Often times you find two seemingly random objects that when you add a word or
add a key all of a sudden now they feel connected. When you take two ideas, two
things that seemingly don't belong together. But when you understand the
connection point, the pivot point, you realize, oh, they actually really are
connected. Let me give you a couple of examples on the surface. When you hear
the words bear and worm, they don't really seem connected until you add the word
gummy, right? Think about gummy bear, gummy worm. Ok. Oh, ok. They're connected.
Uh Another one, if you think of the word traffic and you think of waffle
seemingly unrelated until you add the word cone, right? Or if you think of the
movie Footloose, the original and Denny's, they don't seem connected until you
add the word bacon into it. Right? Well, this morning's message here in week
four of our series, who is Jesus is like that, that this morning's message is
entitled Really The Power of God's Word. And, and we're talking about two
stories that are both found in Mark chapter 42 stories that as a pastor, uh
going to a Christian university and studying ministry. It's, it's common stories
and common knowledge that you study this when you go into ministry. But I never
really tied the two together other than the fact that they're both in the same
chapter. And what we're gonna discuss today are seemingly two different ideas,
two different really stories that are actually held together, almost think of it
as like two shoelaces. And that this morning's message is hopefully the knot in
between. And those ideas are really known as the seed and the storm, the seed in
the storm. Because we're gonna talk about the parable of the sower, the parable
of the seed. And then we're gonna talk when Jesus calms the storm and they
happen in Mark chapter four. And in this series is all about who is Jesus and
trying to answer really this question based on our study of the most talked
about figure in all of history through looking at the least, talked about gospel
account and the Bible, the Gospel of Mark. And we're gonna see that it's the
word of God that ties these two stories together today. And if you're taking
notes, I want you to write this down is that you can trust God's Word to
transform your life, you can trust God's word to transform your life. It's God's
word that ties the seed and the storm together. And another way to phrase that
is to really think through the fact that God's word is simple, like a seed. But
then it's also stronger than the storm. The first part of this message is really
gonna be the challenge. And the second part is really the encouragement or the
reason why you can trust him. Normally in sermons, you preach a message and
here's the content. And then you end with the challenge. Today, we're actually
gonna start with the challenge and then we're gonna end with why you should
accept that challenge and why you can have confidence in that. Because when we
talk about trusting the word of God, it's not about the amount of trust that you
have. It's about the object or, or really just the person in whom you have.
Trust that matters picture for a moment. If you are stumbling down a mountain,
you're starting to slide down a hill and you see a tree branch sticking out in a
rock or a tree branch sticking out. What's more important, how much you grab
onto that tree branch or can that branch hold you up? Right? Because if you
barely grab hold of it, you'll still hang on and you'll still survive. Versus if
you fully grab hold and wrap around this branch, but it cannot hold the weight
of you. You're still gonna fall. And a definition of trust is really the
confidence you have in someone's character and competence. There might be people
in your life that you trust as a person. They are the nicest guy, they're the
nicest girl, but they don't know what they're doing. Right. And so you like them
as a person, but you're not gonna give them a job. But then there's other people
who you trust their competence, they're great at what they do, but you don't
trust their integrity, right? And ultimate trust is when you have confidence in
both someone's confidence and character. And so when it comes to trusting God,
it's not about the amount of trust that you have. You can come in with all your
questions, with all your doubts, even with all your anger, if you have it
towards God, because it's not about that amount, but rather the object of your
trust. And I wanna give you the freedom to question it out because what we're
gonna see here is that trust in God's word, trust in God's power is like the
fact that it's described as a seed means it's accessible. It's small. It's
simple to start. You don't have to understand everything in Christianity to have
faith. You don't have to uh just have like a seminary degree to understand and
trust in God's word to have faith that it starts simple, it starts small. But
when it grows, it's more powerful than anything else in your life. It's simple,
like a seed, it's stronger than a storm. So let's jump into it. Let's go ahead
and see this challenge how Jesus puts it. He's doing ministry. We talked last
week on uh from Mark chapter two, that Jesus is for everyone, but also Lord over
everything and that you have to accept both statements as true. That when you
accept that Jesus is Lord for he is for everyone, it breaks that cycle and
belief structure of moralism where good people and bad people out. But then you
also have to believe that Jesus is Lord over everything that he wants all of who
you are, that He is the authority of truth, not we as the authority of truth.
And we fight progressivism and relativism who would like to say, well, open
minded it is, is in and judgmental is out. No, Jesus is both for everyone, but
also he is Lord over everything, meaning that he is the ultimate authority and
structure that as a church, we don't simply stand on God's word. We pick the
verses we like versus the vi verses. We don't like to prove a point. But rather
we all collectively myself included, sit under the authority of God's word. And
that when you read scripture and there's something that you don't like, ok,
who's in the wrong there. Right. Right. We have to understand and submit to that
collectively. And so we're gonna be challenged in that. And so Jesus is, is for
he's, he's doing miracles in Mark chapter three. He heals a man with a withered
hand, but he does so on the Sabbath. So he makes the religious leaders mad. And
he talks about how the power of life, he calls his fir all 12 disciples. And
there he's ministering, he preaches on the Holy Spirit. He talks about who his
family, that if you believe in him, if you follow him, that you are his family.
And so now a crowd is starting to gather and we pick up now in Mark chapter and
reread this that again, Jesus began to teach beside the sea and a very large
crowd gathered about him so that he got into a boat and he sat in it on the sea.
Now this is, this is great because in just a few verses at the end of our
sermon, just about 1520 minutes from now, here you're gonna see a boat come back
into play. And so it is an illustration in the making. It's a little setup for
the point he's gonna make for his disciples later. But also for those who like
logistics, it's very practical. There's a huge crowd. They don't have
amplification. So how are they gonna hear Jesus? Well, by getting in a boat and
sitting down and speaking towards the shore where most likely there were some
hills there right now, acoustically speaking and he could speak and everyone
could hear him. And so he's preaching in a boat. He, his disciples are mostly
fishermen, right? That's gonna come into play in just a few moments. So hang on
to that. But for right now, we read that he sat in on the sea and the whole
crowd was beside the sea on the land and he was teaching them many things in
parables. And in his teaching, he said to them, he said, listen, behold a sower
went out to sow and as he sowed some seed fell along the path and the birds came
and devoured it, another seed fell on the rocky ground where it did not have
much soil and immediately sprang up since it had no depth of soil. When the sun
rose, it was scorched. And since it had no roots, it withered away. Other seed
fell among the thorns and the thorns grew up and choked it and it yielded no
grain and then other seed fell into good soil and produced grain growing up and
increasing and yielding 30 fold, 60 fold and 100 fold. And he said, so he who
has ears let him hear? Now, that's a cool little story. You know, a parable is
really an illustration or a story like a physical reality to describe an eternal
truth and a physical picture, to describe a spiritual truth in a principle to
understand, take a complex subject and make it speak in a language in a way that
people can understand. And he goes on and says that he's going, he shares the
keys to the kingdom, to the disciples. But for everyday public, he preaches in
parables. That's why a lot of pastors and in servants and stuff myself included,
often speak in illustration of trying to not invent truth but to communicate
truth in a way that people can connect with. You take an idea where someone's
not sure what it means and you describe it in a way or in a field of life or in
a way that they understand and now they can connect the two. And so that's what
Jesus does here. And if, if you hear the story of the sower or someone who's
planting seed, throwing out seed, you know, like, oh, that's nice. But I have no
idea what that means. I want you to know you're in good company because the
disciples who mind, you just witnessed multiple miracles also had no idea really
what it meant at that time. And so if you've ever been the one in the classroom
to hear the teacher say something and then they, and you, you days out for a
minute and then she goes, all right. Does that make sense? Can we move on? Yeah.
OK. And you're like, wait a second, I just missed it. You're OK because the
crowd missed it too. It happens to all of us. We, we think we're so clear when
we communicate just yesterday, I was coaching a little basketball, we come down
to the end of the game, right? And I was like, all right, you have to go this
way, you're gonna go this way and like you got it, got it, got it. Coach. As
soon as the whistle blew, they ran the complete opposite way. It was like, oh,
man, I get it. But we do that too, don't we? We do that. God tells us to do
something. All right. I want you to do this and we're like, ah, no, and we turn
and it's so easy to forget. But thankfully, Jesus follows up this story of the
parable to directly tell us this is what it means. Some parables. We have to
figure it out and try to guess and commentary and compare it like, well, I think
Jesus means this. I think Jesus means this. We don't have to wonder with this
first parable because he actually says here is what it means. And so we continue
reading in verse 13 and Jesus said to them, do you not understand this parable?
And how then will you understand all the parables? There's a key verse here,
verse 14, the sower sows the word. What is the seed that we're talking about?
The seed is the word of God. The seed is the word of God. And what's interesting
in this case is that the sewer gets no accolades here. It gets no, no awards.
It's not. It, there's nothing special about that. And as a pastor, as a preacher
that both takes the pressure off. But then also very much a challenge for me
because what you realize when you see that verse, that the sower sows the word
and that's it. The preacher gets like four words in this parable is that it's
not about me. In other words, it's not about celebrity pastors, celebrity
creatures. There's a revival kind of thing going on right now in Kentucky, a
small Christian college there, Asbury and there a lot's been written on it and
you can read on it and it's, it's really incredible. But it's really cool
though. So what started as a simple chapel service where a preacher got up and
spoke and then he actually, when he got done, like texted his wife, man, wh it
another stinker and he left. Well, the students didn't leave and the spirit
moved and they, and they just stayed and now they're going on like day, like 15
of like this continuous prayer worship service. And at this point now thousands
upon thousands of people has made their way into this small town and just people
are repenting and crying and getting saved and praying with one another. And
what's cool is there a lot of media is trying to come in and they've rejected
and pushed out the media and said no, no media. And they said no celebrities
just Jesus. Isn't that cool? I love that. And, and so it's a challenge for me as
a preacher, right? That it's not about me but understand this is, this isn't
just a parable about pastors. This is for Christians too, that when you share
your faith, it's not about you. It is about others. But the nice part is the
pressure is off because when you sow the seed right, you send it out, it's not
your job to save, it's your job to share. And he shares four different types of
soil in there, which is encouraging in the sense that it, it shares the reality
of how people can respond to the word of God. But it's discouraging that by the
start, the starting point, only 25% of people are even gonna get it right out of
the gate. And that's like the highest possible percentage, right? And so you are
not responsible for how someone responds to the word of God. Your job as a
Christian is simply to share the word of God. But you can take encouragement
from that because it's not about you. It's not up to you. You simply have to
share because you don't know what is in people's hearts. So it continues on now
in verse 15, it says these are the ones along the path where the word is sown.
It says they hear the word and Satan immediately comes and takes the word that
is sown in them. And then there are the ones that are sown on rocky ground. The
ones who, when they hear the word immediately receive it with joy and when they
have no root in themselves, but endure for a while. Then when tribulation or
persecution arises on the account of the word, immediately they fall away in
verse 18. And others are the ones who sown among the thorns. They are those who
hear the word, but the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches and
the desires for other things enter in and choke the word and it proves
unfruitful. But those that were, that were sown on good soil are the ones who
hear the word and accept it and bear fruit. A 30 fold, 60 fold and a
hundredfold. Now, what's interesting about those four types of soil? Is that all
four of them hear the word of God? And what that tells me is that just simply
attending a Sunday morning service is not where the battle lies, just hearing
the word of God does not determine your life. It's what do you do with the word
of God? And so the question is, how is the soil of your heart? What will you do
with the seed that's planted into your heart today? What are you gonna do with
it? What is the application? So it's not just the Sunday sermon or the message,
it's great. It has a place, it has value, but also what are you gonna do with it
afterwards? What are you gonna do on Monday or Tuesday or any day that ends in?
Why? Because that will determine the fruitfulness in your life, not checking a
box. So I went to church at Christmas at Easter or I went to church today. I
went to church every week. I got perfect attendance. Perfect attendance does not
equal fruitfulness and faithfulness in God's work. It's how you respond. So it,
it actually offers us four challenges here of the heart. Four challenges of the
heart. The first type of soil that we see is the path. That's the, it's like a
sidewalk. It's a hardened ground here that's really describes a life of
triviality. It's trivial. It's, it's passive, it's ignorant. There's a lot of
different words you could use to describe it. Basically, it just falls on deaf
ears. Right. If you've ever said something to a coworker, to a spouse and they
just give you that blank look back like. Right. Right. If you like, are you
listening? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I'm listening. Of course, I'm listening.
Right. Like we've all had that moment. Ok. Jesus, being there are people that
respond that way. There's some people when you hear the word, it just bounces
right off. And the reality is, is that until the Holy Spirit kind of pricks your
heart or opens your, your mind to that, it's just gonna go right over your head.
It's just gonna, it's just not gonna land. And I understand that there's some
people hearing this today that's just not gonna land, but there's also hope in
that. There are many pictures I don't have any on the screens this morning. But
there are many pictures where if a seed does break through and take root and
grow, it's pretty powerful to watch a tree break through a rock and grow the
fact that any plants survive here in Arizona is amazing. Right. It's amazing.
Right. Anything survives. It's a win. I mean, it might be a little prickly but
might be, describe us as Christians as well. Right? We might be a little prickly
but we survive. Ok. But there is hope for anyone but you have to allow the word
of God to actually take root in your life. Otherwise it's just gonna get washed
away or brushed away or the birds will come and eat it. Some people just come on
to church or they hear the word or they read it and it just goes right over the
head like it just doesn't stick. I understand that is that you second challenge
of the heart and second type of soil really is described as a seed thrown among
rocks and that describes the trials that come. So you hear the message, you
receive it with joy, you're excited about it. You love the things that
Christianity offers forgiveness, purpose, love, joy, but life is hard, right?
And so if you hear the message and you receive it with gladness, but you don't
allow it to take root into your life that when hard things happen, you're not
sure where to turn right? When you hear things like prosperity gospel, like if
you believe in Jesus and you will be blessed and God will provide and do all
these things, which is true. But blessing is really more of a spiritual reality.
Right? And so wait, what about this difficult thing? What about when I preached
this? I obeyed God and, and people persecuted me for it. I don't want that. I
don't want hardship and they turn, but the reason they can't maintain through a
storm or through a drought is because they haven't allowed the word of God to
take root in their life. And that takes root through studying it through
memorizing it, through meditating on it, through speaking it with others
actually living in a way that shows that you believe that it's true. Do you
trust it? So the first type of soil really? It brushes away because it's tri
it's trivial. Second type of soil is rocky and that it, it fades away when the
scorching sun comes out because of the trials. Well, the third type of soil in
the thorns is actually a pursuit of treasure. Now, this seems weird to me. I
mean, I don't wanna tell Jesus how to do his job, but I feel like he mixed up
two and three, right? Like what don't you think that trials and difficult
circumstances and situations are the things that would choke somebody out? But
he doesn't say that what he says is that it's the pursuit of stuff that actually
suffocates you that when you get distracted by this temporary carnal desires and
pursuit of things that is what's gonna choke out your faith. Because our
ultimate pleasure and joy and, and the cravings of our soul are only met by God.
No amount of money in your bank account can calm your soul. No amount of stuff
or the new thing, new car, new house, new phone, new, whatever, fill in the
blank, whatever your lust of choice is, is not going to satisfy your soul. And
if we get stuck in that mindset that I need X to be happy or to have joy, to
wait through to like I have to wait till I'm beyond a hard thing or a hard
situation to have joy. You will not have joy and the things of this world will
distract will pull you away that even that word distract at its root is to
actually pull you away from something else. And so when you turn your eyes, your
focus off of Jesus off of the word you're gonna, and you think something is
gonna satisfy, you're always left craving more or when you get it, you're gonna
feel is that it? I thought if I got the promotion, I thought if I got it and,
and understand this, that money and, and promotion and, and, and things and
relationships and the marriage and, and whatever it is that you're going after
those things in and of themselves are all moral meaning that they are not moral,
not good or bad. Like, right here's a chair. Ok. This chair is a more like, it's
not good or bad. You can sit in the chair. It is great. You're all sitting in
chairs. It is, it is functioning well. Now, if we were in a wrestling ring and
you picked up the chair and started hitting someone with it, ok. Now it is an
instrument of evil at that point, right? Like you're taking it out like same
object, a chair, you're sitting down or a chair to break someone's back. Right?
Is it the object? The chair is not the bad thing. It's what you do with it. So
money at it in itself and resources when stewarded well can provide blessing,
but money will never satisfy the cravings of your soul. And if you get stuck in
that endless cycle of searching for stuff, you're gonna end up like that hamster
on a wheel, just running, running, running, running, running, running, running.
And at the end of the day, you don't go anywhere and you're exhausted, it'll
choke you out. Yeah. Now that I've uplifted and encouraged all of you, we can be
reminded. Ok? Not simply how do you hear the word? What are you gonna do with
it? Because that's the soil is, how will you respond to the word today? Well,
the path it's taken away, it's trivial, the rocks. That's difficulty in trials.
The thorns is really that pursuit of earthly treasure. Thankfully, there is 1/4
option, the good soil, which is based in trust. When your heart is in a place to
receive the word of God, to allow it to take root in your life, as evidenced by
obedience, right? It starts to grow and when it grows, that tiny little seed
brings with it fruitfulness, 30 fold, 60 fold, 100 fold. And he goes on even
further actually says that the Kingdom of God is like a growing seed. I love
that. The word of God is described as a seed because it's small. I no one's ever
afraid of a seed that I'm aware of, right? Like, I mean, you can plant seeds,
you can chew seeds, you can throw seeds. I don't know, but no one's like, ah a
seed, ah, like, like here's the thing I love that he's described as a seed
because it's approachable. Ok? If you don't understand all the words, can you,
can you start with one verse, one word, one thought, one person, right? Go
through and, and start simple and just allow what you do know, to ruminate and
illuminate your soul and your mind and you start to believe it and your identity
changes and you start to act out of that identity instead of searching for
identity. And, and pretty soon that seed grows into a transformative life and
that life transforms your marriage, your kids, your business, your community.
See, we think so small. We think about just trying to get through the hour and
just trying to get through the day. God thinks through generations and legacies
and lifetimes and eternity. There's no telling the eternal impact of one changed
life for Jesus that ripples into all of eternity. And it starts by trusting that
God can change you. Not that you have to change for God, but that God in
believing His word and the power of His spirit will change you. Romans 12 talks
about no longer be conforming to the patterns of this world, but be transformed,
passive tense, be transformed by the renewal of your mind. In other words, you
can trust God's word to change you. So that's a challenge, right? How's, how's
the soil? How's the soil in your life? How, how is your heart right now? Is what
I'm saying? Just bouncing off, just letting it go. You're thinking about all
your to dos right now. I, I mean, I get it right. You just letting it bounce
off, pass on by all. That's for someone else. Are you struggling right now?
Through a trial? I was like, oh man, I, I feel like I'm getting scorched right
now and you need some roots. Are you stuck in the endless cycle trying to pursue
things and stuff? And you go to bed exhausted, longing for more. Are you willing
to pause and let the word of God take root in your life and to grow that you
might not see that fruit today, but you're going to see it in the time to come
30 fold, 60 fold, hundredfold. Well, beyond anything, you can a ask think or
imagine. And so he gives this challenge and now notice at the end of the
chapter, same chapter chapter four, verse 35 he says on that day, same day. So
this is where I realized these stories are connected here. He's preaching on a
boat about the soils. How will people receive the word? And now notice here when
the evening had come, he said to them, let us go across to the other side here
in the sea of Galilee and leaving the crowd, they took him with them in the boat
and just as he was, and this is a key verse here is a key little detail that
Mark includes. He says, and other boats were with him. Notice there are other
boats in the water. This is key in just a second here. OK. Verse 37 and a great
windstorm arose and the waves were breaking into the boat. So the boat was
already filling and I love me some verse 38 because here's why. But Jesus was in
the stern asleep on a cushion. I don't know about you. I wanna be like Jesus and
Jesus took naps, right? Some of you are gonna go home and be like, hey, what are
you doing today? Like I'm living out scripture, Mark 438. Be like if you get
nothing else be like Jesus today right now. How crazy is this? Right? Most of
the disciples were fishermen who made their livelihood on the same sea that they
were in. They just spent the entire day listening to teaching from Jesus on a
boat. They're in the boat. It's dark. How scared do you have to be for the wind
and the waves to feel like you're, you're, you're gonna die. Like if you're not
a boat person, you get, you hit one wave like I'm out, it's over. We gotta jump,
we gotta swim to safety like this is done. But if you live on the water and your
job up to this point is on the water and you're on that same water, how bad does
it have to be? Like this is it? And he was asleep on the cushion and they
welcome. Ok. Who wants to be the guy that wakes Jesus right now? You wake him?
No, you wake him. Like finally someone steps up and they said to him, hey,
teacher, uh Jesus wakey, wakey, do you not care that we're perishing? And he
awoke and he rebuked the wind and said to the sea, peace be still and the wind
ceased. And there was a calm and I've preached through this story before, but I
missed something last time I preached through this, it says, and the wind
ceased, I get that. And there was great calm. Here's why this is, I think is
important. How often does a storm pass? And then the waves remain? Have you
experienced that? Like when a boat goes through? Right. And it creates a wake?
How far does that wake go? Even when a storm rolls through? Right? And the
water's choppy. I wonder how many of you here today again? It's not the same
story. Same God though. So you can apply this here. I wonder how many of you the
storm has passed, but the water is still choppy for you, right? Your storm
happened a year, two years, a decade, five decades ago. But you're still in
choppy waters because of it emotionally, physically, financially, you're still
struggling with the effects of something else that happened to you or that you
did. There are wind and then there's waves and Jesus called both with a word. Do
you see it? How did he calm the storm? Did he karate chop it? Then Jesus woke
and he goes hiya like he calmed the storm with a word. Peace. Be still. And he
said to them, why are you so afraid? Have you still? No faith? And they were
filled with fear. They still had fear. But now it changed, right? Like you're
afraid of the wind and the waves. But wait a second, this guy woke up from a
nap. Hit the snooze button said peace be still. And I don't know. Did you just
go back to sleep? I don't know. But it's like, like that's how little he was
bothered by the storm. And they say who then is this? This is the question of
all of Mark, who is Jesus, who is this? Then that even the wind and the waves
obey him. The challenge is to believe and to trust the word of God to transform
your life. But then the encouragement is that same word. To give you a picture
of the word can calm a storm, the wind and the waves in a moment. There's
another story later in the gospel again, they're on the same sea. It's the
middle of the night. It's stormy, it's nasty. They think they're gonna die.
Jesus comes walking out on the water. Peter says, Lord, if it's, you tell me to
go out there and see, I've, I've preached this wrong before. Sorry, I have
confession time here because we as preachers, pastors, we preach that Peter
walked on water. I wanna tell you that he did not walk on water. Here's why.
What did Peter respond to when Jesus called him out? He said, come, don't miss
this because this is a light bulb for me. And II, I think it might be a light
bulb for someone in here. Ok. Peter did not walk on water. He walked on the
word. Think about that. It was the power of the word of Jesus that said come,
it's the power of the word of Jesus that calmed both the wind and the waves. And
it's the power of the word of Jesus that can transform your life that you don't
have to walk with waves and winds in your life. Right now. You can walk on the
word and you can trust it, but you gotta let it plant in your soul. You gotta
believe it, receive it and live it. So we gave you the challenge. But let me
encourage you a little bit because if you're walking through something tough
right now, I just wanna encourage you that it's a different story, but it's the
same God. So what principles can we take from this story that are still true?
2000 years later and I believe it's this, that number one. If you're walking
through or you're living through a storm right now. Understand that if you
believe in God, if you call yourself a Christian here, you have Jesus in your
boat. There were other boats on the sea that time. Who do you turn to? Right?
Like you can't just be in like the guys in the other boats like storms coming,
they're afraid they're gonna die. Um Carl wake up, Carl like just pick any name,
right? Like Steve, Sally, Sally, come on, there's a storm, do something. What am
I supposed to do? Right? There were other people in the storm, but the disciples
could turn to Jesus. Look, if you're walking through something so hard right now
in your life. I don't know the outcome. I don't know what's gonna come from it
if you might be walking through the deepest darkest valley of the shadow of
death. But you can fear not why because the shepherd is with you that Jesus is
in your boat that you have someone to turn to. I don't know how people walking
through the trials in this life get through it apart from faith. I just don't,
you don't have to, you can turn to him. So you have Jesus in about the second
encouragement to you. Is that what scares you does not scare God? Right? When a
little kid runs into mom and dad's room in the middle of the night, ah, there's
a monster. The parent doesn't go back and say, oh, no, it's gonna eat. You run,
right? Ok. I just do that one time. I'm sorry, I apologize for it. Right. You
know. No. Like what scares you. It does not scare God. He was taking a nap. He
was unconcerned with that moment of what stressed everybody else out. Right?
When you call 911 you don't want the person on the other end of the line to be
more stressed out than you. 911. What is your emergency? You tell the mercy. Oh,
no. What are you gonna do? What you should call someone, right? Like you don't
want, like you don't want that. Like, so here's the reality, right? We can take
comfort in the fact that you got Jesus in your boat. Number two. That what
scares you doesn't scare Jesus number three is that Jesus cares that you're
scared, he doesn't go back and said leave me alone, I'm sleeping. Ok? Jesus
cares that you're scared. He leans in if you're hurting. If you're struggling,
if you're questioning and you look up to God, I promise you God's going to lean
into you. And the last encouragement here is that while those other first three
are nice, the most important thing to remember is that Jesus is greater than
your storm. The word of God is more powerful than any wind or wave or water
coming your way right now. You can question it, make me angry. You can have
doubts. That's ok because it's not about the amount of trust you have. It's the
object of your trust. And the reason you can trust the word of God to change you
is because at a word, God spoke the world into existence. At a word, the wind
and the waves cease and at a word, it is finished. Jesus conquered death itself
so that we celebrate the truth that He has risen is power and evidence to
understand that the word of God, while it's as simple as a seed, it's so much
bigger than any storm. And so you can trust God's word to transform your life,
to transform your marriage, to transform your job, your health, your situation,
understand this, that God is with you. God is for you. God is in you. God loves
beyond you. God works through you. Understand that the word of God is powerful,
the word of God is purposeful. The word of God is accessible. And so what are
you gonna do with it? We have access to the greatest thing, the greatest person
and a savior who loves you and you can trust Him. Do you trust him? Will you
trust Him? His hearing is not enough. Will you pray with me dear heavenly
father? There's someone in the room right now who's never believed in you. God,
I pray that we can just trust you as Lord and savior. And I know for some in the
room it's gonna pass right on by and for others, it's not going to take root and
for others still, the pursuits of this world are gonna choke, choke out their
faith and prove unfruitful. But by God, for those who allow the seed of your
word to be planted into their heart and their soul, to take root and to change
them. God was you, you alone. There's equation, there's forgiveness, there's
purpose and love and eternity that your word is greater than winds and any waves
that can come our way. So let us stand in awe let us find peace and let us place
our trust in you as Lord and Savior. We love you God and your sons and we pray
amen.