World population is exploding. Our economy is on a rampage. Our environment is endangered through carelessness and waste. Our natural resources are being depleted. Our government is often ineffective and sometimes corrupt. Crime is increasing toward frightening proportions. Millions in our country are jobless. Hundreds of millions throughout our world are starving. Drought, earthquake, natural and man-perpetrated calamities are wracking our world. That should be enough so that we begin to feel something of what the disciples felt as the “storm of wind arose and the waves beat into the boat,” and they awakened the sleeping Jesus crying out, “Teacher, do You not care if we perish?”

Maybe Jesus is saying to us what He, in essence, said to those disciples: “Why are you so afraid? Have you still no faith? I have created, redeemed, and appointed you for just such times as these. I am always with you, working out My will through you. Trust Me; I won’t let you down. There is a quiet harbor somewhere at the end of your journey, but for now you are to abide in Me and work for Me in the mist of storm.”

What this Gospel portion is saying is that God truly does care about us and, in the mist of our insufficiency, His grace is sufficient – and it is available. It is not something we have to earn, merit, or work for; it is grace, Jesus’ great gift of love. While Jesus does not promise to cancel out all the storms of our lives as He did that storm on the Sea of Galilee, He does promise to be with us as we face and endure the storms that whirl about us. We need only, in faith, to recognize and accept His promises and power and to lay claim to His loving, supernatural peace even in the mist of these raging tempests that beset us.

We lay hold of the grace of God which is sufficient to keep us steady and faithful whatever the storms that ravage our small craft.