Standing in the Storms of Life (2 of 2)

Mike Connell

Page 4 of 6
So you've got to understand, can you imagine someone walking out across Napier Harbour? Can you imagine someone walking across the Westshore area there? Can you just imagine how scary and freaky that is, to see something like that happening? It's just very scary. Now the disciples are absolutely exhausted, it's the middle of the night; so miracle number one, Jesus shows His dominion over nature, total authority over the law of gravity, and He's walking on water. Miracle number one.

Miracle number two, the second thing it tells us, is that when He got into the boat, immediately the wind just stopped. Now you know how gusty it was last night. Have you ever been in a storm where it's just going; and it suddenly just seems like it stops? It's not very often you have that happen, but it's like; there's this eerie - so you get it in a hurricane, when you get to the eye of the hurricane, and then it suddenly it's just still. Now you're in the eye of the hurricane, and it's about to start up again; but it wasn't like that. What happened was, the winds are blowing and blowing and blowing; and suddenly it just stops. All winds stop. They were amazed. What man is this, that has that kind of power? So there's miracle number two, He can control the weather. You would be amazed when we do missions, outreaches in Uganda and places like that, how often the moment you get into preaching the gospel, the weather suddenly changes; because occult people stir up spirits, stir up witchcraft.

I remember in Uganda there, man it was scary. You want to see the kind of wiring they had. They had this generator over here, and bare wires. They put sellotape around them, and they had the lights all going there, and then it just poured down like that; and I'm thinking: man, I don't want to step in the water, I'll get electrocuted somewhere; but it happened exactly at the altar call. The moment we come to the altar call, been no sign of rain, suddenly [pa-doompa!] down the rain came, and it just pummelled down, just drove everyone away. So we had to pray each night to restrain the heavens, so that there'd be no rain that would destroy our attempts to bring the gospel to people; and we saw that each night, God held it back for us.

So Jesus demonstrated His total authority over creation, over the wind. What man can stop wind? No one can. Now the third thing that happens, you read this in the gospel of John. Once Jesus got in the boat, and the winds stopped, here's the third thing that happened. Immediately, the boat was on the other side. Now if you don't read all three accounts of the gospel, you don't get it. There's one more thing that you'll need to read in a moment; so three amazing miracles! One, He walks on water; two, the wind ceases, the moment He's in the boat; and three, immediately the boat is transported. Remember the nine hours rowing, and they're only half way? Then when Jesus gets in the boat, it's there.

The nearest thing you find to that, is the example of Philip; where Philip is preaching, and suddenly he's gone, and he turns up somewhere else. It's called transportation - physically literally shifted from one location to another. That is the power Jesus has. All creation yields to His power. That's why He said: all authority of heaven and earth is given to Me, I have all authority, authority over the laws of nature; because when heaven invades earth, heaven's authority is greater than anything in the earth. It's most amazing, so God is able to do creative miracles. He's able to restrain nature. He's able to overcome natural laws. He's able to accelerate things. He's able to increase things. He's able to move you quickly from one place to another. He's able to do those things.