The bride and
groom, still tired from the emotional pitch of the wedding the day before, were
on the darkened airplane. As is so often the case, the transatlantic flight
left shortly before midnight. In the morning they would awaken as they landed
at the Milan airport. The plan was half full, so the bride could curl on her
side and rest her head in the lap of her new husband and sleep. She was
awakened a few hours into the journey. They had encountered turbulence, the
captain announced. This pilot must be a master of understatement, she thought.
Although she had traveled a great deal, she had never experienced anything like
this. The plane was pitching wildly, periodically dropping in a way that made
her stomach jump up into her throat. It seemed like this silver bird that was
supposed to be winging them smoothly to their honeymoon was being twisted by
great hands, as if it were Sunday’s chicken with its neck being snapped by some
great farmer’s wife in the heavens. The overhead bins responded to the torque
by popping open, and jackets and tote bags began to rain down on the seated passengers. One or two began to stand, to
shut the bins, and the flight attendants announced sharply, “You must remain in
your seat. It is unsafe to stand up with this turbulence.” The bride lay curled
up, eyes wide as the plane seemed to twist and shudder, thinking, “God, why are
you doing this? I finally found the perfect husband, and now we’re going to die
in the Atlantic before I even get a chance to enjoy being married to him.” Her
husband, sensing her anxiety, patted her gently, but said nothing. There was
nothing to say. They could only keep riding through the air on this bucking
bronco of a 757, hoping and praying that things would get better. The bride
found herself thinking of the pilot, and wondering if he was praying as she
was, or if this was not as frightening to him. Perhaps he had gone through this
kind of turbulence before. Perhaps he had studied the construction of the plane
and its systems so thoroughly that he knew that it was built to withstand what
was happening. Perhaps he simply trusted in the plan, in God, in his extensive
training. And as she thought these things, a strange calm came over her. There
was nothing to do but to pray and to trust. And in a little while, the ride
smoothed out to the usual near-imperceptible floating forward sensation that
she was familiar with on plane rides, and she dozed off again. They were safe.
Trust. How do we
get it? How do we hold on to it, when all the signals say there is no reason to
trust?
Sometimes we
trust because we are too stupid to know that we should not. We might be tempted
to say that about David as he faced Goliath. He was just a boy, probably a
preteen. The sum of his battle experience was chasing off the wild animals who
threatened his father’s sheep. And Goliath, this champion of the King of the
Philistines, this man who demanded the ancient tradition of one representative
from each side to fight to decide the battle, was almost 10 feet tall. But
David volunteered to fight Goliath, one on one. Little David, a shepherd.
Perhaps he was barely five feet tall. The passage notes how handsome and ruddy
he was, not how tall and muscular he was. One on one hand to hand combat. Did
David volunteer because he was too stupid to realize how outmatched he was? Or
was there something else going on here, a well of trust that God would make
sure he not only survived but overcame the enemy? On the face of it, it was a
ridiculous matchup. And King Saul realized that. He tried to get David to put
on Saul’s own armor and carry the king’s weapons, but it was clear that David
was a lot smaller than the king, so he tossed the protective garments and
weapons aside, saying they were much too big for him, and he wasn’t used to
them. He faced the might of the enemy with no more than a slingshot and five
smooth stones. Goliath tried a little trash talk, to make the boy nervous. But
David was not to be intimidated. He trusted that God would help him, and he ran
toward the line of battle, pulled back on the slingshot and felled the ten-foot
tall Philistine champion with a single stone. The arrogance of youth or the
trust borne of a deep faith that God would do what was necessary? Samuel’s
account of the battle certainly argues for the latter.
But sometimes in
the midst of battle, in the midst of frightening circumstances that clearly
seem to portend our doom, we feel the trust draining out between our shaking
fingers like cold water. We don’t immediately sense God with us, and we panic.
We abandon trust because trusting in such circumstances defies what we see and
hear and feel with our own senses. We become like the apostles in the little
boat with Jesus out on the Sea of Galilee. The storm has whipped up a terrible
wind and waves, and we are quite certain that the boat will be swamped and we
will drown. And through it all, Jesus is asleep. How can he sleep through this
storm? He’s supposed to take care of the disciples, and they are more than a
little upset as he snores away at the back of the boat. So they wake him up:
“Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?” He looks up, sees what is happening,
sees the disciples’ distress, and commands the wind and the waves to cease…and
suddenly all is still. He sees that their trust is almost shattered. Almost.
They have, after all, awoken him. If they truly did not believe in him, that
would have been a pointless exercise. So he attends to their needs by calming
the storm. Note that he doesn’t start out by chastising them that they are weak
in their faith and trust. No, he fixes the problem at hand, like a parent with
a child with night terrors, soothing them until they are calm again. Only then
does he say, “I thought you understood that I would not abandon you. When you
are going to truly and completely trust me?”
In these two
stories, I’m reminded once again that the people that God chooses – David, the
disciples in the boat – are the ones who most need to trust. Had the Lord told
Samuel to anoint the eldest son, Eliab, the one who already had his father’s
birthright and blessing, the tall and handsome lad who was most likely
everyone’s favorite, the young man would have sailed into kingship with no
doubts, no worries, no struggles…and no need to reach out to the Lord saying “I
need you and I trust you to be there for me.”
If Jesus had
chosen a King or a Pharisee to be His apostle, a person with privilege and
power and status, that person would have assumed that he was called into this
role because of his own gifts and power or position rather than because of
God’s grace. That person would have felt no need to reach out to Jesus and say
“I need you and I trust you to be there for me.” In a boat in the Sea of
Galilee, a king would have had an entourage in a following boat who would
respond to his command. A Pharisee would have quoted how this was the result of
breaking a law. Neither would have placed his trust in the only One who truly
deserves our trust.
No, God had
Samuel anoint David, the youngest, least favored one. The son who didn’t even
merit being paraded before Samuel when he visited Jesse’s house. And he became
the one who slew the Philistine giant, who became a great albeit very human
king of Israel.
The Lord chose
the disciples, ordinary fishermen and working folk. The ones whose names were
not engraved in stone over a lintel, who were not even the best-known in their
own communities. And they became the ones who were the mighty voices telling
the story of the Son of God and his new covenant with all of us.
All because they
were people who needed to trust something and someone larger than themselves.
We all need to trust. Sometimes it is difficult. Sometimes our trust falters.
But our faith in the One who is the giver of all strength and comfort and truth
leads us back, again and again, to the place of trust.
As the Psalmist reminds us, “Those
who know your Name will put their trust in you, for you never forsake those who
seek you, O LORD.” It’s good not to forget that, in a boat, in an airplane, or
when facing down the giants that challenge us. God never forsakes those who
seek the Lord.
Amen.
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