fitzgerald on radar until about 7:10 p.m., when she disappeared from sight and all twenty-nine crew members were lost.

Not too many people have the experience of being out at sea in a storm like that, but I can tell you from personal experience: It is scary. It is really scary. When huge waves begin to form, and you realize that if one of those waves comes from a direction you are unprepared for, you will die. Every wave is a life-threatening situation. The smaller the vessel you are in, the scarier it is. When you know that every wave that comes along may end your life, it becomes a very terrifying situation—especially at night, when you can’t see the waves coming. Keep this in mind as we look at Luke 8:22-25. Follow along as I read.

Now on one of those days Jesus and His disciples got into a boat, and He said to them, “Let us go over to the other side of the lake.” So they launched out. But as they were sailing along He fell asleep; and a fierce gale of wind descended on the lake, and they began to be swamped and to be in danger. They came to Jesus and woke Him up, saying, “Master, Master, we are perishing!” And He got up and rebuked the wind and the surging waves, and they stopped, and it became calm. And He said to them, “Where is your faith?” They were fearful and amazed, saying to one another, “Who then is this, that He commands even the winds and the water, and they obey Him?”

From this text you are going to be reminded of two very important attributes of Jesus and how you need to live in light of those attributes. The first is: Your savior is 100 percent man. Look at verse 22, “Now on one of those days.” That is, one of the days that Jesus was going about from village to village, healing the sick, doing miracles, casting out demons, teaching, and preaching the kingdom of God. Mark 4:35 says it was actually in the evening on the day [Jesus] told the parable of the soils. It also says, according to Mark’s Gospel, that there were other boats [on the sea] with [Jesus and the disciples] [see Mark 4:36]. So it was on one of those days that Jesus said, “Let’s head out.” So a small fleet of boats headed out onto the lake. Look at the middle of Luke 8:22, “Jesus and His disciples got into a boat, and He said to them, ‘Let us go over to the other side of the lake.’ So they launched out.”

First of all, why would Jesus want to get into a boat? If you remember, at this time there are thousands of people following Him around. They all want His attention, they all want to be healed, they all want some miraculous fish or bread made for them out of nothing. [There is] constant pressure [on Jesus] to give and give. That is what Jesus came to do. He came to “serve, and to give His life a ransom for many” [Matthew 20:28; Mark 10:45]. That is what He is doing, from early morning to late at night. It is very exhausting. Jesus wanted to get into a boat instead of traveling around the lake. [In the center of the region of Galilee is this big lake], the Sea of Galilee, or the Sea of Tiberius, or Lake Gennesaret—they are all the same body of water that is about a mile-and-a-half wide and a couple of miles long.

[Jesus and the disciples] are going onto this lake to cross over to the other side. As we get down to Luke 8:26, we are going to find out why. Jesus is going to encounter a demon-possessed man, the Gerasene demoniac, and is going to demonstrate some more of His powers.

In this section of Luke, Luke is changing his emphasis. In the previous chapters he talked about what Jesus taught. Everything was about what Jesus taught—His discourses, what He taught people. Now we are starting to see what Jesus is doing. Luke is now going to record a whole series of events so we can see Jesus’ miraculous powers on display.

Look at the middle of Luke 8:23, “but as they were sailing along He,” that is, Jesus, “fell asleep.” Jesus is God incarnate, and God never sleeps or slumbers [see Psalm 121:3-4]. Jesus does. Why? Because He is a man. He is a human being, and He is really tired. I don’t know if you have ever been so tired you feel like, “I could just fall asleep on the ground.” Do you ever get that tired, when if you could just find a place to hold still you could fall asleep anywhere? Even in church on Sunday morning? It doesn’t matter how committed you are, how energetic you are, what plans you have, what goals you have, how passionate you are to get something done, you have to sleep. God just made it that way. You have to sleep. You have to let your brain just shut down for a minute and sleep.

Jesus was continually the center of attention: preaching, teaching, doing miracles, traveling from town to town, getting up early and praying, staying up late and praying. He was exhausted. He was tired. He was really tired.

Someone did a study and came to the conclusion that thirty minutes of preaching takes about the same amount of energy as eight hours of mild labor. I don’t know how they figured that out or even if it’s accurate. I do know that on Sunday after preaching two services I am kind of like a man from the boneless chicken ranch. I just want to get something to eat and then I collapse. I tell my wife [not to] accept any invitations after church because after I eat I am good for nothing but sleeping. I am trying to stay awake, and I am doing the Woody Woodpecker thing—[my head slumping down and then jerking back up].

Imagine what it must have been like for Jesus. He is doing this day after day, all day long. He is exhausted. He is wasted, and He gets into this boat, and [falls asleep]. Have you ever been tired like that? That’s what happened to Jesus. He was a man. He was fully human. He needed some sleep.

Through the years, the deity of Christ has been emphasized many, many times over because it has been under constant attack. There has always been a threat from [false teachers who are trying to deny] that Jesus was just a man. There is a lot of emphasis placed on His deity, but not a lot placed on His humanity. We need to stop and realize that Jesus was just as much man as He was God. Let me just survey a few texts to remind you of this important fact.

In Galatians 4:4 Paul says, “When the fullness of time came, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the law.” Jesus was “born of a woman,” just like you. In Luke 2:40, Luke writes, “The Child continued to grow and become strong, increasing in wisdom; and the grace of God was upon Him.” Then in Luke 2:52, Luke writes, “And Jesus kept increasing in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and men.” Jesus grew physically. Jesus grew mentally. Jesus grew just like you did. In Mathew 21:18, it says, “Now in the morning, when He was returning to the city, He became hungry.” Jesus got hungry just like you get hungry. In Mark 13:32, it says, “But of that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but the Father alone.” When Jesus was incarnate—when He was in the flesh, when He was a human here on earth—He didn’t know things. Though He was God and He knew all things He didn’t know things when He was here on earth. He was limited.

In John 4:6, [it says]: “So Jesus, being wearied from His journey, was sitting thus by the well.” And then He asked the Samaritan woman to give Him a drink. Jesus was wearied and thirsty because He was a man—He was human. In Hebrews 2:18, it says, “For since He Himself was tempted in that which He has suffered, He is able to come to the aid of those who are tempted.” Jesus was tempted just like you are tempted.

In Hebrews 5:8, it says, “Although He was a Son, He learned obedience from the things which He suffered.” That is an amazing text. Jesus learned obedience. It’s not that He was a sinner and had to learn not to sin, but He grew in His level of dependence on and trust in God. He continued to grow in obedience. He did it through suffering. So, don’t think that suffering is always bad, because it’s not always bad. Jesus learned obedience through the things He suffered.

Turn to Philippians 2. In the book of Philippians, Paul has to address something that is going on [in Philippi]. A couple of women are causing a fracture in the Church at Philippi. Paul writes the book of Philippians to remind them of the joy they are to have in Christ, but also to try and keep the Church from splitting. These two women had obviously been very influential in the Church and had drawn up sides. People were starting to divide: one with this person and one with that person. So Paul writes these words to tell them the kind of attitude they need to have as believers in order to maintain unity. He says this, in Philippians 2:5-8:

Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant and being made in the likeness of men. Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

When we survey all of these texts, what do they teach us? They teach us that Jesus was a man. He was a man. He was human just like you and just like me: 100 percent human. Jesus was born, grew up physically, mentally, and spiritually. He became hungry and tired.

The deity of Christ has been emphasized so much that a lot of times I think people forget He was a man and He is still a man to this day. He will forever be a man—just like you, just like me, Jesus is a man. And though He is the second person of the Trinity, and though His person has existed from eternity past as God—the second member of the Trinity—when Jesus became a man He laid aside the independent exercise of His divine attributes.

What that means is that He was always all-knowing, all-powerful, and all-sovereign, but when He became a man, He chose not to tap into His divine attributes except when it was the Father’s will. That is why when you look at the New Testament you see He grew in wisdom, and grew in knowledge. If you know everything why do you need to grow in knowledge? Well, because when He was incarnate—that is, when He was born of a woman—He chose not to exercise His divine attributes. He chose to submit Himself and become like us. While He possessed the attributes [of God], He did not tap into them. That is why He prayed, became hungry and tired, and all of those things which God never does. Jesus humbled Himself and became a man with all the limitations that come with being human.

Well, this is Jesus, sleeping in the boat. We learn from the text that He is worn out. He is conked out. He is wasted. He crawls into the boat and says, “Go to the other side,” and that’s it. Then something happened. Look at the end of Luke 8:23: “And a fierce gale of wind descended on the lake, and they began to be swamped and to be in danger.” What is being described here is a squall, or what is called a “microburst.” It is a sudden, strong, violent wind. I don’t know if you’ve ever been outside doing something and all of a sudden there is this big wind that comes along—“pow!” You can just feel it. Sometimes it only lasts for a few minutes, and sometimes it lasts for quite a long time. In the mountains where I used to like to go hiking and hunting, we would have these times where it would be perfectly clear. Then clouds would come over and there would be this raging wind. It would just dump water, and it would rain, rain, rain. Then all of a sudden the wind would stop, the sun would come out, and it would be over. It was a little microburst.

A white squall is similar to this. Sometimes you can be in the middle of a lake or in the middle of the ocean, and if it is daytime you can see on the horizon this wall of choppy water. The wind is just blowing along and churning up the water. You can see the white caps, and they are coming toward you. When they hit, it’s just “pow.” It’s a squall. If it’s got a lot of rain mixed in with it, it’s called a “white squall.”

Now, keep in mind that these men, [the disciples], are expert fishermen who grew up navigating boats on the Sea of Galilee, but they were not prepared for this. In fact, few people are prepared to deal with a squall or a microburst because they’re unpredictable. They come upon you when you are not ready. You are just in calm water, doing your thing, and all of a sudden, “pow.” The winds can blow so hard sometimes—50, 60, 70 mph—they just tear off all the rigging from the boat. Anything that is not lashed down gets blown over the side. Sometimes things that are lashed down still get blown over. If your vessel isn’t facing in the right direction when the squall hits, the wind can instantly capsize your boat.

On May 14, 1986, the Pride of Baltimore, a fine, 137-foot schooner was struck by a white squall. The 121-ton vessel sank about 240 miles north of Puerto Rico. The surviving crew drifted for about five days at sea until the Toro, a Norwegian freighter, picked them up at 2:30 a.m. on May 19. An eyewitness described what happened with these words: “A tremendous whistling sound suddenly roared through the rigging and a wall of wind hit us in the back. The Pride heeled over in a matter of seconds. The seventy-knot wind pushed a twenty-foot-high wall of water into the starboard side. She sank in minutes.”¹

How do you prepare for that? You don’t. It doesn’t matter how expert you are. If you are facing in the wrong direction when something like that hits, you’re going down. It is important to remember that this is what’s going on while Jesus, the man, is sleeping in the bow of the boat.

You need to realize that Jesus is a man. Why is it important for you to realize this? Well, for this reason: Have you ever been tired, exhausted, or worn out from doing ministry? We all have. Jesus knows what it’s like to be tired, exhausted, hungry, and thirsty. He knows. Why? Because He is a man. When you pray to Jesus, remember that He knows what it’s like to be a man because He is still a man. He will always be a man. Do you realize that when He became a man it was a permanent thing? When you go up to heaven I am sure there He will be—six-foot-four, brown hair, and perfect. He will always be a man. He’ll never stop being a man. He will be the man Christ Jesus on the throne. You will be able to talk to Him. He isn’t going to be some big, inflated person. He is going to be a man—glorified, but a man. When you die, or you are raptured, you are going to be just like Jesus is now. You are going to be a glorified man as Jesus is right now a glorified man.

This is a comfort when you are tired, hungry, or thirsty. When you are experiencing trials, and you want to pray, and you want to talk to Jesus, you know that He knows what it’s like to be a man. He, too, lived in a sin-cursed world, among sin-cursed men, was born of a woman, and died a very gruesome death on the cross. He knows what it’s like.

Some of the most encouraging words in the New Testament are based on Jesus’ humanity. Hebrews 4:15-16 says this:

For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin. Therefore let us draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

Do you see why you can boldly approach the throne of grace? Why God commands you to do that? The whole foundation of you being able to approach God’s throne to find mercy and grace in a time of need is because on that throne is the man Christ Jesus, who knows what it’s like and can sympathize with your weakness.

But there is another application of knowing Jesus’ humanity. That is the forgiveness of sins. In order for Jesus to forgive us of our sins and to make atonement for our sins, He needed to be 100 percent man. If Jesus was 99.999 percent human, He couldn’t be our Savior. He had to be perfectly human or He couldn’t be a substitute. If you’re going to redeem a human sinner, you have to find a man who is perfectly holy, perfectly human, and who actually wants to die a substitutionary death and pay the penalty of the sinner. I am telling you, that’s hard to find. But that is who Jesus is. Jesus is the perfect God-man.

Do you know why He did this? Do you know why He became a man, and why He was born of a woman, lived in a sin-cursed world, and died on the cross? Because He loves you. He. Loves. You. Even though you’re a rebel, He loves you. Even though you’re a sinner, He loves you.

This is why rejecting Christ is eternally damning. You are not sent to hell because you have committed all the sins that everybody always commits. Every saint in heaven, every holy one, every redeemed person in heaven, committed all those same sins to one degree or another. The reason you go to hell is because you reject Jesus’ love for you. You will not have the free gift of eternal life, you will not turn from your sins, you will not have forgiveness, you will not have atonement, you will not have this Man reigning over you. You don’t want to change, you don’t want to be like Christ, you don’t want to worship Him, and you don’t want to serve Him. Because of that, you reject His love and the free gift of eternal life. You refuse to take it.

What religion or pagan god is willing to save unworthy rebels by grace—undeserved, unearned favor—to completely forgive them and change them by grace? There is only one God, and that is the God of the Bible. That is why rejecting His love is the sin that nails the lid on your eternal doom.

The second of Christ’s attributes you need to recognize is that your Savior is 100 percent God. Look at Luke 8:24: “They came to Jesus,” this is during the storm, “and woke Him up.” Now, just stop there for a moment. It is amazing that Jesus never woke up during the storm. I can relate to this, too. One time, we fished all day long and then we got into some rough seas. We wanted to run all night, so we stayed up all night doing engine maintenance. Then we fished all day again, and then that night we were going to run some more. We each had three hours we could spend sleeping. So I got up into the bow of the boat and I was just out. I didn’t even have to think about falling asleep. I lay down and that was it. When the captain woke me up about three hours later (it was about 3 in the morning), he said, “Hey, you’re bleeding.” I looked, and my knee was resting against the bulkhead, and the storm had been so rough that it rubbed a hole in my knee. I said, “Yeah, I was tired.”

So, Jesus is tired. He is wasted and sleeping in the boat. If you look at the text here, in Luke 8:24, let’s see what [the disciples] said. They come to wake Jesus up, and they say [in hysterical voices], “Master, Master, we are perishing!” You don’t think they said it that way? I know they said it that way. They didn’t come to Him, saying [in a quiet, sing-song voice], “Excuse me? Master? We’re dying at this time.”

They never spoke to Jesus like they spoke to Him here. This is the only time in the Gospels they ever spoke to Him this way. When you look at Mark, it says that they said, “Do You not care that we are perishing?” [Mark 4:38]. Matthew says they said, “Save us, Lord; we are perishing!” [Matthew 8:25]. When you put these together they said “Master! Master! Do you not care? We’re perishing!” And the word “perishing” here is the word apalua. It’s the word used to describe people who are lost in hell forever—who are utterly destroyed. They said, “Master, don’t you care? We are going to die right now.” That’s what they are saying.

What are the disciples to do? They were the expert fishermen, they were the expert navigators, and here we have the conked-out carpenter in the front [of the boat]. But they come to Him. They see the waves. They’re out in the middle of the lake at night. (We know that because they left at evening.) Feeling the wind and the waves, they know from personal experience, “This is the worst storm we’ve ever been in and we are going down. We’re going to die. And we want to make sure to wake up Jesus so He knows.”

They went to Jesus, and as we go on, we will find out they didn’t have everything right here. They were not placing their faith in Christ, but at least they went to [Him]. At least they went to Jesus, which is a lot more than I can say for a lot of people who say they know Christ, who say they believe in Christ. We need to learn from [the disciples’] example. Does Jesus want you to rely on Him only when you have a problem? Does Jesus want you to rely on Him only when you need something from Him, like a new car? No. He wants you to rely on Him all the time. In the morning, in the night, and all throughout the day, He wants to have that relationship with you. He wants to talk to you. He wants to be your friend. He wants you to give Him your day, your thoughts, your worries, your goals, your ambitions, your fears, and your wants. Jesus wants you to come to Him.

Many who call themselves Christians make a habit of not going to Jesus, either in good times or bad. When something bad happens, they get stressed out, they start worrying, they start talking to other people, or going to the internet, their visa, their doctor, their lawyer, or their friends. But they don’t go to Jesus. You talk to them, “Hey, have you brought this up before the Lord?” [They reply,] “Uh, no.” It’s almost like [they’re asking], “Why would I do that?” Do you know why they do that? It’s because they don’t know Jesus. If you don’t go to Jesus as a regular habit of your life, how can you say you have a relationship with Him? You don’t. You’re just fooling yourself. You’re blind.

Do you know what I am talking about here, [when I talk about] going to Jesus? Does this make sense to you? Or are you just like, “What are you saying?” What I am talking about is this: You wake up in the morning and your first thought is of God. Does that happen to you? You go to bed at night and you’re thinking about God. As you’re getting ready [for the day], you’re thinking about God, you’re talking to God, you’re praying to God.

Do you know what? When you, [a Christian], go to God in prayer, the first thing that comes to mind is always, “I am such a sinner.” You know that you are such a beggar and such a wretch that you have never loved God like you should have loved God. Even on your best day it’s worse than He deserves. Here you come, crawling up before Him, with maybe some sin in your life that you confessed a million times. You know it, He knows it, and you know you’re not doing what you should be doing. You know God deserves better.

You know God’s grace and mercy are sufficient [see 2 Corinthians 12:9], and you’re not using the resources God has given you. Yet you come, because you know that His Word has told you that when you confess your sins, He is faithful and just to forgive your sins and cleanse you from all unrighteousness [see 1 John 1:9]. You know His steadfast love indeed never ceases, and His mercy never comes to an end [see Lamentations 3:22-23]. You know that “there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” [Romans 8:1]. That He loves you with a love incorruptible, and when you are faithless, He remains faithful and He cannot deny Himself [see 2 Timothy 2:13].

So you come. You boldly approach the throne of grace to find help in a time of need [see Hebrews 4:16] ,and He always helps you, because He is the almighty God, and He has all the resources you could possibly imagine—unlimited resources, perfect wisdom, absolute sovereignty.

Do you know what I am talking about? If you don’t, and all of this just sounds foreign to you, you need to come to Jesus for the first time. Not come to the knowledge of Jesus, but come to Jesus as your Savior. That is what you need. You need to be like the disciples who, although their faith was not in it, and although they didn’t really understand what Jesus was going to do, at least they came to Him. It is a bad omen when someone who professes to be a Christian goes through a trial and doesn’t turn to Christ. That is a bad omen. That is almost a sure indicator that that person is lost. Even a dog knows to go to its master.

When the storm came upon the disciples, they ran to Jesus. I’m sure they thought at first, “Well, let’s not wake Him up, let’s not disturb Him. I mean, He’s really tired.” But afterward they realize, “We’re going down. We’re in a bad storm and we’re going down. Let’s wake Him up.” So they wake Him up and are yelling at Him, “Save us! Master, do something!” They were not prepared for what was going to happen. Look at the text again in Luke 8:24: “And He got up and rebuked the wind and the surging waves.”

Let’s just stop there. Jesus is sound asleep, and the boat is being swamped with big waves, water, and wind. They come to Jesus, “Master, Master! Wake up! We’re perishing!” He wakes up and He’s kind of groggy and He’s looking around. You know how it is when you first wake up when you’re really tired—it’s like you’re coming out of a coma. Jesus looks around at the situation, sees that there is a storm, and the wind and the waves, and the world that He created is getting a little out of control so He says, “Be still.”

Now, who ever heard of somebody speaking to the waves and rebuking them? I mean, no one in his right mind [would do that]. But here, the Savior—God in human flesh, creator of heaven and earth—sees the wind and waves and He rebukes them. I am sure the disciples right now are thinking to themselves “What? This isn’t going to help! Excuse me? This is not going to work. Waves don’t obey. You can do the demon thing, and you can tell people to obey, but waves do not obey!” And before they can even think through this, they’re thinking, “We’re going in, man. We’re going to be swimming.”

Look at the end of Luke 8:24, “And they,” that is the wind and the waves, “stopped, and it became calm.” [One moment earlier], the waves were one surging about and crashing down, the wind [was] howling, and the expert fishermen [were] hanging on for their lives, [and then] all of a sudden all that wind comes to an abrupt halt. The waves don’t even subside, they just [stop] flat, quiet, calm. There they were, expert sailors. One moment they were struggling for their lives, and the next moment [they were] standing in a quiet boat. What a shocker that must have been—seeing the wind, the waves, to be terrified one moment and the next moment to be on a perfectly calm, windless lake. That would have been spooky. Especially when you realize the one who did it is in your boat.

I don’t remember who said it first, but someone once said, “There is only one thing worse than having a storm outside your boat, and that is having God inside your boat.” I am sure that this display of power probably terrified the disciples more than the storm: to realize that a passenger in your boat—this teacher, this rabbi, this carpenter, this prophet—is able to control the weather. You don’t have to be Socrates or Aristotle to figure out this syllogism: 1) Only God can control the weather; 2) Jesus controls the weather; 3) therefore, Jesus is God.

I wonder what they thought after that. What do you do after that? It’s all quiet now, and calm. Make small talk? “Yeah, who do you think is going to win the Super Bowl?” What do you do after that? I know what they probably wanted to do. They probably wanted to say, “Are you God?” I wonder what they said on the way to shore. That would have been interesting. Was everybody just kind of quiet? “OK, let’s go to shore, guys.” What do you say when the guy in your boat calms the sea, and rebukes the wind?

Jesus’ resources are unlimited and His power immeasurable. It is amazing that He bends His power and His wisdom to love unworthy sinners. That is what is amazing. When you go to prayer, you are praying to a God who has already demonstrated beyond a shadow of a doubt that He loves you with a love incorruptible.

Turn to Romans 8:31. Many people have read this passage. I am sure it’s familiar to a lot of us. A lot of times people don’t stop to meditate on this and really see what it is saying. For people who are worried about being forgiven, and worried about God loving them, this is the cure passage. Oh, by the way when [Paul] says “to these things” he has just talked [at the beginning of the chapter] about how there is “no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” [Romans 8:1]. That God has given us His Spirit. That we don’t know how to pray as we should, but the Spirit intercedes and helps us pray according to the will of God, and that God causes all things to work together for good to those who are called according to His purpose. That God predestined us to be justified and glorified. Those are some pretty great things. Then he says this in Romans 8:31-32:

“What then shall we say to these things,” [these great things God has and is doing for us,] “If God is for us, who is against us? He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him over for us all, how will He not also with Him freely give us all things?”

Do you see that? If God has already become a man, and died a torturous death on the cross for you, why wouldn’t He give you anything less than that? If He has already made the premium sacrifice, why would He not go farther than that and help you with your little pusillanimous problems? From verses 33-39:

Who will bring a charge against God’s elect? God is the one who justifies; who is the one who condemns? Christ Jesus is He who died, yes, rather who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who also intercedes for us. Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? Just as it is written, “For Your sake we are being put to death all day long; we were considered as sheep to be slaughtered.” But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

That is who was in the boat with the disciples, that is the person that we worship, and that is the person that you pray to who “will never leave you or forsake you” [see Deuteronomy 31:8]. It is that God that we serve and we worship, and who loves us, and who has demonstrated His love for us by dying on the cross for us—by becoming a man permanently, from that point on to all eternity. Jesus is a man, but Jesus is also God.

Third, what do you need to do about that? You need to have faith in your Savior, who is both God and man. Look at Luke 8:25: “And He said to them ‘Where is your faith?’ ” They came to him all frantic, scared, and rebuking Him. What a great wake-up call: “Master! Master! Don’t you care that we’re perishing!” Jesus says, “Where is your faith?” What do you think Jesus is saying here? Where is your faith in your navigational skills, or your expertise as sailors? No.

Today people like to talk about faith as if faith is something good in and of itself. It’s not. Faith in faith is nothing. “You just need to have faith.” Whenever I hear anybody say that, I ask this question: “In what?” Is faith in a snail or Twinkies good? No. Faith in Jesus Christ is good. Faith in anything else is not good. The object of faith must have power to help you, otherwise it’s futile to put your faith in it. So, when [Jesus] asks, “Where is your faith?” we know the answer. He is talking about, “Where is your faith in Me?” It tells us [that the disciples] weren’t believing in Him. Though they came to Him and said, “Save us,” they were probably saying to themselves, “But we know you can’t. But we are waking you up [anyway], kind of giving you a wake-up-before-death call.”

They had experienced plenty of things. They had enough proof. They had seen Him do miracles. He wasn’t just a good man. He wasn’t just a prophet. He wasn’t just God with a little “g.” They saw Him raise the dead, heal the blind, heal all manner of disease and sickness, predict the future, and know things that were unknowable. They knew the prophecies, but they still just wouldn’t believe. They could not even come to the conclusion that Nicodemus came to. When he came to Jesus in John 3:2, he said, “Rabbi, we know,” that is, the Pharisees know, “that You have come from God as a teacher; for no one can do these signs that You do unless God is with him.” They all knew. This guy came down, was in heaven with the Father, and came down. Everybody knows that. But here were His disciples, who had seen all these miracles and they just couldn’t bring themselves to believe it.

There is an important point that needs to be stressed over and over again: Miracles, experiences, signs, and wonders do not save people. They may create belief in Jesus, that He did something. They may create belief that God has done a miracle. They may point to the messenger, or, if Jesus did it, to the Messiah Himself, but they don’t impart saving faith.

In John 12:37, it says, “But though He had performed so many signs before them, yet they were not believing in Him.” Sure, the multitude watched. Yes, they believed that He could do miracles. Why would they follow Him around the country if they thought He couldn’t do them? Of course He could do the miracles. They believed that. They may have believed He was a prophet. They may have even believed He was the Messiah. But it didn’t save them. It didn’t save them. The disciples had witnessed all of Jesus’ miracles. They had been with Him the whole time, but they still did not believe that He could do something about this situation. What could He do? Only God could calm the sea.

You could see that they didn’t believe Him by looking at Luke 8:25. Notice their response, “They were fearful and amazed, saying to one another, ‘Who then is this, that He commands even the winds and the water, and they obey Him?’ ” And notice that Luke doesn’t even answer the question. It is so obvious. There is only one person who can command the wind and the waves. They couldn’t even figure out the basic syllogism that I just gave you. How many people control the wind and the waves? There is only one answer. Surely you could get that right. If you had a multiple-choice test it would contain one choice.

What can we learn from this? Well, the big point of this last point is this: Where is your faith? So I ask you, where is your faith? What have you placed your faith in to save you from your sins? Who are you living for? Who are you trusting in? Who are you going to? Today is the day of salvation. If you haven’t repented of your sins and placed your faith in the person and work of Jesus Christ, you need to do that today. Tomorrow never comes.

I used to work for an old guy who had peg leg. I mowed his lawn. He would say, “Hey, are you going to mow my lawn today?”

I would say, “Tomorrow.”

And he would say, “Tomorrow never comes.” I never did understand what that meant. So one day I thought I would wait until tomorrow. I came and said, “OK, it’s tomorrow.”

He said, “No. Tomorrow is tomorrow.” Finally, I understood.

You need to give your life to Christ. When somebody asks you where your faith is, you just need to say, “My faith is in Jesus and Jesus alone.”

There is a hymn whose author is unknown [although some hymnals attribute the words to Lidie H. Edmunds, 1851-1920]. The music is an old Norwegian melody. It first appeared in a hymnbook in 1891. Its words read as follows:

My faith has found a resting place, Not in device nor creed. I trust the ever-living One, His wounds for me shall plead.

Enough for me that Jesus saves—This ends my fear and doubt. A sinful soul, I come to Him, He’ll never cast me out.

My heart is leaning on the Word, The written Word of God. Salvation by my Savior’s name, Salvation through His blood.

My great Physician heals the sick, The lost He came to save. For me His precious blood He shed, For me His life He gave.

I need no other argument, I need no other plea. It is enough that Jesus died, And that He died for me.

[“My Faith Has Found a Resting Place”]

I hope that’s your prayer. Let’s pray.

Father, we thank You for this great text, where we get to see Jesus’ humanity, and His deity, and His call to have us place our faith in Him. Father, I pray for all who know You here today, that we would leave here with a commitment to live for You and to come to You for every joy, every pleasure, every need, every trial, every want that we have. That our whole lives would be about trusting and living with You—relying on You, talking to You. For those who don’t understand what that is, Father, I pray that You would save them today. That You would open their hearts to the light of Your truth. That they would realize they “need no other argument,” they “need no other plea. It is enough that Jesus died and that He died for [them].” And that they would cease working their own way, quit trusting in their own efforts, and that they would come humbly to the foot of the cross, repent, and believe, and be changed forevermore. We pray this in Christ’s name. Amen.

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Unless otherwise indicated, Scripture is taken from the New American Standard Bible®, ©1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation