It has been said that every person is either going into a storm, in the middle of a storm, or coming out of a storm.

It’s kind of hard to argue against that statement, isn’t it? 

As much as we really don’t like storms they are an inevitable part of life for everyone.

The last word of the last sentence is extremely important so please read it again.

Everyone, including those who follow Christ, experience storms. Just because we are going the direction Christ would have us to go does not mean we will never find ourselves in the eye of a storm. 

In fact, Jesus very candidly told us to expect troubled seas in this life.  In John 16:33 Jesus said, “In this world you will have trouble”.  Not exactly the promise we wanted Jesus to make. We would much rather Jesus had made us this promise, “In this world you might have trouble” or “in this world you will only have trouble if you don’t follow me”. 

That’s not the promise Jesus made to us though. Jesus promised us problems, without exception. No one, including those walking closest to Jesus, are storm exempt. 

We find an example of this in Matthew 8:23-24: “Then Jesus got into the boat and his disciples followed him. Without warning, a furious storm came up on the lake, so that the waves swept over the boat”. 

The disciples followed Jesus into the boat and a storm followed the disciples into the boat Share on X. 

The disciples weren’t expecting a storm to follow them when they were following Jesus and neither do we.

 We might expect to encounter high winds and waves when we run from Jesus but not when we remain with Him.

Yet there is no escaping the fact that the disciples encountered the storm while they were with Jesus which means we won’t be escaping all the storms of life either.  

There will be days when we follow Jesus out of our house and without warning will find ourselves in the middle of a storm. When that happens we need to remember that while Jesus may not cause the storm in our life He will always use it in our life to develop us into mature disciples of faith. James 1:2-4 says: “Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything”. 

 James says, “the testing of our faith develops perseverance” which eventually leads to mature faith. 

None of us want to experience the storms of life but the reality is that our faith can never grow stronger unless it is tested and the storms of life test our faith.

I don’t believe that Jesus caused this storm in the disciples life but I do believe He used it in their life to test their faith because He wanted them to develop persevering faith that would grow into mature faith. 

Matthew tells us that when the disciples found themselves in the middle of the storm they went and found Jesus who was sleeping in the boat. They wake Jesus up and say to Him, “Lord, save us! We’re going to drown! Jesus replies, You of little faith, why are you so afraid?” (vv.25-26)

When the disciples faith was tested it was found to be lacking and not complete. Perseverance had not finished its work within them. They still had a few more storms to go through to get them to the faithful shore. As long as they kept following Jesus, though, it would be a journey they would for sure complete. 

Storms are not the classroom we would choose to enter to have our faith tested but we need to recognize that Jesus uses storms as part of His discipleship training.  Therefore, the next time we find ourselves in a storm we need to become a student of the storm and discover the area of life our faith needs to be further developed. 

Put simply: When we find ourselves in a storm we need to keep rowing in faith so that we can keep growing in faith. 

What storm is Jesus using in your life right now to develop your spiritual maturity? 

©2016 Travis L. Edwards. All Rights Reserved