One of my most favorite things to do is to build sand castles, massive wandering piles of dripping sand, with spiring minarets, flying buttress and gravity defying arches. I wear a big floppy hat and a long sleeve shirt. I’m an embarrassment to my children.
I like to build the castles close to the water so that when the tide turns and comes up, the whole occasion washes away. I often sit and watch it collapse and dissolve. Sometimes I try to fight the tide, and I keep repairing it just to see how long I can keep it standing.
So much of life is like trying to build a sandcastle at high tide; things tend to fall apart faster than we can put them together. For a time we can withstand the tide and keep things together, but the tide always catches up with us eventually, and we can no longer hold things together. The wind and the waves, the relentless storms of life eventually sink all our boats.
The other thing I like to do at the beach is to body surf, to ride the waves into shore.
The great thing about SC beaches is that our waves are small and we don’t have to go out very deep. But sometimes the waves are far out, and I have to go into deeper water, and I am always scared of what lurks unseen beneath the waves. All those shark attacks that the media delights in terrifying us with every summer are burned into my mind, always there, rarely forgotten.
Both the eroding tide and the danger hidden in the depths carry hidden meaning, the meaning that life is not sustainable, we are all worn down eventually. Something gets us in the end.
Water. To the ancient Hebrews water typified the power of chaos at work in the world, the power always at work making things fall apart, wear out, and fly off in every direction. The power that wants the world to dissolve, that devours and destroys everything it gets a hold of, like a prowling lion wander to and fro.
Storms were evidence of this disordering power escaping into the world, so were disease, floods, famine, the demonic, death and war. Anger and violence are that beast striving to break out and destroy us.
The saying, “that all hell broke loose” comes from this understanding of destroying chaos bursting into the world. Once it gets loose it is very hard to stop, and human society, human life and the whole ecosystem are washed away in its tide. Only the creative power of God can stop the disordering destruction. Only the miracle of God’s creative speech can then re-speak the words of creation, speaking existence back into being.
The psalm today speaks of God being the one who calms the storms of chaos, “he stills the storm to a whisper and quieted the waves of the sea.”
And we hear Jesus rebuking the wind and he says to the sea, “Peace! Be still!”
When Jesus calms the storm this entire ancient drama of devouring chaos, of storm and wind and waves dissolving creation itself is played out before us and before the disciples.
When the disciples behold the calm waters and the one who spoke creation back from the brink of dissolution, they know exactly what is going on.
When the disciples say, “Who then is this, that even the wind and sea obey him?” they know exactly who it is. Who indeed!
Only one can speak creation out of the chaos, only one has the creating word that brings life back from the dissolving forces of destruction. Only one.
And that one is in the boat.
The storms of hell are ravishing existence. The world is falling apart and Jesus goes into the storm and speaks the words that exorcise the chaos out of the world.
Peace. Be still.
Jesus is the one who is bringing peace, who is speaking creation back from the brink of dissolution.
Who indeed.
Can he calm our storms?
Can he bring peace?
Can he speak the word that would restore our life?
Who indeed!
God is calming the waters.
God can be trusted to bring us through the storm.
That is the gospel, God can be trusted.
And Jesus is that word of God speaking life out from the grave.
Peace! Be still!
The tide has been turned back.
May we carry that creative word with us, may we be that peace that stills the destruction.