Have the challenges of life ever given you spiritual questions?
When circumstances are hard and God seems to be silent, it’s not uncommon for questions like “Does God really care?” and “Is He still in control?” to well up inside of us.
In fact, it reminds me of Mark 4:35-41, where the disciples begin to question these very things in the midst of stormy waters. And yet, as the passage unfolds, the disciples—and we who read it, today—find answers to those pressing spiritual questions.
Take a look at what it says:
On that day, when evening had come, he said to them, “Let’s go over to the other side.” Leaving the multitude, they took him with them, even as he was, in the boat. Other small boats were also with him.
A big wind storm arose, and the waves beat into the boat, so much that the boat was already filled. He himself was in the stern, asleep on the cushion; and they woke him up and asked him, “Teacher, don’t you care that we are dying?”
He awoke and rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, “Peace! Be still!” The wind ceased and there was a great calm. He said to them, “Why are you so afraid? How is it that you have no faith?” They were greatly afraid and said to one another, “Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?”
This passage gives us two answers we can hold onto in the midst of both our challenges and our questions:
One. Jesus is still in control when life feels out of control.
I find it interesting that this incident, which so frightened the disciples, took place on a boat. You see, many of Jesus’ disciples were professional fishermen and they would have been experienced in navigating through choppy waters.
So, it’s possible that when the storm first started, they thought they could handle it. They had training. They were hard workers and good-enough sailors. And yet, at some point, it must have become clear to them that this storm was more than they could manage. The wind was too strong for them to push through. The water was filling up the boat faster than they could bail it out. Things were spinning out of control.
And I wonder: have you ever been in a similar situation?
Maybe a trial started small, so you underestimated it, at first. Or the challenge required a skillset you felt confident in, so you didn’t think you needed help. But then, suddenly, things got worse—and you realized: it was too big for you.
In moments like these, we can start to panic. We can start to wonder where God is and why He’s allowing us to feel this way.
But maybe, He needs to let us feel this way.
Maybe, our always-in-control God allows us moments like these so we’ll realize: unlike Him, we’re not in control. We can’t manage our problems alone. We need Him.
This, of course, is the realization the disciples came to in verse 38. They realized they needed Jesus’ help.
And, while we’ll talk more in a minute about the question they asked Jesus, we need to acknowledge one thing, upfront: the disciples turned to the right person. In the midst of a storm that was too big for them, they turned to Jesus—and that was the turning point in their crisis.
Verse 39 says that when they woke Jesus up, He “rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, “Peace! Be still!” The wind ceased and there was a great calm.”
The things that are too big for us, are not too big for Jesus. The circumstances that are out of our control, are still firmly within His rule and reign.
So. When life feels out of control, we need to realize: that only means it’s out of our control. And we are invited to run to Him who is sovereign over all things—who can speak directly into our storms with authoritative words they have to submit to. Jesus can change things in an instant.
The truth is, we may not know exactly how He’ll choose to move on our behalf. But if we will cry out to Jesus in the midst of the storm, we can know that He will move and it will be good. He may choose to calm our external, circumstantial, storm or He may choose to calm our internal, emotional, one—but either way, He will bring the peace and calm we need.
Jesus is still in control when life feels out of control.
Two. Jesus still cares when He seems to be silent.
Up until this point in the disciple’s experience with Jesus, He had always been in the driver’s seat, leading His band of followers from town to town to meet the needs of hurting people. But now, when the disciples themselves were hurting and in need, Jesus seemed to be M.I.A. Instead of taking charge at the wheel, He was asleep in the back of the boat.
Looking at things with human eyes, we can kind of understand why the disciples cried out, “Teacher, don’t you care that we are dying?” I even think there are moments we can relate to this response.
- When we pray and pray, but still don’t see the answers we long for…
- When we see God showing up in other people’s stories, but not our own…
it can make us question the Lord’s care for us.
But do you know what the problem is with this kind of questioning? It stems from focusing only on what we can see with our eyes. It lacks faith.
You know, after Jesus calmed the storm, He asked His disciples two very direct questions: “Why are you so afraid? How is it that you have no faith?”
This is the heart of the matter.
Fear—such as the fear that God doesn’t care about us—comes when we believe only what we can see with our own eyes. But faith is when we believe the truth about God regardless of what we see happening around us.
So maybe, when the storm came and Jesus was asleep on the cushion, He was giving His disciples a chance to live by faith and not by sight.
It’s not that He had abandoned them forever—we know the end of the story: Jesus didn’t let them die. He did care! But in the meantime, He wanted them to cling to what they already knew to be true of Him—that He was kind, compassionate and available; powerful, all-knowing and always right on time.
When God seems silent in our struggles, I believe He is extending the same invitation to us. He’s inviting us to live by faith.
And the beautiful thing is, no matter how strong or weak our faith may be in practice, God will just keep giving us more of Himself to believe in.
He will strengthen our faith with more of Himself.
The passage concludes with verse 41 saying, “They were greatly afraid and said to one another, “Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?”
The disciples didn’t have a perfect faith during this stormy experience. But they came out of it with a new revelation of Jesus and, in the end, they traded fear of their circumstances for fear (or reverence) of their Savior.
God has so much good that He wants to give us—even in the silence and struggle.
So, when storms come, and the questions roll in like turbulent, ocean waves, may we cling to the lifeline of Christ’s goodness.
Jesus is sovereign and caring, even when we can’t see it.
This devotion is based on one of the Scriptures from my 2025 reading plan: “A Year in the Gospels” To receive a copy of the reading plan (and future reading plans), sign up for the email list below. Hope you’ll follow along! You can also learn more about my Scripture over Screentime experiment here.
Written by Paige K. Burhans
©2025 Paige K. Burhans
Scriptures taken from the World English Bible. Public Domain.
