He Was Asleep on a Pillow

The crossing was His idea.

That is the first thing, and it is easy to miss because it is in the setup rather than in the drama.

And the same day, when the even was come, he saith unto them, Let us pass over unto the other side.Mark 4:35, King James Version

He said it. They were not out there on a whim, and they had not wandered off course, and nobody in that boat had made a poor decision about the weather. Mark 4:35 has Jesus proposing the trip and Mark 4:36 has them taking Him even as he was in the ship, which reads as a man too tired to be handled carefully.

So the storm in this passage arrives on an obedient course. Whatever else is true about it, it is not a consequence of anybody going the wrong way.

Then the wind.

And there arose a great storm of wind, and the waves beat into the ship, so that it was now full.Mark 4:37, King James Version

Now full. Not taking water. Full. And these are men who know that lake, several of them professionally, which means the fear in this boat is not amateur fear. When a fisherman on his own water thinks it is over, it is a serious night.

And then the detail that only Mark gives us.

Mark keeps the cushion in

Here is the sentence.

And he was in the hinder part of the ship, asleep on a pillow: and they awake him, and say unto him, Master, carest thou not that we perish?Mark 4:38, King James Version

Asleep on a pillow.

Matthew has Him sleeping. Luke has Him sleeping. Mark tells us where He was in the boat and what was under His head. It is the kind of detail somebody remembers because they saw it, and the early church consistently understood Mark's Gospel to be carrying Peter's memory, and Peter was in that boat.

Two things sit in that cushion.

The first is that this is a genuinely tired man. Not a man performing calm to make a point. He had taught all day from a boat, He got in that evening even as he was, and He was asleep at the back on the steersman's cushion before the weather turned.

The second is that the sleeping is not indifference. It looks exactly like indifference from where the disciples are standing, and that is precisely what they say.

You are not on a course you chose alone. Mark 4:35 has Him proposing the crossing before any wind arrives, and it is the Holy Spirit who keeps that fact standing when the weather makes it look like a mistake.

Now their question, because they do not ask what we would expect.

Master, carest thou not that we perish?

That is not save us. It is not even a request. It is an accusation with a question mark on it, and it is aimed at His character rather than at His power. They do not doubt He could do something. They doubt He minds.

And He does not scold them for the wording. He gets up and speaks to the wind.

You have been allowed to ask the accusing version of the question, and Mark keeps it in the sentence exactly as it was said. The written word records carest thou not rather than a tidier prayer, and the same Spirit who preserved that wording is the reason your version does not have to be improved first.

Then the calm.

And he arose, and rebuked the wind, and said unto the sea, Peace, be still. And the wind ceased, and there was a great calm.Mark 4:39, King James Version

And then the thing that always stops me. Read what happens to them after the sea goes flat.

And they feared exceedingly, and said one to another, What manner of man is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?Mark 4:41, King James Version

They were more frightened after the storm than during it.

During the storm they were afraid of drowning, which is an ordinary fear with a known shape. Afterward they were afraid of Him, because a man who talks to weather is a category they do not have.

You have been in a boat with somebody whose calm turned out to be more startling than the storm. Mark 4:41 says they feared exceedingly after the wind dropped, and it is His Spirit who makes that a comfort rather than a curiosity, because it means the peace in that boat was never ordinary.

Now the sentence in verse forty, and I want to handle it carefully, because it is often used to beat people.

Why are ye so fearful? how is it that ye have no faith?

I am not going to hand you that as a rebuke, and here is why: it is asked from inside the boat. He is not standing on the shore evaluating their performance in weather He is not in. He was in the same water, on the same course, going to the same far side, and He asks the question soaked.

You were never being marked from the shore, and the question in verse forty comes from somebody in the same boat. Mark 4:38 puts Him in the hinder part of the ship rather than anywhere else, and the same Spirit who kept Him in the boat is the reason nothing in this passage is said down at anybody.