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The Ship Of Church

June 22, 2024 Pastor: Rev. Dean Kavouras

stormChrist Lutheran Church
Cleveland, Ohio
June 23, 2024
by: Rev. Dean Kavouras

Pentecost 5
In The Boat

That day when evening had come He said to them, "Let us cross over to the other side." Then leaving the crowd behind, they took Him in the boat, just as He was, and there were other boats with him. Mark 4:35-36

The height and depth and width and breadth of the gospel is endless. We might study Scripture our whole life long, partake of holy liturgy for years on end, and sit under Christian teaching and preaching from the cradle to the grave. But the more we know about sacred scripture, the more there is to learn.

Take today’s gospel for example, and indeed all of the readings that the church assigns for us to hear this day. No, the pastor does not make them up on the fly. But these are the same readings you heard three years ago, and God willing will hear them again three years from now.

“Oh, he depth of the riches and
wisdom and knowledge of God!
How unsearchable are his judgments
and how inscrutable his ways!”
Romans 11:33

But getting back to today’s gospel let us consider this inspired sentence: “They took him in the boat, just as He was.” What does that mean?

In the first two verses of chapter four we find this surprising report from St. Mark, “Again he began to teach beside the sea. And a very large crowd gathered about him so that he got into a boat and sat in it on the sea, and the whole crowd was beside the sea on the land. And he was teaching them many things in parables.”

What can we learn from this?

First let’s say a word about water. There are two kinds of water, just like there are two kinds of fire: friendly and unfriendly. If you are in the desert, or dirty, or hot or thirsty water is your BFF.

But when, during Hurricane Katrina, the waters of the Gulf of Mexico transgressed their divinely appointed stopping point, “this far and no farther.” (Job 38:11) And when as a result the dykes broke in New Orleans, then the entire city of New Orleans was praying the same prayer the disciples prayed that day in the boat,

“Lord! Don’t you care that we are perishing?”

It’s the same prayer that we pray today: O Lord God, Maker of Heaven and earth why are you asleep when we are in the jaws of death? When our sins have caught up with us. When our health has collapsed, our calm has fled, and our hope gone missing – as the deadly waters are filling up our boat?

But rest assured! Be very sure Dear Ones, that Jesus was not going to let those disciples perish then – nor will he let you perish now!

Because even when God is “asleep” (though the Bible says: “He who keeps Israel neither slumbers nor sleeps. Ps. 121:4) he will still rescue you from sin, death and devil because as today’s Psalm says, and as we pray in every confessional service: “Our help is in the name of the LORD, who made heaven and earth!”

So what does it mean when St. Mark pens by inspiration, “They took Him in the boat, just as He was.”

In a word our gracious Lord Jesus Christ, the Eternal Word of God made flesh, speaks to us, teaches us and comes to us from “the water and the blood” (1 Jn 5:6) of his pierced side, poured out from the cross – and imparted to us in the Bridal bath of baptism which cleanses us of all unrighteousness, and transforms sinners into his “spotless Bride.” And again and again in the Blessed Sacrament of his Body and Blood.

And so there is no more appropriate place for Jesus to dispense his power and love for us, than from a boat in the water where “his Voice thunders over the waters!” (Ps. 29) That is to say over the unstable, uncontrollable, treacherous and deadly waters to which countless people have succumbed over the centuries. But as Psalm 91 promises, “It shall not come nigh thee.” And so rest assured that as Jesus saved you by his cross, he continues to save you by his love and power each day.

Now you may know that water is probably the Bible’s most common image of the power of good and evil. Water is either man’s dread enemy as in the Great Flood. Or man’s best friend as when Moses struck the rock in the wilderness and it gave enough water to quench the thirst of an entire nation, in the desert.

“That rock was Christ!” (1 Cor. 10:4)

And as you may know this sacred space we sit in today is often called the NAVE of the church, as in the word NAVY. The church has always been understood as a Great Ship of Salvation that calls out to the “ships of fools” to “repent and be baptized for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.” (Acts 2:38)

Said another way Sunday is the “day of salvation” as we heard in today’s epistle, and the NAVE is the “place of Salvation” where Jesus is seated – not now at the stern of the boat which is the rear most portion. But at the bow, at the very front leading the way as the “Shepherd and Bishop of our souls.” (1 Peter 2:25) Which inspired Herman Melville to write in Moby Dick, “The pulpit leads the world.”

This holy space is also called a sanctuary, which in this case means a place of safety. The place where our blackest sins are forgiven, where death sentences are not commuted, but vacated, and New glorious Life is richly given to us. It is the place where the “great calm” of today’s gospel is imparted to us. Indeed, “the peace that surpasses all understanding."

The Nave is the place where Jesus is graciously present to save us, by this Divine Service, from the chaotic, tumultuous, unpredictable and seemingly interminable storms brought on by the devil, the culture and all too often our sinful flesh! A veritable miniseries of miseries!

But as we hear in today’s Psalm “Our help is in the name of the LORD who made heaven and earth.” As such we will never, never be in want, (Ps. 23:1) because “ … He is good, and his mercy endures forever.” (Psalm 118) And it endures forever because his resources are as eternal as He Himself Is.

And so let us marvel today with David in the Psalm, with Job in today’s Old Testament lesson, with Saint Paul in today’s epistle, and with the 12 in the boat that day and ask with joyful wonder, great faith and humble worship, “Who is this that even the wind and the waves obey him?”

He is the LORD. Our Helper. The Maker of Heaven and Earth. (Ps. 124)

Blessed be the name of the LORD unto the ages of ages. Amen.