We turn in our Bibles to the book of Psalms, but Psalm 107. Psalm 107, a little different than in your bulletin. And let's stand together. In a moment, we'll sing Psalm 93. We will read from Psalm 107. And we will begin with verses one through three. We'll skip to verse 23, and then we'll read the last verse. Psalm is Psalm of God's saving mercies. It gives us a series of vignettes or scenes in which that saving mercy is shown. We'll read the theme and we'll pick one of those scenes and then the conclusion. Verse one. Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good, for His mercy endures forever. Let the redeemed of the Lord say so, whom He has redeemed from the hand of the enemy and gathered out of the lands, from the east and from the west, from the north and from the south. Moving to verse 23. Those who go down to the sea in ships, who do business on great waters, they see the works of the Lord and His wonders in the deep. For He commands and raises the stormy wind, which lifts up the waves of the sea. They mount up to the heavens. They go down again to the depths. Their soul melts because of trouble. They reel to and fro and stagger like a drunken man and are at their wit's end. Then they cry out to the Lord in their trouble, and He brings them out of their distresses. He calms the storm so that its waves are still. Then they are glad because they are quiet. So He guides them to their desired haven. Oh, that men would give thanks to the Lord for His goodness and for His wonderful works to the children of men. Let them exalt Him also in the assembly of the people and praise Him in the company of the elders. Whoever is wise will observe these things and they will understand the loving kindness of the Lord. Luke chapter 8 and verse 22. Now it happened on a certain day that he got into a boat with his disciples and he said to them, let us cross over to the other side of the lake and they launched out. But as they sailed, he fell asleep. And a windstorm came down on the lake, and they were filling with water and were in jeopardy. And they came to him and awoke him, saying, Master, Master, we are perishing. Then he arose and rebuked the wind and the raging of the water. And they ceased, and there was a calm. And he said to them, Where is your faith? And they were afraid and marveling, saying to one another, who can this be? For he commands even the winds and the water, and they obey him. The grass withers, the flower fades, and the word of God endures forever. We turn in the word of God to Luke chapter eight. And already in our Old Testament reading, In our singing of Psalm 93, and in our reading of Luke chapter 8, you may have discerned a theme. A theme that is clear in the Scriptures. The theme is the power of God over all that He has made, but especially in Luke chapter 8, that this power belongs to Jesus Christ for He is Lord. And that comes to us by way of an eyewitness report. This eyewitness report of the power of Jesus Christ and the storm in the Sea of Galilee is clearly important in the scriptures. It's important in the following way that we find it in Matthew, Mark, and in Luke. Jesus' disciples clearly thought this to be a very important narrative in giving the answer to the question, who is Jesus Christ? Who is the man, Jesus of Nazareth? Their eyewitness reports, three times over, they have some little differences between them. They give different details, but the event is similar in all three of them. We generally, receive the testimony of eyewitnesses. If you think of how news stories come to us, they usually come to us in the following way. A reporter standing somewhere with a microphone, scene behind them, and they are telling us the story of something that happened. And very often, one of the ways that they tell that story is not only to tell it themselves, but to interview a number of people who have seen the thing. And again, that's exactly what we have here in the Gospels. the eyewitness report with multiple corroborating witnesses of a kind of power and glory belonging to Jesus Christ which sets him apart as different, singularly different from all others who have walked the earth. The claim before us is that Jesus Christ is Almighty God, the Eternal Son. It's implied at the end of the text, for by the end of this scene, all those were afraid and marveled, saying to one another, who can this be? For he commands even the winds and the water, and they obey him." Here is the testimony that Jesus Christ is the eternal Son of God. This is the truth at the heart of Christianity that makes it different from every other religion. Polite society would be happy to call Jesus a good man. with some good ideas like love your neighbor. If that's as far as you go, that's garden variety theological liberalism. The Bible says something else, Jesus is God. Not only says it in this narrative three times, Matthew, Mark, and Luke, but it's actually the way, what is, Jesus is identified here as God, the creator of God, the Lord of all creation. It is the very way that the Gospel of John introduces our Lord Jesus Christ. The eternal Word through whom all things were made. Nothing that was made was made without Him. As a matter of fact, all four Gospels say the same thing. Jesus Christ is the Creator, Lord of the universe. The eternal Son of God. The second person of the Trinity. And because of this, The way you live and walk before Him and what it means to believe in Him should have profound implications for all of life. You can't live with Jesus as Lord over all and not give your all to Him. Submit to Him in every way. Trust His wisdom and His saving power. In this text, His unbounded infinite power is shown to us. It's more like a lightning bolt and a storm. It's a moment. But it's an unmistakable moment. An unmistakable moment that reveals His infinite power. If we go to the text, beginning at verse 22, we're going to look at a few things. We're going to look at the situation, which is a storm at sea. The revelation of Jesus Christ as Lord over all. And then look at lessons for the church of the Lord Jesus Christ. The situation. and then the revelation of Jesus Christ, and then lessons again for the church of the Lord Jesus Christ. First, the situation which is, in a nutshell, we'll see it's a storm at sea, but before we get there, a little bit of our bearings in the Gospel of Luke. Especially here, Jesus is setting the tone and giving the principles of his public ministry in the parable of the sower. We know that in the other Gospels, what happens in the Sea of Galilee happens immediately after he teaches. Matter of fact, the other Gospels he was teaching from a boat, he's at the sea, it's not explicitly mentioned here in this chapter, but he's been teaching about his preaching ministry. He's therefore at the sea. He is ready now to depart, having finished setting before the disciples and the crowds the nature and importance of his preaching. He and his disciples get into a boat. Verse 22, it happened on a certain day. Luke not as concerned with the exact day. He got into a boat with his disciples. It's not uncommon. Peter, James, and John were fishermen. There was, in the 80s, in 1980s, a boat from this era was actually lifted from the Sea of Galilee, and it was shown to be about eight feet wide and 25 feet long. You probably put about 15 people in it. This was not an uncommon craft. It would be able to hold a group of people. They were used for fishing. Peter, James, and John, we know all the way To the end of the Gospel of John, we're still fishermen and likely still had some boats. This is not at all an uncommon scene. It's not, it would have been well known to those around the Sea of Galilee. It would have been an ordinary thing. Jesus and his disciples, therefore, get into the boat. And as they are in the boat, he gives a command, let us cross over the other side of the lake. They launched out and as they sailed, he fell asleep. The lake is about 13 by 8 miles. It's freshwater. It's fed by the Jordan River. It's actually part of the Great Rift Valley that runs all the way down into Mozambique, that Jordan Valley. And it is unusual. It's, I think, about 600 feet below sea level. It is freshwater. Again, it has this fishery. But what's important is that it is in a bowl surrounded by mountains. And in that bowl, it's not uncommon that significant storms can come up. Thunderstorms can quickly develop. As a matter of fact, in the 1990s, there was one where it documented waves over 10 feet tall on the Sea of Galilee. They cross over this lake to the other side and it is one of those storms, verse 23 again, a windstorm came down on the lake. Matthew tells us that it was a great tempest and he uses a Greek word seismos for shaking. It was a shaking of the lake. A strong storm and the mountains funneled the wind. We have a tradition of families from the church camping at Lake Jocassee. We've done that for many years. And if you're familiar with that lake, you have exactly the same effect. The lake is roughly the same size. It's not an oval shape, but it's not been uncommon over the years as our family's been out there that in moments, a windstorm comes over the ridge and whips the lake into a frenzy. And that is what happens at this lake. And again, there's an eyewitness accuracy from a group of disciples who were fishermen who knew the lake. And what happens? As they're in the boat, they start filling with water, which isn't that hard in a boat. You don't need very big waves to fill. It just has to start coming over the side. And once it does, it starts filling. And if it starts filling, you're beginning to sink. And again, our Savior, if you go back to the beginning of the verse, He is sleeping through all of this. He is unperturbed and asleep. The disciples on the other hand, and another thing to remember is that they're fishermen, many of them, they came to him and awoke him saying, master, master, we're perishing. They're in a panic and they know what they're talking about and they have been out there many times. And they are clearly aware that this one won't end well. And two things to notice here about this picture. First, something about Christ. He's sleeping. He has this weariness. He's a man. I said earlier He's God Almighty, but the text just as clearly presents Christ to us as a true man. He needed to eat and He needed to sleep. He's been preaching and teaching constantly, healing, serving, traveling. And in this moment, which you would have hoped, perhaps, had been quiet, if you were one of the disciples, Jesus is weary and to the point where he's sleeping. He's also trusting, apparently, like David. I will lie down and sleep in peace, for you alone, O Lord, make me dwell in safety. True humanity. Remember that. It'll be important later. But a second thing to remember is what it means to follow Jesus. An implied lesson here already. J.C. Ryle says this, Christ's service does not exempt his servants from the storms of life. You follow Christ and it will involve perplexing danger. The boat was filling with water and they were in jeopardy. The word there is danger. Danger of dying. If you go back to verse 22, you need to remember, let us cross over to the other side of the lake. They were following the Lord Jesus Christ. It's similar to Psalm 23, where we think of being led by still waters and green pastures. He leads me for his own name's sake, but the next verse, verse four, yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, still following the good shepherd. They're following the good shepherd and they're in the storm. And they have questions and fears, and they don't understand, and they are losing sight of Christ. They're forgetting who He is and what He's already done, that He has raised the dead and healed the sick and cast out demons and preached with authority. They are forgetting already in chapter 5 that when He told them to fish, there was a miracle such that Peter said, I am a sinful man, that He had power over nature. And in this sort of frenzy, in the storm, They are crying out to Jesus, waking him up, Master, Master, we are perishing. Years ago, I was on a sailboat in Lake Erie with a few friends, actually, Loralee and I, and we had all our kids on board, their kids and our kids, and it was about a 30-foot sailboat, and we got out of the break wall into the open lake, and we realized that these waves were way too big to have small children on board. So we turned around, as men are perhaps prone to do, dropped off the children. And then we went sailing. And it was glorious. And 30-foot boat, we were coming down the waves, and the bow would be deep under the water, and we would catch the top of the next wave. But it was also immediately evident that the powers that existed were so much greater than anything we could ever do. And the front sail snapped out, and we had to pull that in. And we made it back fine, but just the edge of a storm. Power. So great. If it was a little more, we might have been crying out. We're perishing. They're at the point where they believe they're perishing. And they know the water. They know this place. It's at that point that we have the revelation of Jesus Christ as Sovereign Lord. What does He do? It came to Him and awoke Him. Master, master, we are perishing. Then he arose, that means he awoke. The Greek word means to awake from sleep. He heard their cries, he awoke, the first action there. And then he rebuked the wind and the raging of the water. Familiarity with biblical narratives makes us perhaps read sentences that should jump out at us without the proper care and concern that we should have for them. He's speaking to the wind. He's talking to the water. And he's doing it with authority, and he's rebuking. He is arresting. He is stopping. the motion of his own creation. You would think, think about back to the sailboat that we were on years ago, all of us could have said all the words we had in the world, nothing would happen. Second thing is if one of us had begun to speak that way, you would know that that man was either a fool or a proud fool. but not Jesus. He rebukes the wind and the waves, and we read immediately, and they ceased, and there was a calm. This should be electrifying, to speak into the cosmos. and arrest the motion of the storm. And there have been some, again, liberal commentators that said, well, storms whip up and end quickly on the Sea of Galilee. Waves don't, and quickly, there's a calm, there's a supernatural, instantaneous obedience of the natural creation to the Lord of Glory. And what is being revealed here? That He is the Creator, the Lord of Glory. That with a Word, He is causing the waves to cease. That His Word actually has this kind of authority. Going back to what we just read from Psalm 107, He commands and raises the stormy wind, and then He calms the storm so that its waves are still. Psalm 104, verses 5 through 9, we have a similar matter. You laid the foundations of the earth so that it should not be moved. This is an extended meditation on the creation week. You covered it with the deep as with a garment. The water stood above the mountains. At Your rebuke they fled. At the voice of Your thunder they hastened away." And that's the description of the separation of dry land and seas. The Word of God reverberates in history and the natural creation obeys instantaneously. He is the One who has the power and Him alone with a Word. He is saying, I am the Maker of the heavens and the earth. All these things belong to Me. They obey Me. And he's saying more. He's saying, you are seeing the glory of the covenant God of Israel. I am Yahweh. I am who I am. I am the one who sent the waters of the flood and caused them to recede. I am the one who divided the Red Sea and then drowned the Egyptians. I am the one who divided the Jordan River and Israel passed through on dry ground. I am no ordinary man, though I sleep in the boat tired. I am also God Almighty. I am the God-man. And the Psalms celebrate this. We just sang a few moments ago from Psalm 93. It is this imagery. of His power and the power of God, especially over the mighty waves of the sea. Psalm 93, the floods have lifted up, O Lord. The floods have lifted up their voice. The floods lift up their waves. But the Lord on high is mightier than the noise of many waters, than the mighty waves of the sea. He reigns with majesty. He is clothed with strength. Only God can do this. God alone. It's also interesting that in Psalm 89, the psalm that tells us of the Davidic covenant and the coming Davidic king, that these same powers belong to Him, given by the Lord God of hosts. O Lord God of hosts, who is like You, O Lord? Your faithfulness surrounds You. You rule the raging of the sea. When its waves rise, You still them. The heavens are yours, the earth is yours, the world in all its fullness, you have founded them. There's another place in the scriptures, perhaps an illustration of the same power that belongs to God, not in the poetic form of the Psalms or in the language of the prophets. I could think of Isaiah 17. How about Jonah? He's worth remembering here for a couple of reasons. We'll get to it in a moment, but do you remember what happened when he was running from the ward? He was sleeping in a boat and he was found to be sinning and he was thrown overboard. Immediately, there was a great calm. And what did the sailors do? They worshiped. They recognized something supernatural had happened. Jesus here is demonstrating divine power over the waves of the sea. I am God Almighty, Yahweh, Creator, God of the Covenant. In the response of the disciples, verse 25, they were afraid and marveled and said to one another, who can this be? I referenced earlier, chapter 5. Simon Peter answered to Jesus after he said, let down your nets for a catch. He said, we've toiled all night and caught nothing. Nevertheless, at your word, I will let the net down. Verse six, they had done this. They caught a great number of fish. They signaled to their partners to come, filled the boats, began to sink. When Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus' knees saying, depart from me, for I'm a sinful man. Why did he say this? He said it because like Isaiah when he saw the glory of God, I am a man of unclean lips. I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips. My eyes have seen the glory of the Lord. Here we come face to face with a flash of the glory of Jesus Christ. The man who slept, I said a moment ago, is no mere man. He's a complex person. He has all power over nature, over history. Complete, infinite, in every facet of the existence of the universe, Jesus Christ is King and Lord over it and obeys Him. This is unabashed supernaturalism. This is the testimony of those who lived and walked and were on the boat with Jesus Christ. This is one of the things that makes Jesus a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense. Because if you know Him, You must worship Him. There's no other way. If you know Him, you must worship Him as God alone. This kind of eyewitness account of His power. And the natural man will suppress, reject, and deny. Because to think otherwise means that if you were encountering Christ, your life would be in the hands of the living God. And that would require worship. The testimony of all the historical accounts of those closest to Jesus Christ is that he turns water into wine, he feeds the 5,000, he raises the dead, he casts out demons, he preaches with authority, he stills the sea, he directs the fish of the sea. And this is just a glimpse of his power. This is just one momentary lightning bolt from the one who is in his state of humiliation. Shrouded glory. This is also necessary power. For without this power, there would be no redemption. There would be no cross. There would be no atonement. There would be no new creation, a new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells. And one day, you will see this power without restraint in the exalted Jesus Christ. What are some of the things that we can learn from the lesson of the storm. There's a huge lesson here, a lesson of the Christian life, perhaps not the first lesson that you would think. Jesus Christ is Sovereign Lord of the Universe. That's the first lesson here. Jesus Christ is Sovereign Lord of the Universe. But I want to ask you a question going back to the text. Where would you go to learn this in the text? That seems obvious having just preached its revelation. But you might think that the first revelation is when He arose and rebuked the wind and the raging of the water, but that's not what our Savior thought. The mistake you might make that would go with this mistake would be Jesus can make the storms of your life go away, which is not entirely wrong, It doesn't capture what's being communicated here. Look at verse 25. They ceased, there was a calm at the end of verse 24, but he said to them, where is your faith? What is he doing? Why were you afraid in the first place? Why did you not understand? Why were you afraid when I was sleeping? That's what he's asking. Why were you panicking that you were perishing? For I was in the boat with you, the Lord of the universe. I was already there. As a matter of fact, the first place that Jesus expects his disciples to trust is sovereignty. And when you go back in the text, look what he said. Let us cross over to the other side of the lake so that you might enter the storm with me. Going back to Jonah, why was there a storm? Because the Lord hurled the storm. That's what Jonah says in Jonah chapter 1. Because the sovereign Lord of the universe was Lord of the storm before He was Lord of the calm. It's no different with Jesus. Why was Jesus sleeping? Indeed, I will lay down and rest for You alone, O Lord, make me dwell in safety. It's what David says in the early Psalms, if there's 10,000 around me, I will still sleep. Because you are with me, Lord. Here they have the second person of the Trinity, God incarnate with them. And he's teaching them this, when I was sleeping, I was calling you to exercise faith in me. For I am the God who never slumbers or sleeps. is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. J.C. Ryle would write, what is the profit of believing if we don't believe in a time of need? The Lord of glory is in the boat. He is the one who led them across to the other side. He is the Lord of the storm. Nothing is outside of His divine power. As a matter of fact, every storm that has ever happened in history, or the storms you may be presently experiencing in this life, are also under the hand of the Sovereign God. Mysteriously, unmistakably, perfectly, wisely, they flow from the same hand. This is the first lesson on sovereignty in the text. is His indisputable rule over all. It was clear the disciples understood this, implied who can this be for He commands even the winds and the water and they obey Him. What God imposes, only God can repeal. Humble yourself. Back to Jonah. Thrown in. Calm. Worship. The Lord made the storm. The Lord stilled the storm. We worship. We trust Him all the way through. Some of you may be asking this morning, where is God in my suffering, my pain, and the storm I'm presently in? Here's the answer, He's Lord of the storm, He's Lord of the calm. He's Lord over all. If you follow Him, you'll be both. You'll be both. The question Christ is pressing is where is your faith? He is not unaware of your tears and cries for mercy. And he will answer them like he answered the disciples. But if you're in a storm, he brought you there. And if you're in a storm, only he can bring you out. He's sovereign. Second lesson, Christ in the place of sinners. I've been bringing up Jonah a number of times, and it's interesting that our Lord Jesus Christ When he points to an Old Testament narrative that would explain his three days from the cross to the resurrection, he says that's the sign of Jonah who was in the fish. And in so doing, he says that this Old Testament prophet who is a sinner and Jesus is not, that his life and ministry and call in some way are a template for our understanding of Jesus Christ. And I've already hinted at this, but it was Jonah who was asleep in a storm. It was Jonah who was awakened by sailors who were perishing. It was Jonah who was thrown into the storm. And it was Jonah who was saved in a picture of resurrection. And hear this God-man Jesus Christ. The Lord of the storm subjects Himself to the storm. The Lord of the storm in His humiliation enters into this cursed world. The Lord of the cosmos enters into the cosmos and is subject to the storm. Subject to all the miseries of this life. And one day death. As the fullness of the storms of the wrath of God would sweep over Him. Which would call forth ultimately at the cross for His unbounded power. So that He would be the propitiation of our sins, not only ours only, but the world. And then rise again with the sign of Jonah from the dead. Here is an intimation. of Christ for us and with us. He's the man in the storm and he's the holy, holy, holy Lord God Almighty. The whole earth is full of his glory. Together making the suitable, substitute, infinitely powerful mediator that you need in order that you would be delivered and rescued from your sins and brought through the storm to the other side. Christ in our place. It also means that when you pray to Him from the storm, He is a sympathetic High Priest. He knows, for He entered into it. There is no storm that you can find yourself in, including the ultimate coming storm, which is the judgment of God, not met in Christ. and for which, as you cry to him, Master, I am perishing, in your weakness and fear, where he does not have the answer for your redemption in himself." Third lesson, Christ is the Prince of Peace. There's a deeper imagery to storms in the scriptures, and it's not an uncommon one. Conflict, striving powers. Years ago, I was in Santa Cruz, California, walking by myself above the cliffs, and there were these beautiful sets of waves coming in. I saw them come in from the ocean on the smooth water, and they would slowly rise and build and then slam against the cliffs. And it felt like those waves were so powerful that they could shake the ground. It was a loud sound and feeling of impact as the spray went into the air. A kind of power that no one could stop, they just keep rolling in. This picture of power, the mighty waves of the sea which we read in the scriptures, predominantly and often is a picture of the striving and rebellion of humanity against God. Now that brings a mystery. Some have posited that like Job, the storm on the sea was one of Satan's attacks on Christ and the disciples. We don't know. But surely Christ's, and that under the sovereignty of God, still under the Lord of the storm. But we know that the storms of life, the striving only comes because of sin and rebellion. And the imagery we often read in the scriptures is imagery like we find in Psalm 65. You who still the noise of the seas, the noise of their waves, the tumult of the peoples, They who dwell in the farthest parts are afraid of your signs. You make the outgoings of the morning and the evening rejoice. Isaiah chapter 5 and verse 30 has the same idea. That the nations and their strivings are like the waves of the sea. And that day, the nations will roar against Israel like the roaring of the sea. If one looks to the land, behold, darkness and sorrow. The light is darkened by the clouds. There's this roaring, striving of rebellion. If you read our Savior's own words in Luke chapter 24, he says that the striving and raging of the seas is a picture of the rebellion of the world against God. He says this in his Olivet Discourse. The symbolic nature of the raging wave, Psalm 93 is the same thing, is that of warfare between good and evil. Now back to your place, maybe your sufferings in the storms of life. The disciples understood that to follow Christ, I said this earlier, is to enter storms. Dear friends, do not be surprised at the painful trial, the suffering you experienced. Peter writes, as though something strange was happening, perhaps he recalled. And he knew that Christ was the Lord over pain and evil, over the raging seas. He knew the mission and ultimate purpose of God was to still the sea. As a matter of fact, in Revelation chapter four, there's this beautiful picture of the throne of God, Christ at the right hand. There was a sea like crystal, smooth as glass. No more raging, no more storms. A place of peace purchased by Christ. You ever known peace and tranquility in your heart and life? Jesus came to calm the storm, to bring peace. Peace I leave with you, my peace I give to you, not as the world gives, he says. Do not let your heart be troubled, nor be afraid. I came to bring peace. He's the prince of peace. Maybe you're here this morning and you don't have peace. A bad conscience because of repeated sins, that would rob you of all your peace and make you afraid of the almighty power of God and the judge of all the earth, Jesus Christ. You wouldn't have peace. A bitter relationship or stateness stirred someone up against you. You wouldn't have peace. A love of the world and the things of the world, you would not have peace. What is peace? What kind of peace did Jesus come to bring? Inner tranquility, the peace that comes from peace of conscience and knowing that you have been loved with an everlasting love by God through Jesus Christ, his son. And by virtue of his cross work and resurrection, all your sins washed away. That will give you inward tranquility, the peace that Jesus came to give. But he does more. He himself is our peace. He breaks down the middle wall of separation. He gives us peace and tranquility in relationships. And he does more. He promises to bring peace to the world. And even more, as the natural, the ruler over the natural creation, he promises one day to transform all of creation, including the natural realm, so all vestiges of the curse are gone, and there is perfect harmony between God and man, man and man, and even man and beast, Isaiah says in Isaiah chapter 11. A new creation by virtue of the Redeemer creator, characterized by perfect peace, shalom, safety on every side. He will bind Satan and the demons. He will cause the saints to range with Him. He will punish all sin. He will eradicate all rebellion. He will fill the world with the knowledge of God as the waters cover the sea, and the wolf and the lamb, and the calf and the lion, and the child and the snake. And a new world will live at peace. He is the Prince of Peace. You remember what the angel sang earlier in this gospel? Glory to God in the highest, on earth, goodwill, peace toward men. That's what Christ came to give. He's the peacemaker. The only way to that peace is to have Christ in your heart. It wasn't enough to have Christ in the boat. You're here in a worship service where we worship Jesus Christ as Lord of all. The word is near you. Christ speaks. The key question that Jesus asked his disciples was, where is your faith that you might have Christ in you and so have peace? He was in the boat, but not in their hearts, so they were afraid. One side of a faithless heart It's always trouble, fear and unrest, and fitfulness, and you need distractions. Let me press your heart. It would be a tragedy, again, to have Christ so near, so close in the Word today, but not in your heart. Run to Him and believe that He has the power, the love, the saving mercy, the perfect qualifications as the God-man. And now His finished work to bring you peace forever. And pray to Him, Lord, forgive my sins, carry me through the storms of this life, and speak peace to my heart by Your Gospel. Lord, I believe. Maybe you're a believer in a storm. It happens to believers. In Psalm 42, the psalmist confessed, all your waves and billows have gone over me. I am sinking. Psalm 69, the same language. Maybe He has you in a storm. Maybe you're like Jonah who quoted those words when he was going down into the depths. The waves and billows of God are pressing me down hard. Again, J.C. Ryle, what is the point of believing if we don't believe in a time of need? Believe Him, trust Him. You don't even need the storm to end now. You might not. Some people die of drowning, believers. But if they die believing in this Jesus everlasting life, that's what he's saying. He's saying, this is who I am for sinners. This is what I came to do. I'll bring you to the sea of crystal before the throne and all your storms will be gone forever. Again, Ryle, the Christian so sees Jesus beside him in his darkest hour, always believing that beyond the clouds is the blue sky of his grace, glory, and peace. So pray the same way. Lord, forgive my sins, carry me through the storms of life, and bring me to heaven's shore. Speak peace to my heart, Lord Jesus. Let's pray. Lord our God, we are thankful for your word, which is so clear, which testifies to us of your grace and glory, Father, in your Son, condescending to us in our weakness, sin, and pain. And we long for the better day when all sadnesses are gone, when our fears are forever banished. But Lord, we pray that while you carry us through this often stormy life, that you would fix our eyes in true faith on Jesus Christ, looking to him for redemption, life, and peace now and forever. And we pray in Jesus' name, amen. But go now with the blessing of the triune God. The Lord bless you and keep you. The Lord make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you. The Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you his peace, amen.