Help!  My ship is sinking.  Have you ever felt that way?  I felt this way today.  Nothing really major happened.  It was just the everyday little things that all added up to a near shipwreck.  I am a stay at home Mom with three children ages 7, 5 and 2.  I homeschool my 7 and 5 year old which leaves the 2 year old to do his thing.  Whatever his thing may be at the time.  Today he decided to throw  a thumbdrive, compact flash card, my husband’s deodorant and some essential oil in the toilet.  I’m really not sure how he got all of these things or why the particular combination, but he managed to do so while I was distracted homeschooling and my husband was distracted working.  At the same time my 5 year old was crying hysterically about, well, I’m not really sure.  She’s 5, she was sad about something.  It just seemed like complete chaos.  I found myself tense and angry.  About 30 minutes into the whole ordeal, it occurred to me to talk to God.  I don’t know why it takes me so long to remember to do this sometimes.  I know in my heart He is always right there and ready to listen.  I sometimes just get so distracted and my eyes get so turned on my “problems” I forget.  
    While I was sitting and thinking about it this evening, I was reminded of the story in Mark 4 where Jesus calms the storm.  Starting in verse 37 the Bible says that a great storm arose and the ship was actually sinking.  Some versions say it was filling with water.   I can envision chaos on the boat – men running around and bailing water.  It was probably very noisy with the wind and storm.  What was Jesus doing?  Was He helping in the chaos?  No, the Bible says He was sleeping on a pillow in the stern of the ship.  Naturally, the men with Him woke Him up and asked Him, “…Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing”?  (Mark 4: 38 NKJV)   He woke up and calmed the storm.  But what’s next is interesting to me.  Then He asked them why they were so fearful, why they had so little faith?  Here these men were in a boat that was taking on water, the wind and lightning were all around them – it was chaos – and Jesus asks them why they are scared.  Why do they have so little faith?
    Sometimes we just expect Jesus to keep the storms from happening in our lives and when they come we are confused.  Why do these things happen to me?  Have you ever heard yourself saying something like that?  I sure have.  In this story, Jesus didn’t keep the storm from happening.  He didn’t give them divine wisdom to take a different route around the storm.  He didn’t tell them to wait until the next day so they would miss the storm.  Sometimes in life this is how it works.  Sometimes, we are protected from the storm even starting in our life.  In this story the opposite was true, He is the one who told them to cross over when they did.  He knew the storm was going to happen.  But also notice, He didn’t tell the wind to blow, he told it to stop and it did.  
    Sometimes we are protected from the storms and sometimes we have to go through them.  Why?  Only God knows.  I know in my life I have gone through many storms big and small, and in every one my relationship with the Lord has deepened.  I truthfully can say that no matter how big the storm was that I endured, I can look back now and see that I am a better person because of it.  The truth is, if I get really honest with myself, I grow in the Lord a whole lot more when I am under the pressure of a storm.  It’s in those times that I am forced to press in and find out what He wants in the situation.  I grow other times as well, but it’s the pressure situations that make it clear that I can no longer control things in my own strength and I have to give it all to Him.  
    What storms are you going through today?  Are you knee deep in water and your ship is sinking?  There has never been a promise in this Christian life that storms will not come, but there is a promise that no matter what happens God will bring us through.  In the story above, when He was asked and faith was applied there was immediate peace and great calm.  We have a promise that no matter what we are going through, no matter what the enemy will bring our way, that we can have peace in Jesus.  Call on Him today.  Ask Him to give you peace.   Even if the storm is still blowing around you He will calm it in your heart and mind.  The Word of God says in John 16:33 “…that in Me you will have peace.  In the world you will have tribulation: but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world” NKJV