Tuesday of the 13th Week in Ordinary Time
July 1, 2014 6:30am
Yesterday I spent about an hour
and a half with a man who is suddenly dealing with a very threatening tumor.
He realizes that physical healing
may be impossible.
He is not literally out on the
Sea of Galilee in a boat with a storm of high winds and heavy rains.
But he is in one of those storms
that this gospel incident signifies.
Today’s story is both a real and
symbolic incident.
At some point in life, we will
all find ourselves in a storm:
maybe an emotional depression,
maybe a very threatening medical diagnosis, maybe financial troubles that seem
insoluble, maybe a marital crisis, maybe the death of a loved one, and on and
on it can go.
And where do we go with this?
What do we do?
What does this man whom I visited
yesterday do?
I think we are to do what the
apostles on the Sea of Galilee do.
We turn to the Lord
“Lord, save us, we are drowning.”
Frankly, there is no other place
to go.
Jesus is teaching us today that
he is with us in these storms of life.
And so, we need to be aware of
him and turn to him – in faith and in prayer.
And, if we do that, there may or
may not be a quick or even any resolution of the storm itself.
But, there will be someone,
Jesus, there with us.
And there will be some inner
steadiness and calm and strength that come from Jesus and our turning to him.
We do this through prayer and the
sacraments and the Scripture and the community of faith and those near us.
And we prepare for turning to
Jesus in the storms that will come by turning to him when the storms are not
there and things are calm and we are not even thinking that a storm is
possible.
Because if we do this at those
times, then our hearts and minds will be open and more able to feel that
steadying and calming and strengthening presence of the Lord in the storms.
