Who is on your boat? (John 6:15-21) 280207
Last year, the Boys’ and Girls’ Brigades officers and volunteers had a retreat and we went to ice-skate. It was a wonderful experience for many of us, though many of us have problem balancing ourselves and kept falling, but the fellowship of us doing things together was fun and memorable. But little did we know that this ministry was constantly at risk. We had shortage of volunteers for past few years, it was unimaginable when the Chaplin of GB was on sabbatical for half a year, and I was still studying full-time with various other ministries responsibilities, I was reluctunt to lead the ministry where there was only three officers left. On the other hand, the principal of the school was not in favour for us to continue to run this ministry in the school. Our enrolment for new children had not been strong and we do not have strong finance resource backing up the ministry. We have low morale and low resource, it was as if I was heading toward the rock. To make thing worse, I always have the perception that I am not gifted with children.
But one year has gone by, God has provided us with nine officers and volunteers today, God has given us a huge sum of money to fund our activities last year, God has seen to it that the BB company got its bronze award so that the school is willing to allow the ministry to continue, and most importantly, this year we have about 50 childrens in this ministry whereby the school population is only about 800. Today, I see the hope of this ministry, but not at the beginning of last year. There is one lesson I have learnt: Do not be afraid, know that Jesus is in the midst of the storm with us.
Jesus did not want to be king (v15), but He only want to be THE KING of our life, so that we can trust Him to rule us. It was strange that the disciples actually left without Jesus (v17). Sometime when we start our journey of faith without the object of faith, Jesus! Sometime, we do our ministry the way we think we know best, without Jesus. Sometime, we manage our relationship and marriage in the way we think it is alright, without Jesus. Sometime, we study and work in the way the world demands from us, without Jesus.
In the situation where Jesus is not with us, and storm arise (v18), we panic or use our mere human wisdom and strength. I believe that many of Jesus’ disciples who were fishermen, they know how to navigate through the storm, they can do it without Jesus. But when Jesus approached them on the water, they were afraid (v19). What were they frightened of? They knew how to deal with stormy situation, why were they afraid of it? They knew Jesus, why were they frigthened of Jesus? It was even more strange when I read that, ‘They were willing therefore to receive Him into the boat,’ (v21). Did the author meant that they were actually not willing at first to recieve Jesus? Why were they not willing? Maybe they thought that Jesus was a ghost. This was a common interpretation with the support of other parallel passages. But maybe John was suggesting that they were not willing because they wanted to hold on to their ‘expertise’ to control the boat, and when they were not sure what Jesus would do with them.
Isn’t life similar? Are you willing to let Jesus into your ‘boat’ in the midst of storm? Or are you going to be in fear and stress on your own and refuse to recieve Him even you see Him coming to you? Do you think that you can really manage the storm of life without Jesus?
Do you know that the miracle here is not only about Jesus walking on the water and He causing storm to stop? He actually ‘teleport’ the entire boat to the land where they should be going (v21b). It was an immediate thing! The fact is that Jesus know where we should be going to, and will bring us there, if we allow and welcome Him into our ‘boat’.
