DAILY READING
REFLECTION
Don't You Care
by Mary Alice McGinnis
When my son was a baby, we went on a summer camping trip on the tip of the thumb in Michigan, on the shores of Lake Huron. We were enjoying a wonderful day swimming in the lake and making sandcastles on the beach. After finishing our picnic lunch, we saw something strange on the horizon.
Across the lake, the sky was turning dark, and a line of thick dark-green clouds were speeding towards us. We could see ALL the boats in the lake frantically racing toward the shore, trying desperately not to be overcome by the oncoming storm.
As we stood there on the beach and watched, lightning began flashing across the sky, the mounting wind tossed up beach balls and umbrellas in its clutches, and the dark-green storm front marched closer and closer.
We scurried back toward our campsite wondering where we were going to find a safe place to wait out the storm. Our little Apache camper was no match for the fierce winds. My husband told me to get inside the camper, sit on the floor with my infant son and wait for him to come back for us.
There I sat in the middle of the floor of our lightweight camper, getting pummeled by sheets of heavy rain and buffeted by thirty-mile-per-hour winds. I hugged my son close, and cried out to God, “Where are you? How could you leave me in a situation like this? How could you just leave my son and I here amid this storm?”
Picture such a scene from the storms of your own life. Maybe you have had a time in your life when you were extremely frightened and overwhelmed. Think about how that moment in time felt. Did you feel like God was distant or inattentive to your turmoil? Or worse yet, that maybe He just didn’t care?
Did you notice that after spending the day teaching the crowd from the disciple’s boat, Jesus said to the disciples, “Let’s go over to the other side?” He already knew how the story was going to unfold that evening. The storm did not surprise him. In fact, He was so much at peace with what was about to happen, He curled up in the front of the boat and fell asleep. Faith sometimes calls us to rest.
Despite His promise that they would “get to the other side,” the disciples gave into fear. Fear led them to doubt Jesus. As they frantically tried to save themselves by their own skills, they question Him, “Don’t You care if we drown?”
The real question wasn’t if Jesus cared. The real question was, did they TRUST HIM? If they truly knew Jesus was the promised Messiah, did they trust He had the ability and the desire to save them? Did they really think the Messiah would die in a storm in the middle of the Sea of Galilee?
When Jesus awoke and calmed the storm, they were even more afraid, wondering, “Who is this? Even the wind and the waves obey Him?”
Jesus was (and still is) the God incarnate, of whom Psalm 89 says: “Who is like you, Lord God Almighty? You, Lord, are mighty, and your faithfulness surrounds you. You rule over the surging sea; when its waves mount up, you still them.”
After having spent a whole day listening to Jesus teach the multitude using parables, He then used this storm on the Sea of Galilee as a physical parable of sorts. Jesus is the Almighty Lord, who is Faithful One and worthy of ALL our trust, even when it seems He is sleeping.
PRAYER
Use the words from Mark 9: 24 and 2 Timothy 1:18 as your heartfelt prayer to the Lord today:
“I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!”
"I know the One in whom I’ve placed my trust. I’m convinced that God is powerful enough to protect what He has placed in my trust until that day."
