The Progression of our Salvation

In today’s Gospel, Mark 4: 35-41, we are presented with the story of Jesus’  disciples detaching from the crowd by crossing to the other side of the lake.  It is evening and they take Jesus with them.  Shortly after getting into the boat, ”a violent squall came up and waves were breaking over the boat so that it was already filling up.”  Jesus, in the meantime, fell asleep in the stern, probably dead tired from a very long day in ministry.  The disciples are frantic as the boat fills up with water and wake Jesus, saying: “Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?” Jesus wakes up, rebukes the wind and says to the sea, “Quiet! Be still.” And the wind and the sea obey Jesus’ command and cease their stormy terror!  “Where is your faith,” Jesus asks the disciples. “Why are you terrified?”

We may be entering one of the stormiest times of U.S. history. And Jesus asks us the same question: ´”Where is your faith?” “Why are you terrified?”   Those are the questions  you and I are faced with in the storms of life-- our personal life, the life of our families, our ecclesial life, the political life of our country, the threats from other countries or the actions we take as a nation that could lead to violence toward us from other countries or to other countries abandoning us, as we “vow” to isolate ourselves from our neighbors around the world.

Jesus, and Jesus alone, is our Savior. He is aware of the times we are treading water, when “violent squalls” come up and waves are breaking over the “boat” of our lives. Jesus/God is the same yesterday, today and tomorrow.  What God has done to bring the Chosen People to the Promised Land and what Jesus had done to save the disciples in the boat and us through His death on Calvary is what God will do for us in 2017 and beyond! What is happening, I believe, is not about any political figure or world leader anymore than it was about politics in Jesus’ earthly life. It is about God working out our salvation in Christ Jesus!