The Sea of Galilee, October 2019

Tuesday in the Thirteenth Week of Ordinary Time, June 28, 2022

Matthew 8, 23-27

As Jesus got into a boat, his disciples followed him. Suddenly a violent storm came up on the sea, so that the boat was being swamped by waves; but he was asleep. They came and woke him, saying, “Lord, save us! We are perishing!” He said to them, “Why are you terrified, O you of little faith?” Then he got up, rebuked the winds and the sea, and there was great calm. The men were amazed and said, “What sort of man is this, whom even the winds and the sea obey?”

The Apostles had seen the Lord heal many people and expel demons from many others, and as much as these miracles had awed them, they had heard of miracles like these performed by the long ago Prophets.  But this sign of the Lord’s power over nature “amazed” them, or, “struck them with wonder”.  When they saw the Lord healing the paralyzed or the blind, they had the role of dispassionate witnesses.  But here they themselves were at the point of violent death in the sea, and the Lord saved them with hardly any effort on his part.

I have managed to paste at the top of this page a photograph I took two years ago when a priest friend and I visited the Holy Land.  It is of the Sea of Galilee as seen from its western edge.  I took other pictures of the Sea, but this one best shows something of its size.  In the top right of the picture is a tiny white dot which is the sail of a boat we watched.  It is a very big fresh-water lake, indeed a “sea”.  St. Matthew does not record that Jesus told the Apostles to head for any particular destination, although he must have done so.  It is possible that he told them to head south along the western coast for another Galilean town and that the storm that raged up against the boat threw them off course so that they landed in the “country of the Gerasens” about fifteen miles, ten on the water, from Capernaum, from which they had started out.  Clinging to the shore at night would have made more sense to these fishermen than attempting to cross the length of the Sea in the dark.  Without warning, “a violent storm” came upon them.  The Greek word translated in this way is seismos, from which we get the English “seismic”, and it has as its primary meaning “earthquake”.  It is modified by the adjective megas, meaning “large” or “great”.  Matthew uses these words so that we do not labor under any misapprehensions.  The storm was of unprecedented suddenness and fury.  Matthew, reflecting afterwards in safety on dry land, perhaps remembered these verses from the Psalm: “[God] said the word, and there arose a storm of wind: and the waves thereof were lifted up. They mount up to the heavens, and they go down to the depths: their soul pined away with terror. They were troubled, and reeled like a drunken man; and all their wisdom was swallowed up.”And then this verse: “And they cried to the Lord in their affliction: and he brought them out of their distresses” (Psalm 107, 25–28).  

“The boat was being swamped by waves; but he was asleep.”  We note the contrast.  The boat, tossed about by the waves like a toy, the Apostles bailing for their lives and in danger of being blown overboard even if their vessel did not capsize, and the Lord, stretched out and sound asleep.  When awakened by his panic-stricken followers, he rebuked them for having little faith.  Then he rebuked the sea and the wind and the storm utterly vanished.  The Lord sleeps at this time in order to show the Apostles and us that if he watches over them while he is asleep, despite their worst fears, how much more when he is “awake”.  That is, when we are beset by life-threatening disaster and persecution, and it seems that the Lord is not aware or does not care, he is indeed preserving us, and how powerful he shows himself to be when he dispels our troubles, when he seems to “wake up”.

Another Psalm helps us to understand what he does for us.  It is also a prayer we can pray in our emergencies: “Our God is our refuge and strength: a helper in troubles, which have found us exceedingly. Therefore we will not fear, when the earth shall be troubled; and the mountains shall be removed into the heart of the sea. Their waters roared and were troubled: the mountains were troubled with his strength. The stream of the river makes the city of God joyful: the Most High has sanctified his own dwelling. God is in the midst thereof, it shall not be moved: God will help it in the morning early. Nations were troubled, and kingdoms were bowed down: he uttered his voice, the earth trembled. The Lord of armies is with us: the God of Jacob is our protector. Come and behold ye the works of the Lord: what wonders he has done upon earth, making wars to cease even to the end of the earth. He shall destroy the bow, and break the weapons: and the shield he shall burn in the fire: ‘Be still and see that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations, and I will be exalted in the earth.’  The Lord of armies is with us: the God of Jacob is our protector” (Psalm 46).