Jesus in the Storm: The Storm is Not Punishment
Part 4 in a series about finding connection with Jesus in emotional storms caused by complex trauma, narcissistic family dynamics, scapegoating, and estrangement.
The Storm is Not Punishment
As I sit here and type this from the public library in the desert where we now live, I look to my right and see a homeless man in a chair with bags of his belongings sitting next to him. Beneath me, another homeless man on the 1st floor has been coughing loudly without covering his mouth for the last hour. To my left, a man dressed in Buffalo Bills pajama pants is pouring a protein shake into the feeding tube in his stomach. He answers his phone and says in full volume, “Whattya need? I’m trying to get some food in me!”
My desk up here on the mezzanine faces the window that looks out over the desert horizon while all this carries on around me. I can’t help but think of my last ministry job as a pastor of a university that afforded me an office overlooking a sprawling campus with grand classroom buildings, tall white pillars, and marble floors. Now, I’m working without a salary on the other side of an expired nonprofit start-up grant, and there is nothing but brown dirt and rock as far as the eye can see.
Through the lens of the pain of everything I have lost (see Part 2 of this series), it can seem like the storm is my punishment and the desert is where God has brought my dreams to die. 15 years is a long time to suffer privately with complex trauma, ambiguous loss, prolonged grief, and the post-traumatic stress of estrangement. Meanwhile, every other normal loss in life, difficulty, or failure has triggered the traumatic memory of the estrangement and begged the questions, Where are you God? (have you abandoned me), Why is this happening (is this my fault), and How do I make it stop? (is it my responsibility to fix it).
Up until a year ago, I have been able to keep myself afloat in these emotional storms, but the tragic death of my friend was the wave that finally sunk me. As I slipped further and further under water, I had to let go of my questions and simply cried, “Jesus, save me!” At the same time, I began an 8-week prayer retreat through the Ignatian Exercises, and as I shared in the earlier parts of this series, I have been contemplating the story of Jesus walking on water in the storm ever since.
I noticed three significant events in this story, and will be sharing a corresponding reflection for each.
Jesus put the disciples in the boat—it was intentional, but not punishment.
Jesus went to the mountainside to pray until just before dawn—he was not absent, he was waiting for the right timing.
Jesus walks on water and is received into the boat—performance is not required for salvation.
Matthew 14:22-25
22 Immediately Jesus made the disciples get into the boat and go on ahead of him to the other side, while he dismissed the crowd. 23 After he had dismissed them, he went up on a mountainside by himself to pray. Later that night, he was there alone, 24 and the boat was already a considerable distance from land, buffeted by the waves because the wind was against it. 25 Shortly before dawn Jesus went out to them, walking on the lake.
The story of Jesus walking on water in the storm takes place immediately following the martyrdom of John the Baptist and the feeding of the 5,000. The disciples were grieving the traumatic death of a fellow disciple, afraid of what might happen to them, and in desperate need of a retreat after ministering to 5,000 people in the desert. They were expecting smooth sailing to the other side of the sea of Galilee where they could finally get some rest, but an already traumatic and exhausting day only seemed to get worse.
Throughout the night, the disciples drifted three to four miles from shore (John 6:19), and were “struggling at the oars” (Mark 6:48) for approximately 6-9 hours. “Just before dawn” was considered the fourth watch of the night—between 3am and 6am. It is the darkest and coldest part of the night.
As I placed myself inside the boat with the disciples, I could imagine they may have been questioning if God was punishing them with abandonment and suffering because of something they had done wrong, and expecting them to figure out how to survive the storm and to get to the other side of the lake on their own. Maybe they were angry—thinking Jesus was negligent, uncaring, only concerned about his own needs, or exasperating as a leader. As they rowed for hours—getting nowhere—some may have remembered the day they left their families and their jobs as fishermen to follow Jesus. Now, they were back in a fishing boat—alone, in the middle of a storm, and unsure if they would make it out alive. After all, John the Baptist didn’t. Mark 6:52 says, “For they had not understood about the loaves; their hearts were hardened.” Perhaps they questions their decision to follow Jesus to begin with, and if Jesus was even who he said he was.
Yet, as I read this passage over and over again, I begin to discover a narrative entirely different.
When I was in seminary we were taught to pay special attention to transition words because they were often used to indicate significant meaning. This story starts with the transition word “Immediately”. Matthew 14:22 says, “Immediately Jesus made the disciples get into the boat and go on ahead of him to the other side, while he dismissed the crowd.”
Wait a minute, I thought, that was intentional. Was he punishing them? Is that something God would do?
First, I recalled how Jesus was “immediately” led into the desert by the Spirit to be tempted by the devil for 40 days after his baptism. It was just after the dove descended upon him, the heavens parted, and the Father said, “You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am pleased.” (Mark 1:12) Jesus didn’t do anything wrong and God was not mad at him. On the contrary—God was pleased! It was the devil that was tempting him with thoughts otherwise. It was the Spirit that led Jesus into the desert for a specific purpose and at a specific time.
Then, I was reminded of how God said to Noah, “Go into the ark, you and your whole family…because I have found you righteous [or blameless] in this generation. (Genesis 7:1) Then, Noah endured a storm for 40 days that wiped out everything he once called home, and had to remain in the ark until the water receded for over a year. In total, Noah was stuck on that ark for 370 days with one window, thousands of animals, and total silence from God until he stepped off the ark. Enduring the storm and grieving such traumatic loss in the dark for days on end most assuredly would have challenged Noah’s faith. However, we can see now that the storm was not able to drown out God’s plan of salvation for mankind. Nor was it able to rewrite God’s story for Noah’s life.
I also considered how God delivered his people from the oppression of Pharaoh, and personally escorted them on a 40 year journey through the desert to their Promised Land. We know the Israelites grew weary on the journey, and that they began to doubt following God into the desert. They exclaimed, “It was better for us in Egypt!” Yet, we learn in hindsight that although there was a much shorter route, God charted their course through the desert because, “If they face war, they might change their minds and return to Egypt.” (Exodus 13:17-18) God knew the exact path their lives needed to take to rescue them, preserve their faith, and to get them to where they were promised. Through Christ’s recapitulation of the Israelites journey through the desert, we see the fulfillment of God’s promise to lead all of us to our Promised Land.
Finally, I thought of Job, who God called “blameless” just before his livestock, servants, and all ten of his children were killed. (Job 1:8) After all of this affliction, Job was deeply grieved and angry, and God called him blameless again. (Job 2:3) It was Job’s friends who insisted he must have done something wrong to cause such tragedy to unfold in his life. Instead of accompanying him in his grief, they they encouraged him to perceive the traumatic events as his fault, internalize shame, ruminate on “right and wrong” to determine the cause of his suffering, and to perform his way back into connection with God. However, God spoke to Job “out of the storm”, opened his eyes to see, and enabled Job to declare his trust in the sovereignty and goodness of God despite his circumstances. Then, God chastised Job’s friends for leading him to believe his suffering was punishment for something he had done wrong. Finally, “After Job had prayed for his friends, the Lord restored his fortunes and gave him twice as much as he had before.” (Job 42:10)
In the stories of Jesus, Noah, the Israelites, and Job, God explicitly expressed his love and affirmation towards his people, and then demonstrated that love by enacting a plan of salvation that led them through landscapes and circumstances that would strengthen their faith, deepen the intimacy shared between them, and increase their dependency on Him alone. The desert was not where God brought the dreams of his people or his promises to die. The storm was not God’s punishment. Not only are the desert and the storm a normal part of the spiritual journey with Jesus, they can be the best route to healing from trauma and our Promised Land.