St. John Studies

My wife does not tell many stories about herself. She is a quiet person, who does not like drawing attention to herself.

Her father made a mistake many years ago. He told me a story that I would like to tell now, a story of her relationship to the Bible as a young kid.  His mistake was telling me.

One day she went to the family Bible in her living room. It happened to be on the coffee table.  She was surrounded by several adults at that moment; one of those adults was her Dad.  She opened the Bible and being a young child, she could see the words in the Book but she could not read them.  Her reading comprehension was not adequate at that young age.

Her father told me what happened next and to this very day I think it is so cute. I can imagine her doing this.   She looked up at everyone and pronounced the family Bible as “God’s Word.”  She paused for several seconds.   Then she closed the Bible and shook her head and said “God’s Word.  I can’t read God’s Word.”

There are many in this world who do not believe like my wife. They can read but they don’t. They doubt that the Bible is God’s Word.

What do we say in response to the unbeliever or doubter who says “Prove to me that the Bible is more than an ordinary book.  Prove to me that the Bible is the Word of God.”

You can cite the following Scripture 2 Timothy 3:16 “All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness,  that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work.”

What does that mean? Sounds to me like it is saying that the Bible is the inspired Word of God.

Will that be enough for the unbeliever? Probably not.

They may ask what does inspired mean? Well before we get into this too much and this post doubles and triples in size, “God inspired” means that God is the originator of the Bible but used man to write the Book.  God did not have a computer keyboard like me, writing directly to a screen and then working the text over until getting what He wants; then emailing an attachment to Moses, or some prophet like Jeremiah and they expressed His ideas.

The Old Testament tells the story. God spoke directly to people in the Old Testament.  There are numerous examples. I am reading the Old Testament now and in the book of Joshua, The Lord spoke to Joshua repeatedly, telling him how to take possession of the Promised Land, how to conquer Jericho and how to maintain the covenant between God and the Israelite Peoples.  God gave Joshua direct orders.

Sometimes the people who were directly addressed by God did what God wanted. Sometimes they did not.  The Old Testament is clear in so many places.  If you do what God wants, you will be blessed.  I you do not do what God wants, you will be punished.

What about Jesus? How did He feel about The Bible?  Jesus said in John 10: 35 “The Scripture cannot be broken”, in Matthew 15:3 He states the Scripture is “the commandment of God.”  In Mark 7:13 He refers to Scripture as “the Word of God.”  In Matthew 5:18 He says “Until Heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass away from the law, until all is accomplished.”

Certainly Jesus believed that Scripture was the Word of His Father.

Lastly, the Old Testament has connection to the New Testament and the New Testament writers obviously connect their works to the Old. Jesus’ birth seems to be referred to in Isaiah 7:14: “Therefore the Lord Himself will give you a sign: The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel.” Isaiah 9:6: “For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on His shoulders. And He will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.” Micah 5:2: “But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, though you are small among the clans of Judah, out of you will come for me one who will be ruler over Israel, whose origins are from of old, from ancient times.”  Is all this coincidental?  I don’t think so.

Paul writes in Galatians 3:8 “Scripture foresaw that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, and announced the gospel in advance to Abraham: ‘All nations will be blessed through you.’”   The writer of Acts speaks as if God is in the New Testament Scriptures in verses 24 and 25:  “And when they heard this, they lifted their voices to God with one accord and said, “O Lord, it is You who made the heaven and the earth and sea, and all that is in them, who by the Holy Spirit, through the mouth of our father David Your servant, said, why did the Gentiles rage, and the people devise futile things?”

This post is just the intro. There is so much more to discuss.

When an unbeliever expresses doubt about the inspired Word of God, we have to defend this Book, not an ordinary Book by any means.

What will you do when the unbeliever casts doubt on the Bible?

Will you defend it or sadly admit “I can’t defend God’s Word.”

It is a special Book, our Book, it is God’s Word.

Human beings are funny aren’t we?

What does it take for us to believe?

For the unbeliever it takes a lot I guess.

Let me give you an example I used to use with my teaching in speech class. A key element in persuasive speaking is reasoning.  For us to believe, someone needs to reason with us.  For us to be persuaded, someone one needs to reason with us.

One of the most common ways for a person to be persuaded is to throw facts at them. Fact after fact after fact after fact can be delivered to the skeptic until they finally say “Ok, I believe.”  That is called making an inductive leap.

I get in the car to go to work and I am not sure about the time. I am supposed to be at work at 9:00 A.M.  I am not sure if I am going to make it on time or not.  I turn on the car and see on the car clock it is 8:56.  Oh Oh! I am going to be late.  Maybe not, the car clock is notorious about being inaccurate.  Then I pass Hucks on the road to work and I see they have a big digital clock in the window that says 8:57.  Oh Oh!  Maybe I am going to be late.  Then as I travel down the road, I go by a fast food restaurant and I see their big clock on the wall and it says 8:58.

I believe I am going to be late…I make an inductive leap.

How many pieces of evidence did it take for me to believe…three.

How many pieces of evidence does it take for an unbeliever to become a believer that Christ rose from the dead?

From the day of the Resurrection to the Ascension [a forty day period] Jesus appeared to Mary Magdalene in Mark 16:9 and in John 20:14, to the women returning from the tomb in Matthew 28:9,10, to Peter later in the day in Luke 24:34 and 1 Corinthians 15:5, to the Emmaus Disciples in Luke 24:13-33…. Are you beginning to believe?

I could go on to recount the dialogue Jesus had with the “show me” Disciple Thomas when Thomas had to touch Jesus’ hands. I could go on with the Luke 24 appearance when Jesus not only appeared but took fish from the Disciples and ate it.

How many appearances does it take for you to believe?

Some may say these are hallucinations?

Really?

I don’t know about you but most of the hallucinations I have heard about have occurred in situations where a person saw the hallucination alone. Maybe they are distraught, maybe they are lacking nutrition, maybe they are under the influence of some substance or maybe they are mentally unstable but the idea of hallucination is “a sensory experience of something that does not exist outside the mind.” [from Dictionary.com].  In First Corinthians 15, Jesus appears to five hundred people.  Have you ever heard of five hundred people hallucinating the same image all at the same time?

I haven’t.

To say that hallucinations produced the appearances of Jesus is to ignore the evidence.

Something changed the group of frightened Disciples into men who were not afraid to speak out with courage and conviction. They did more than that; they became men who suffered for the message that they were inspired to deliver.  They became men who gave of their lives; being stoned, crucified, burned and clubbed to death.

They changed the world.

They believed.

They all made an inductive leap.

I don’t think their inductive leap was based on hallucinations.

I think it was based on facts.

Next week’s posts will deal with the following doubt:

Is the Bible God’s Word?

I guess I am lucky. I don’t remember ever swooning.  I have been knocked unconscious sliding into home plate at a baseball game but that is the closest I have come to “swooning.”

Doubters of Jesus Christ and His resurrection have put forth the swoon theory to explain their reluctance to accept the idea that Jesus rose from the dead. Here is the way it goes:

“Christ was indeed nailed to the cross. He suffered terribly from shock, loss of blood, and pain, and He swooned away; but He didn’t actually die.  Medical knowledge was not very great at that time, and the apostles thought He was dead…. He was taken down from the cross in a state of swoon by those who believed Him to be dead and laid in the sepulcher.  And the cool restfulness of the sepulcher so far revived Him that He was able to issue forth from the grave.  His ignorant disciples couldn’t believe that this was a mere resuscitation.  They insisted it was a resurrection from the dead” [J.N.D. Anderson].

Let’s examine this theory and try to debunk it. It basically claims that Jesus survived the exhaustion, pain and loss of blood to live.

First of all, He had to live three days without food and water and then be strong enough to escape the tomb. After the scourging that Jesus took and the abuse of carrying His cross to Golgotha and being in the elements with no food and water, He went for 72 hours in a tomb and then emerged under His own power.  That’s hard to believe.  It also counteracts the findings of Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus and the Roman soldiers at the crucifixion who thought He was dead when He was removed from the cross.  His side was pierced by a lance and His corpse made no motion.  From the wound, a mixture of blood and water flowed which revealed the state of decomposition of His vital organs.

Secondly, He was removed from the cross and wound in grave clothes. In preparing a body for burial, it was washed and straightened and bandaged tightly from the armpits to the ankles in strips of linen about a foot wide.  Spices were placed between the wrappings or folds which served as aroma and also as cement to glue the wrappings into a solid covering.  For a “swooned” man to get out of grave wrapping would be a miracle, much less a man who has suffered as much as Jesus.  Then of course a weakened Jesus who had swooned pushed aside a stone at the entrance of His tomb.  Historians say that it would take several men to move a stone like that.

Thirdly, there were Romans guard outside the tomb. How did Jesus get past them?  Roman soldiers were highly disciplined and they did not take guard duty lightly.  They were not weak as Jesus was and yet we are supposed to believe that somehow Jesus overpowered them and got away.  It seems implausible.

Fourthly, Jesus took off on foot. This part of the theory also seems unlikely.  The village of Emmaus was about seven miles from Jerusalem.  That was no small walk for a weak man; it was an impossible walk for a man who had His feet pierced with spikes.

Say all this did happen. What did Jesus do after He made His appearances and stirred up a frenzy about His resurrection?

He disappeared.

William Milligan in his book The Resurrection of Our Lord states that “He must have retired to some solitary retreat…while His Church was rising around Him, shaking the old Word to the foundations…. [While all this was going on] He was absent from it, and spending the remainder of His days, whether few or many, in what we can describe as no other term than ignoble solitude.  And then at last He must have died—no one can say where or when or how!”

When I “swooned” I remember sliding up under a big guy named Bobby Buckalew. Being a catcher I was told his leg protector came down and hit me right in the eye. Bobby’s weight was right on my head. I woke up after some time in my Dad and Mom’s car, a bit woozy but alive and able to carry on with life.

When Jesus “swooned” He was able to overcome the horrible injuries inflicted on His body like they did not even exist. The swoon theorists gave Him superhuman powers to do what He did [in their scenario].  As for me, I was very sore and bruised.

As for Jesus, He rose from the dead.

Swooning and recovering was just not possible.

The women who went to tend to the body of Jesus after seventy-two hours were so distraught and overcome with grief that they got confused in the dim early morning hours and went to the wrong tomb—a tomb that was empty. Of course Jesus was not in it!  When they saw it was empty, they jumped to the conclusion that He was resurrected, when in reality He was not.

Wow, this is the third theory of why Jesus was not resurrected.

Dr. Kirsopp Lake wrote a book on this theory, Historical Evidence for the Resurrection of Jesus Christ.  In it, he details why he doubts Christs’ resurrection.  The neighborhood that Jesus was buried in was full of tombs and one could easily get confused.  It was very doubtful that they were close to the burial ceremony and since they were so far away this could have led to them getting confused about returning.  The fog of the early morning hours [literal and mental] could have caused them to get confused.  The upshot?  Dr. Lake is a doubter at best and an unbeliever at worst.

How as Christians do we reply?

First of all, how confused would you think people could get in just seventy-two hours, especially confusion about something as important as this? Also, these were not just any women.  They were Mary Magdalene and Mary the Mother of James and another woman named Salome.  Mary was a faithful follower of Jesus and she witnessed His crucifixion, death and burial.  Mary the Mother of James was the mother of the Disciple James.  Salome was likely another follower but less is known about her.   It would be unlikely that they would have made this mistake.

Peter and John were the first Disciples who heard their report of the empty tomb and they went to the location and they saw the empty tomb also. Would they be confused later in the day and would they also go to the wrong tomb?

In Matthew 28:6 we read that an Angel rolled back the stone from the tomb, an angel in clothing white as snow. The Angel spoke to the women “Do not be afraid, for I know that you are looking for Jesus, who was crucified.  He is not here; He has risen, just as He said.  Come and see the place where He lay.”  Dr. Lake assumes that the Angel is wrong and prefers to explain that the Angel is a “young man” [Mark 16:5].   The young man is a gardener and is telling the women incorrect information.  I enjoy working in my yard but I rarely go out in the yard in the wee hours of the morning.  It is hard to see in dark or near dark conditions.

The Sanhedrin could have taken the body before the women got there and that could have caused the tomb to be empty but would these Jewish leaders have hidden Jesus’ body. As mentioned in yesterday’s post, they would have displayed it to hurt the ministry of Jesus.

If anyone could have confirmed the empty tomb it would be Joseph of Arimathea who gave the tomb for the burial of Jesus. He owned it and the tomb was close to his home; it was described as “a man-made cave hewn from rock in a garden of his house nearby” [Wikipedia, Joseph of Arimathea].  Paul Little states surely Joseph “owner of the tomb, would have solved the problem” [of the tomb’s location].

Lastly, the women are called into question, that they were so blinded by remorse that they were unable to find the tomb. First of all seventy-two hours had passed and they were about doing the business of completing the anointing of their Lord’s body.   Jesus died so close to the Sabbath that His body had to be interred so devout Jews could observe the day of rest.  John Stott feels that instead of blinded by remorse, they were probably “devoted and business-like”, quite a contrast from Dr. Lakes’ description.

The theory of the distraught women in my opinion is hardly credible, but people who are dedicated to attacking Christian belief will try anything, even writing a two hundred seventy-nine page book.

For me and maybe for you, these words are enough: “When they entered the tomb, they saw a young man clothed in a white robe sitting on the right side. The women were shocked, but the angel said, “Don’t be alarmed. You are looking for Jesus of Nazareth,[a] who was crucified. He isn’t here! He is risen from the dead! Look, this is where they laid His body” [Mark 16: 5-6].

The earliest and most popular way to attack the idea of Jesus’ Resurrection was to say the Disciples removed His body from the tomb.

The second most popular theory is the idea that the Jewish religious leaders or the Romans removed the body.

Like any crime, you look for motive. Like any crime, you look for fact.

Yesterday, the fact of Matthew 28: 11-15 was presented, the fact that the Jewish religious leaders paid the Roman guard money to say that the Disciples stole the body. However, there is no mention in the Bible that anyone even responded to that story.  No one even bothered to refute it.

But today, we look at two other theories that can be the basis of doubt in the unbeliever.

The Jewish Religious Leaders Stole Jesus’ Body

Let’s examine what the benefit would be to these “status quo” people, people who were on the top of the religious hierarchy in Jesus’ time. These people wanted Jesus out of the way because He questioned their practices.  But would they steal His body from the tomb?

First of all, what would these people do with Jesus’ body? Would they dispose of it, not telling anyone of it?  I think not.  What I think these leaders would do is parade it for the public to see.  What would the effect be?  Of course, the whole resurrection idea would be debunked and the Christians would have no information to spread among the people about Jesus who came to show us a better way.  He is gone but to a better place, a place where we can go if we follow His way.

This is not a message that they wanted spread in the community.

J.N.D. Andersons observes “Within seven short weeks, [after Christ’s resurrection]—if the records are to be believed at all, and I cannot see any possible reason for Christian writers to have invented that difficult gap of seven weeks—within seven short weeks Jerusalem was seething with the preaching of the Resurrection. The apostles were preaching it up and down the city.  The chief priests were very much upset about it.  They said that the apostles were trying to bring this man’s blood upon them.  They were being accused of having crucified the Lord of Glory.  And they were prepared to go to almost any lengths to nip this dangerous heresy in the bud.”

Like pay off Roman guards to lie.

Like parade Jesus’ body in the streets [if only they had it].

The Romans Stole Jesus’ Body

The Romans in Jesus’ day had a different agenda at the time of the Resurrection. Of course they were reluctant torturers and executioners but Governor Pilate wanted control over the province of Caesarea and spent a lot of time in Jerusalem.  This is where the greatest unrest was.  Pilate wanted peace.  A lack of peace in his province spoke poorly of his ability to govern.

Again, J.N.D. Anderson explains the possible motive for Pilate: “He…was upset about the strange teaching [of Jesus].  If he had the body moved, it seems incredible that he would not have informed the chief priests when they were so upset.”

Pilate would have accomplished several things by producing the body: he would have reestablished the authority of the chief priests, he would have debunked the radical teachings of Jesus and the end result would have probably been peace.

People will believe what they want to believe. They may try to tell you that the Romans stole Jesus’ body but they may not be able to tell you why the Romans guarded a tomb they were going to loot.

People will believe what they want to believe.   They may try to explain that the chief priests stole Jesus’ body but there was no body mentioned and they definitely would have “mentioned” that they had Jesus’ body.

People will believe what they want to believe. They may explain that the Romans stole Jesus’ body but why?  Again to steal a body and then not display a body makes no sense.

“The simple faith of the Christian who believes in the Resurrection is nothing compared to the credulity of the sceptic who will accept the wildest and most implausible romances rather than admit the plain witness of historical certainties” [G. Hanson].

Some folks like reality crime shows on television, you know “48 Hours” or “Dateline”. My wife Susan is one of those people.  She can watch episode after episode of those shows devoted to a criminal event [usually a murder] and the accusation and trial of the alleged perpetrator.  The whole show is the solving of the crime and the passing of judgement by a jury.  At the end, there is always a question—did they send the right person to prison?

You never know.

I tell you this to lead-in to the topic of the day; what caused Jesus’ tomb to be empty after He died and was put in it?

With people who doubt Christ, this is a basic sticking point and many espouse the theory that His Disciples simply stole His body.

Let’s examine the evidence, just like those reporters on 48 Hours or Dateline and ask ourselves would Jesus’ Disciples really steal His body?

First of all, one has to account for how the Disciples could actually accomplish this task. The stone according to some, would weigh around one to two thousand pounds, making the rolling difficult.  It could be done with a couple of men but the problem the Disciples had was how could they roll it without making sound?

The tomb was guarded by Roman soldiers and they would have heard the effort. The Roman soldier was dedicated and not likely to be bribed by the Disciples who would have a motive to remove the body.  Also they probably did not have the money to “buy” them off anyway.  Along with that, the Disciples were not physically powerful enough to face a detachment of soldiers, overpower them and take the body.

Who had the money?

In Matthew 28: 11- 15 the Bible records this idea of bribery: “While the women were on their way, some of the guards went into the city and reported to the chief priests everything that had happened. When the chief priests had met with the elders and devised a plan, they gave the soldiers a large sum of money, telling them, ‘You are to say, His Disciples came during the night and stole Him away while we were asleep. If this report gets to the governor, we will satisfy him and keep you out of trouble.’  So the soldiers took the money and did as they were instructed. And this story has been widely circulated among the Jews to this very day.”  Obviously it benefitted the Jewish status quo to have a stolen body and they could afford to have the Roman soldiers alter their story that something mysterious happened—Jesus arose from the dead.

Some posit that the soldiers could have fallen asleep and the sound did not disturb their sleep. Again, dedicated Roman soldiers don’t fall asleep on guard duty.  It meant certain death by their superior officers.

Let’s look at another piece of evidence. Let’s examine the grave clothes that were left where Jesus’ body was.  Gregory of Nyssa, writing over fifteen hundred years ago, described the tomb:  “The disposition of the clothes in the sepulcher, the napkin that was about our Savior’s head, not lying with the linen clothes, but wrapped together in a place by itself, did not bespeak the terror and hurry of thieves, and therefore refutes the story of the body being stolen.”  Orderliness is inconsistent with snatching bodies from graves.  Looters and vandalizers are not tidy.  Roman soldiers taking the body would not have been that tidy.  Even Disciples taking Jesus’ body would not have been that tidy; they would be in a hurry to get away.

Some point to the fact that the Disciples would really benefit from lying about this special event. However, many of the Disciples did not realize that Jesus was to rise on the third day and they were surprised that He had.  Mentally would they have been prepared to fabricate such a history-making lie?   These were men of high character and not likely to fabricate a tale anyway.  Following the resurrection, their behaviors support the idea that they believed.  They spent the rest of their lives proclaiming the message of the resurrection.  I find it hard to believe that liars would face arrest, imprisonment, beating and horrible death and not recant their lie.

Theologian John Stott states “the theory that the Disciples stole Christ’s body simply does not ring true. It is so unlikely as to be virtually impossible.  If anything is clear, from the Gospels and the Acts, it is that the Apostles were sincere.  They may have been deceived, if you like, but they were not deceivers.  Hypocrites and martyrs are not made of the same stuff.”

Ok folks, we have an empty tomb.

How did it get empty?

You solve the mystery.

For me the Disciples did not steal the body, the Roman soldiers did not steal the body, grave robbers did not steal the body.

The chief priests tried to make everyone think the Disciples stole the body but that was pure bribery on their part. We know they didn’t.

Is there a perpetrator?

You know the answer to that question.

No murder, no theft…

Resurrection

Josh McDowell begins his chapter on the resurrection the following way: “After more than seven hundred hours of studying this subject and thoroughly investigating its foundation, I have come to the conclusion that the resurrection of Jesus Christ is one of the most wicked, vicious, heartless hoaxes ever foisted on the minds of men, Or it is the most fantastic fact of history” [New Evidence that Demands a Verdict].

Paul Little thinks the “supreme” credential to authenticate Jesus’ credentials for Deity is His resurrection from the dead.

In short, the resurrection is a foundation of Christianity.

Little devotes a chapter to this question alone.

Early church leaders like Paul said “If Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith” [1 Corinthians 15:14]. Attacks on the church have been centered on the resurrection because it is such an important matter, the most important matter in the life of Christ.

Of the four major religions, only Christianity has an empty tomb for its founder.

Abraham, the father of Judaism, died about 1900 BC but no resurrection was claimed for him.

Buddha never has resurrection attached to his divinity. When he died, it was a passing away with nothing remaining behind.

Mohammed died on June 8, 632 AD at the age of sixty-one and his tomb is visited annually by thousands of devout Muslims.

Yet our Christ went into the tomb as a dead man and came out alive.

I am not an expert on any religion but I have studied the ways of Buddha a little and the main message of Buddha is “follow this leader and do your best” and from what little I have read about Judaism and Islam, the message is similar. For Christianity the message is “follow this leader and if you become a true follower, you will be resurrected.”

What a difference.

In previous posts, I have commented and used others to comment on the many miracles of Jesus but this miracle is special.

Jesus predicted it and it came about just as He predicted.

In Mark

Mark 8: 31

“He then began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the law, and that He must be killed and after three days rise again.”

In Matthew

Matthew 20: 17-19

“Now Jesus was going up to Jerusalem. On the way, He took the Twelve aside and said to them, ‘We are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be delivered over to the chief priests and the teachers of the law. They will condemn Him to death and will hand Him over to the Gentiles to be mocked and flogged and crucified. On the third day He will be raised to life!’”

Mark again

Mark 10: 32-34

“They were on their way up to Jerusalem, with Jesus leading the way, and the disciples were astonished, while those who followed were afraid. Again He took the Twelve aside and told them what was going to happen to Him. ‘We are going up to Jerusalem,’ He said, ‘and the Son of Man will be delivered over to the chief priests and the teachers of the law. They will condemn Him to death and will hand Him over to the Gentiles, who will mock Him and spit on Him, flog Him and kill Him. Three days later He will rise.’”

Isaiah

Isaiah 53: 1-7

“Who has believed our message and to whom has the arm of the LORD been revealed? He grew up before him like a tender shoot, and like a root out of dry ground. He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to Him, nothing in His appearance that we should desire Him.  He was despised and rejected by mankind, a man of suffering, and familiar with pain. Like one from whom people hide their faces He was despised, and we held Him in low esteem.  Surely He took up our pain and bore our suffering, yet we considered Him punished by God, stricken by Him, and afflicted.  But He was pierced for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on Him, and by His wounds we are healed.  We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to our own way; and the LORD has laid on Him the iniquity of us all.  He was oppressed and afflicted, yet He did not open His mouth; He was led like a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before its shearers is silent, so He did not open His mouth.

For a man to predict his future treatment, death and resurrection is amazing and certainly the claim opens one to attack but to read the words of the Prophet Isaiah written around 792 to 740 BC and realize that they predicted the life, treatment, death and resurrection of Jesus is truly amazing and for me awe-inspiring.

I am not going to claim that religions with the message “follow this leader and do your best” are faulty and they are powerless. That would be folly on my part.  I am not qualified to make such a judgement.  But let me close this post with a quote from William Lane Craig, author of the book Reasonable Faith : Christian Truth and Apologetics:  “Without the belief in the resurrection the Christian faith could not have come into being.  The disciples would have remained crushed and defeated men.  Even had they continued to remember Jesus as their beloved teacher, His crucifixion would have forever silenced any hopes of His being the Messiah.  The cross would have remained the sad and shameful end of His career.  The origin of Christianity therefore hinges on the belief of the early disciples that God had called Jesus from the dead.”

“Follow Me and if you become a true follower, you will be resurrected.”

Paul Little thinks the unbeliever who is questioning that Christ is God will need a little reminder of Jesus’ ability to control nature.

In the Bible, Jesus was able to perform many miracles but no miracle is more impressive than His ability to calm the raging storm on the Sea of Galilee.

In Mark 4, the storm is described as “great” and the boat that Jesus and his Disciples were in was “shaking”. In Matthew 8: 24 it says the boat was in danger of being swamped.

Pastor Scott Harris describes the conditions that lead to such a storm: “Such storms were not unusual on the Sea of Galilee. It is a very large lake, some 13 miles long by 7 1/2 miles wide. It sits in a depression with mountains all around except at the extreme southern end where it drains out as the Jordan River. To the immediate north is Mt. Hermon rising to 9,200 feet. Air currents moving across the area would be forced over Mt. Hermon where they would cool, becoming denser, heavier. They would then crash through the warmer, lighter air that would be over the Sea. The cool air down, the warm air up, the winds created what would then bank off the sides of the hills surrounding the lake and begin a swirling motion. The word used in Mark and Luke to describe this storm means a whirlwind or a storm of furious gusts. These storms would come suddenly and whip the sea into a very dangerous tempest. Such was the storm in the middle of which the disciples found themselves.” [from Harris’ sermon “Storm at Sea”].

What is Jesus doing in the middle of this dramatic storm? He was asleep.  Here is a solid indication of His humanity because He has had a tiring day and He needs rest.  Here also is an indication of His faith in His Father because He is able to ignore these life-threatening conditions because He knows He is going to be all right.

His condition is not the same as the disciples. They think they are going to die.  They rush to Jesus and say things like “Don’t you care that we are perishing?” and “master, master we are perishing.”

They are at the end of their rope. They need His help.  They have seen Him cast out demons, feed masses of people with very little provisions and even heal the afflicted but now they ask Him to control nature.

They knew their way around the Sea of Galilee. They knew about these storms and they knew they were in real danger.  They were shocked in Jesus’ ability to sleep and they were shocked in His response to their cries.  “How frightened you are, you men of little faith.”

Jesus has complete faith in God.

The disciples knew the Psalms: Psalm 46: 1-3, that God is our refuge no matter if the mountains fall, the earth gives way or the sea surges. They know Psalm 107: 23-30 when God stirred up the waves and then calmed them.

But in this situation they had “skin in the game.” They were in the sea and it was threatening their lives and like most of us, they forgot the words of God and their faith has flown out the window.

Jesus awakens and rebukes them and then basically says “hush” to the waves and they instantly become calm.

For the Disciples this was a watershed moment. They had seen Jesus do miracles but not on this scale.  They say “What kind of a man is this, that even the winds and the sea obey Him?”

In Mark, Jesus calms the storm after walking on the water. The change is evident in the words about the Disciples “They were completely amazed, for they had not understood about the loaves; their hearts were hardened.  Now they see that Jesus is Divine.

Is His control of nature the deciding factor?

What kind of man has authority over nature to command it in the manner of Jesus so that even what we would call natural law is broken? Only a man who is in fact God, and that is who Jesus is.

Stop and think about this calming of the waters. Think about what this means as you use this incident to get an unbeliever to question their unbelief.

Who controls nature? God.

Why? Because He created nature.

Jesus controls nature.

Why? Because He is God.