When my life is going well, I find it easy to rest in God. But that kind of resting is really resting in circumstances, not resting in God. The hard thing is to rest when life is anything but the way I’d like it to be. It’s like trying to sleep in the middle of a typhoon.
Come to think about it, Jesus slept in the middle of a storm. He was on the Sea of Galilee–do you remember? Matthew says that Jesus “got into the boat and his disciples followed him. Without warning, a furious storm came up on the lake, so that the waves swept over the boat. But Jesus was sleeping” (Matthew 8:23-24). I’ve often wondered, “How could He?” Yes, I know He was exhausted from speaking to the crowds. But sleep in a storm?
I think the only reason Jesus could sleep was that He knew without a doubt that they were not going to sink. The disciples were afraid because they didn’t yet understand that the God who created the very water their boat sailed in was in the boat with them. They were just beginning to understand His full power.
One of the disciples in the boat that day was Peter. And I think he learned a lesson, for years later when Peter was arrested by King Herod and put in prison, the night before his trial, Peter slept. Here’s Peter chained between two soldiers in a prison cell, knowing that the next day Herod intends to put him to death—and Peter is sleeping (Acts 12:1-6).
The only way you can sleep in a storm is by realizing that God is with you. The Psalmist wrote, “I will lie down and sleep in peace, for you alone, O LORD, make me dwell in safety” (Psalm 4:8). “Find rest, O my soul, in God alone,” says Psalm 62:5; ”my hope comes from him.”
Hey, lighten up! Isn’t God really going to bring you through the storm??
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