I need a miracle – Help, I’m sinking!

Have you ever felt like you needed a miracle? Life is never predictable; today you are up, and then, from out of nowhere, trouble sets in. The truth is, no one goes through life without experiencing a storm. Trouble comes in many different forms, such as illness, death, rejection, emotional trauma, accidents, or financial challenges. However, all storms have some common elements: They tend to fill our hearts with fear, test our faith, and, for some of us, cause us to cry out to our Lord for help. And when we are going through the storm, we often feel like we are sinking.

But if we turn to God, the storms of life become building blocks of faith. Being a Christian doesn’t exempt us from the storms of life even Jesus’ disciples went through storms. They experienced anxiety and fear, but they were on a journey of faith with Jesus. Notwithstanding the state of their hearts or emotions, they moved forward because Jesus said they should. Storms are life lessons to help us understand that impossible situations will face us, but they are opportunities for God to work miracles.

In one case, Jesus asked His disciples to cross a lake with Him so that He could rest. Mark 4:35 (NIV) states, “That day, at evening, Jesus said to his followers, ‘Come with me across the lake’.” Yet, even though they were with Jesus, they encountered a storm. From their experience, we can learn some lessons. Why would Jesus take them out into a storm?

1. The storm can prepare us for breakthrough

Sometimes the miracle we need is not the miracle we want! There are some things God plans to do with us, but to do them, He must first process us. For example, He has to get unbelief out of the way. Therefore, a storm is a way to process us. This often involves allowing us to experience some challenges, even though they may be hard, to prepare our heart to receive the breakthrough we need.

2. The storm deepens your trust in God

In this account, Jesus was asleep in the boat, but the storm was so bad, the disciples thought they were going to die. They began to panic and woke Jesus up. “They said, ‘Teacher, don’t you care about us? We are going to drown!’ Jesus stood up and gave a command to the wind and the water. He said, ‘Quiet! Be still!’ Then the wind stopped, and the lake became calm.” (Mark 4:38-39).

Jesus then asked them, “Why are you afraid? Do you still have no faith?” (Mark 4:40). Jesus was working on their faith. The storm was about building faith.

Jesus does the same thing with us. He allows us to experience storms in order to strengthen our faith in Him for the future. Many times, it is after the event has passed that we realise what God was using the storm to do in our lives. We then recognise, just like the apostle Paul did, that “in ALL THINGS, God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose”. (Romans 8:28, NIV)

3. The storm is designed to give us a new revelation of Jesus

Jesus’ presence in the boat made a difference. Jesus may not always show up when we think he should, but He always takes us through the storm. Jesus wants us to get a new revelation of who He is. When Jesus quieted the storm, it gave His disciples a fresh understanding of who He was. In Mark 4:41, it is written: “They were terrified and asked each other, ‘Who is this? Even the wind and the waves obey him!’” They began to recognise that He was God and that nothing was impossible with Him. They could trust Him to safely carry them in troubled times.

We need to understand God’s love for us in the midst of the storm. The deeper truth is that God is concerned for our character development during the storm. We need to ask the Lord to give us a revelation – to open our eyes and our hearts to understand that the storms of life will not overwhelm us if we put our trust in the Lord Jesus Christ.