What is the significance of Jesus calming the storm?

He rebukes the winds and the sea, 23, 27. His divine power over nature.

The Lord might have prevented the storm; He allowed it, and that for two reasons. The disciples had to learn what manner of MAN this was who was with them, and the second was that HE was the One to whom to turn in every difficulty. Doubtless their seamanship had often been tested in days gone by on that same lake, but here was evidently something out of the common. They saw nothing before them but disaster, and although the Lord was with them, and though they had witnessed His power so often before, yet they "were afraid." They had not yet learned to trust Him wholly. The Lord first reproves them for their fears, and then delivers them from their dangers. One has said, "He did not chide them for disturbing Him with their prayers, but for disturbing themselves with their fears."

It was for the moment a terrifying experience, but one which afterwards must have yielded them much encouragement. It served as an opportunity for Him to display His complete mastery of wind and sea, and of the power that lay behind them. At the moment the faith of the disciples was small. They were thinking of their own safety, and had as yet but little understanding of who He was. When later the Spirit was given, and they saw all things clearly, they must have marvelled at their own obtuseness, that they had so little grasped the majesty of His action. If only they had grasped it, their hearts would have been calmed, equally with the waters of the lake.

While crossing over the lake they experienced a storm — evidently one of unusual severity. In all the Gospel history we read of just two storms on that lake. On this occasion the Lord was with them. On the other (Matt. 14:25), the Lord walked on the water to join them. With them, then, but asleep on a pillow in the stern of the vessel, Mark tells us, and the disciples awoke Him, fearing they would perish, for the waves beat into the ship. Their exclamation, "Master, carest Thou not that we perish?" (4:33) intimates that the storm was not a common one. His words addressed to the raging elements, "Peace, be still" — for the knowledge of which, also, we are indebted to our Evangelist — show the perfect command He had over the elements. He spake and it was done. It was the voice of the Creator, and there was instant obedience. The wind ceased, and there was a great calm. It was not a gradual subsidence, but evidently an immediate calm. Astonishment seized all and they said one to another, "Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey Him?" (4:41).

Alas for the poor human heart! Mark, with his customary observance of details, tells us the disciples roughly awoke their Lord, crying, "Master, carest Thou not that we perish?" It is painful to transcribe the words; how cruelly they must have wounded the tender susceptibilities of the Saviour! "Carest Thou not." Had He not cared for the children of men, He would have remained in His own glory; the Bethlehem manger, the Galilean boat, and the cross of Calvary would never have been His lot. Yet, so gracious is He, no word of censure escaped His lips for the heartlessness of their speech; He merely said, "Why are ye fearful, O ye of little faith?" Well has it been said, "Never man spake like this Man. " But how painful to Him to find such feebleness of faith amongst the special objects of His favour after His experience of the splendid faith of the Gentile centurion!

His voice sufficed for the stilling of the elements. "Peace, be still." Long before this incarnation the Psalmist wrote of Him, "Thou rulest the raging of the sea: when the waves thereof arise, Thou stillest them" (Ps. 89:9). Not a single attribute of Deity did He lay aside on becoming man. Omnipotence and Omniscience shone forth in Him whenever occasion called for their display. Demons, disease, death, winds and waves all fled before His word. No human mind, however richly taught of God, can unravel the mystery of the union of the divine and the human natures in His Person. Reason has insoluble difficulties here; faith finds instead material for adoration and praise.

The miracle brought the disciples to His feet in wonder, not unmixed with dread. What manner of Man is this, that even the winds and the sea obey Him? The answer is simple and plain. He was God manifested in flesh, on His way to death for the eternal blessing of all who believe. But in His humiliation, as now in His glory, He had power to dispel every danger that could befall His people. Storms of various kinds may burst upon us during our passage through this world, but none can destroy us while Jesus lives. Our part is just to confide in Him.

How weak was their faith in Him personally! With the Son of God in the boat it was not possible that they would perish, yet they blame Him for not caring whether they perish, But in tender compassion He did not rebuke them first for their lack of faith, but rose and rebuked the wind, saying to the sea, "Peace, be still." The immediate result in producing a great calm would of course be astonishing to anyone. Then He asked them why they were so fearful. How could It be possible that they had not learned from His many previous miracles that He was superior to all circumstances?

We have, first, deliverance from the power of circumstances through identification with Him who is supreme over all. Thus for faith there is peace through whatever storms: although this does not mean that the hearts of disciples are always on the level of their privileges. Here on the sea of Galilee they were plainly not so. Jesus was with them, that they knew; but He was asleep, and the winds and waves seemed to have no regard for Him. In their fear they rouse Him, to find relief in His display of a power with which they had not credited Him, but to meet the sorrowful reproof on His part, "Where is your faith?" In truth our prayers in their very urgency often betray our unbelief, and would reproach the Lord on His side with a passivity which is but a sign of the confidence that He would fain repose in us as those who know His truth and steadfastness. "He that feareth is not perfected in love" — His love: he has not learned as yet the lesson of such entire trustworthiness as is to be found in Him.

He calms the storm; He calms their fears. A very present help in time of trouble is Jesus our Lord! True, their faith was weak, as we speak, for they might have calmly reposed in the midst of the storm, even as He was doing; but He responds to that appeal, which, after all, owned Him, and showed that He was their resource; and His divine glory is, so to speak, unveiled to them in answer to their cry, for "the winds and the sea obey Him."

(2) But while on the one hand we see the weariness of the Servant of Jehovah after the toils of the day, on the other we witness His instant readiness at a call for aid to serve yet more. And, again, we behold a further wonder: not only was the Servant of Jehovah in the boat, but Jehovah Himself was there. For He who spoke with such authority to the winds and the waves was indubitably God; and the One who spoke thus was He who slept and awaked at the cry of distress. This was indeed the God of Israel, for as the Psalmist said, none but Jehovah is "mightier than the noise of many waters, yea, than the mighty waves of the sea" (Ps. 93:4). It was a great revelation. And, no doubt, in after years, as the disciples recalled the thrilling experiences of this night, as they looked again in memory from the tossing billows to the face of the placid Sleeper, from the fury of the creature to the repose of the Creator, they recalled also the later words of the Lord: "That in me ye may have peace. In the world ye have tribulation; but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world" (John 16:33).

(3) Here also was the rare spectacle of the inanimate creature obeying the voice of its Creator (John 1:3). Such obedience is of course observable continually in the operation of what are known as the laws of nature, though these phenomena, by reason of their regular repetition from age to age, have diminished in wonder to the majority. But the sudden stilling of this storm was unmistakable evidence that there was a voice which was heard above the roar of the wind and the waves, and which was supreme in command. This divine Voice emanated from the lips of Jesus of Nazareth, and was audible to His terrified disciples.

It is blessed to see that, unreasoning as their unbelief was, they yet appeal to the Lord for succour. They had no one else to turn to, and they knew it. The burden of their cry, when they awaked Him, was, "Master, carest Thou not (is it no matter of concern to Thee) that we perish?" Had they known who that divine Person was who was with them in the boat, they might have slept as calmly as He; for how could they perish when they had with them in the boat the Son of God? If HE could perish, they also might, but not otherwise; for as He taught them in a later day, "Because I live, ye shall live also." Two things may be remarked in His response to their cry: first, He demonstrated His power over the wind and the sea, so that there was a great calm; and, secondly, He pointed out that fear and unbelief were the cause of all their agitation and terror. And it will be evident to the feeblest soul that as soon as we have learned that Christ has acquired power over death and Satan, through His work on the cross, our fears will cease. He thus said to John, when he fell at the Lord's feet as dead, "Fear not; I am the first and the last; I am He that liveth and was dead; and behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen; and have the keys of hell and of death." The disciples now feared in another manner, feared exceedingly, but it was in the presence of the divine power exhibited before their eyes; and even if they could not yet embrace the full truth of the Person of their Lord, they were yet impressed with the mystery which surrounded Him, for they said, "What manner of Man is this, that even the wind and the sea obey Him?"