Weekly HOMILY for June 21, 2009: Overcoming the Storms in Your Life

12th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle B
Our Lady of Grace
June 21, 2009

Overcoming the Storms in Your Life
By (Rev. Msgr.) Nicholas P. Amato


Imaging the Storm

I would like to begin my homily this (evening) (morning) with you creating in your imagination the storm on the Sea of Galilee that we just heard expressed in the Gospel.

If you feel comfortable closing your eyes for a moment, while I try to describe it, please do so.

It is a sunny bright afternoon and the Sea is as tranquil as a pond on a summer’s day.

The Gospel tells us that “It happened that a bad squall blew up. The waves were breaking over the boat.”

Imagine if you will, as often happens in Galilee, a cold front of dark ominous clouds moves in quickly over the Lake and part of the sky darkens and beneath the winds begin to howl and the water becomes chopped. Soon the downpour begins.

What had been a calm, viable sea all of a sudden becomes a dangerous threat to life as choppy waters lash against the small 24-foot fishing boat and it is caught up in the tumult. It begins shifting to and fro, tossed about by the winds.

Water begins to fill the boat, as bolts of lightening illumine the sky. The Disciples begin to fear for their lives.

Jesus sleeps in the stern, apparently unaware of or unperturbed by the storm; the Disciples, on the other hand, are frantic.

Please open your eyes.

The storm on the Sea of Galilee you saw is a symbol of the storms in our own lives, storms that have to do with our own sense of drowning, going under for the last time, or overwhelm, reaching the end of our rope – call it what you will.

What we see in the dialogue between Jesus and the Disciples in the midst of their storm is a three-fold progression into a deepening relationship with him as their “Savior at Sea.”

I would like to suggest that if we go through that same three-fold progression, we might attain the same sense of being saved from our own storm, as were the Disciples.


We Question

Let’s give it a try and begin with the first step of the progression.

Once the Disciples know that they are in trouble, they do reach out to the Lord albeit in panic. “Teacher, doesn’t it matter to you that we are going to drown” they frantically call out to him.

For us, in our own particular “drowning situation,” it may be the statement:

➢ “Doesn’t it matter that the one I loved has died?”

➢ “Doesn’t it matter that my life has been turned upside down by this divorce, this love, this sickness, this struggle, this problem?”

➢ “Doesn’t it matter that I’ve lost my job, my pension, my investment income after all these years of faithful service to my company.”

Well, the response to that from the Lord is, “Yes, my friend, it does matter!”

It matters greatly to our God when one of his beloved is frightened, scared, or upset.

But let us quickly add that sometimes that turmoil is needed in life, that at times, we need a “perfect storm” to blow through our life, clearing out the cobwebs of over-control, of presumption, of self-righteousness, of selfishness.

We need our precious self-control to be utterly frustrated so we can fall backwards into the arms of the “Sender of the Storm” who will become the “Savior in the Storm.”


Jesus Acts

A second progression of being saved from our storms is hearing Jesus’ rebuke of the wind and the sea when he cries out, “Quiet!”

When storms rage across the boat of your life and mine, and everything turns upside down, we need to be assured that our cry was heard and Jesus will call out in our storm.

We need to hear him say: “Be still, chaos!” “Leave him, anxiety and fear!” “Dispel her darkness!” “Grant them peace in their loss.” “Be lifted depression!”

And as we hear him, we need to let go of it all, to forget our preconceptions and our plans, to yield to the divine energy surging through us.

Do not fight or resist it. Stop struggling in the water; float with it! Trust that God’s word is enough to quell the winds and the sea.

Yes, there is a risk, but we need to trust it!


We Trust

The third and final progression in being saved at Sea is to hear Jesus’ words to each of us in the midst of our storm, “Why are you so terrified, Father Nicholas? Why are you so lacking in faith?”

To be able to make this act of trust in the midst of our storm, we need to know in our heads and trust with our hearts that Jesus would never leave us alone.

We need to know from our own past experiences that God holds all things in his hands and he now holds us as he has in the past.

Only then will our terror and fear dissolve in the warm embrace of God’s arms.

Yes, God holds us. Yes, God is with us. Yes, God is the river we float in, leading us to inevitable glory.


Conclusion

God is the master of all storms. God is the one who allows whirlwinds to rage in our lives from time to time.

But God is also sunshine after the rain. And God is the one who brings newfound peace in new waters of new places in life.

We question Jesus. Jesus acts. And Jesus questions us.