June 21, 2009
Grace Church
Rev. Robert E. Hensley

1 Samuel 17:[1a. 4-11. 19-23] 32-49; Psalm 9:9-20; 2 Corinthians 6:1-13; Mark 4:35-41

      Let us pray.  O God, when the storms of life rage all around us, may your Spirit steady us. We know the power of the wind; we have seen the devastation that it can cause.  Help us always to stay steady in the storm. Help us also to remember that when the storms do come, many suffer. Show us ways to respond to those in need. Remind us that those who suffer from the storms the most are always the poor and oppressed. Keep us steady, Lord, and fill us anew with the power and promise of your Holy Spirit. Amen. 

      A man and his wife were sitting in the living room one evening and he said to her, “Just so you know, I never want to live in a vegetative state, dependent on some machine and fluids from a bottle. If that ever happens, just pull the plug.” 

      Taking him at his word, his wife got up, unplugged the TV and dumped all of his beer down the drain. 

      Our word for this morning is “Trust”. 

      You may not know this, but “trust” now comes in a bottle.  
There is a lab in New York City lab that claims to have bottled trust.  They say that: “After showering in the morning simply spray a squirt or two of odorless Liquid Trust onto your skin, and then the people you meet during the next few hours will trust you without their knowing why they trust you.” 

      Conventional wisdom and common sense would tell you that this is nuts. Sounds weird. One whiff and strangers will automatically trust you? 

      No way! 

      Say that you have a speech to give to Congress tomorrow and want them all to believe you? Spray on Liquid Trust. Do you want your boss to believe you? Dab on Liquid Trust. Do you want to sell that beat-up old car out behind your house for more than it’s worth to a tourist? Use Liquid Trust. 

      You might wonder that it is that is in Liquid Trust. Vero Labs profess that they bottle the naturally occurring and odorless hormone oxcytocin. Oxcytocin is the actual scientifically proven elixir of trust.  It in fact a naturally occurring human hormone that plays a significant role in childbirth, breast-feeding and romantic love. It turns out that trusting people involves both biology and chemistry. 

      In the June, 2005, issue of the venerated journal, Nature, a team of scientists from the University of Zurich published their findings showing that inhaling a nasal spray containing the highly uncommon scent, oxcytocin, makes humans significantly more trusting. Using 128 participants researchers created an investment game in which “investors” were asked to trust their money with anonymous “trustees.” Half of the “investors” were nasally administered three puffs of the hormone oxcytocin. Half of those who puffed invested. Among those who did not inhale the spray, only a quarter invested. Oxcytocin doesn’t make you nicer, or optimistic, or willing to gamble, they say; it just increases trusting behavior.  

      Just.  At $50 a bottle, would you trust the company that’s selling trust in a bottle?  It does sound like a guaranteed moneymaker for a door-to-door sales rep hawking the stuff, as long as she is wearing Liquid Trust. Some folks are warning that trust in a bottle could be an ill wind that’s sure to be misused by Don Juans and crooks.  

      But here’s the thing: What is it – really – that causes us to place our trust in someone or in some thing? Common sense tells us that trust is not just about a scent; trust has got to be more than a chemical. 

      Even your average uneducated fisherman knows this. Especially when they are in a small boat on a big sea. Ill winds at night on the Sea of Galilee can rise with terrifying suddenness and create the perfect storm. Violent storm winds that come off the Golan Heights get trapped in that large freshwater basin and can be deadly even to the most experienced of fishermen. For fishermen in smallish ancient boats, the waters of the Sea of Galilee could grow disturbingly, dangerously and immediately immense.  

      As recently as 1992, a windstorm raised 10-foot waves that crashed into the town of Tiberius causing significant damage there. Ten-foot waves are enormous and deadly, especially when you are in a small sailboat that is only four and a half feet high from the bottom of the keel to the top of the rails (gunnels). This size boat might well be the type of boat Jesus and his friends were in that fateful night.  

      In 1986, during a drought in Galilee, the bones of an ancient boat were uncovered. Carbon dating placed its age between 100 B.C. and A.D. 100, right in the middle of Jesus’ time.   At 26 feet in overall length and seven feet in the beam (its widest point) the boat could fit 15 persons, including a helmsman and a crew of four. It would take a boat that size to haul Jesus and his crew from one shore to another.  

      These boats, once common on the Sea of Galilee, had a single mast rigged with a yard-arm from which hung a square sail. These nearly flat-bottomed boats sailed well before the wind and terribly into it. Jesus’ crew was skilled fisherman and knew what they were doing. These were seamen sailing a trustworthy boat with which they were most likely familiar, and probably was even owned by one of them. These men understood the waters, the wind and the shoreline. They could handle themselves and their boat whenever the weather went from calm to horrendous. In the dark of that night, perhaps they dropped (removed) their square sail when the wind kicked up. Maybe four strong-backed fishermen/disciples took to the oars and began confidently to row a course that could, with the help of the helmsmen – in a power struggle with the wind and sea – save the boat, as well as their lives.  

      Meanwhile, the winds raged and increased, tossing the boat about on angry white-topped waves, all the while astern of the helmsman Jesus slept soundly and comfortably cuddled on a wet deck on a soaking soft cushion. Maybe all self-trust of the fishermen, maybe all their skill, was suddenly washed overboard in mounting, terrifying and smashing seas. They had reason to believe they were headed to the bottom. 

      Now if you were in a boat in a raging sea, who would you trust? Who would you want to be there? Would it be sailors of lifelong experience or a city boy sleeping in the hold?  

      Isn’t this the dilemma we face today? Are we willing and ready to trust a sleeping Jesus? 

      When I’m in the doctor’s office awaiting a diagnosis, am I willing to trust a sleeping Jesus? 

      When I’m in the middle of a bitter dispute, am I willing to trust a sleeping Jesus? 

      When I’m making a change in my career path, am I willing to trust a sleeping Jesus? 

      A Jesus on the road to Jerusalem I might be able to trust. 

      A Jesus opening the eyes of the blind I might be able to trust. 

      A Jesus teaching the Torah to a crowd on a hillside I might be able to trust. 

      A Jesus rebuking the Pharisees I might be able to trust. 

      But – a sleeping Jesus? 

      I don’t know…I don’t think so. 

      If the tormented sea and waves actually were two feet tall that night, or even eight, we can understand the fear in the gruff, bass voices of the sea-worthy disciples when they awakened Jesus, saying, “Teacher! The boat’s going down. Don’t you care?” 

      To which he eventually replied, “What’re you afraid of? Where’s your trust in me?” But before he said those words, he spoke loudly, shouting out into the storm, out into the night, saying to the wind and water, “Peace! Be still!”  

      At his words, as you know, the wind dropped and the seas flattened. His men were stunned. The seascape went from tempest to calm in the breath of a few words. The loud howling wind ceased. Roaring waves vanished. Their boat bobbed. The men stopped their shouting. There was no noise. All was silent. All was calm, except perhaps, the beating of their shocked hearts, alarmed at what he had done.  

      Then, into the silence, in a quiet voice, Jesus asked his friends, “Why are you afraid? Where is your faith? Where is your trust?”  

      After Jesus stopped the storm it was then that their experience of him, or his power, told them, “Trust this man.” Trust us on this: It wasn’t body odor or perfume that gave Jesus an odor or aura of credibility. It was what he did. It was how Jesus controlled the weather with words. It was how he saved all their lives. That was how they came to be more trusting, not of just anyone, but of him. 

      So how do we come to place our trust in someone, or in Jesus? We want to trust, we want to have faith, but sometimes, it’s the most difficult thing that we can imagine…almost impossible. 

      It might be easier if faith came in a bottle. It might be easier if all we had to do was spray on some Liquid Trust. Instead, all we have is our experience of Jesus, and words on a printed page that tell us about him. Because — 

      • Jesus will calm some of our storms. 

      • Jesus will not calm all of our storms. 

      • We have to trust that Jesus knows which storms actually need calming. 

      And no, we don’t have the physical Jesus asleep in the stern of our boats. What we have is more difficult. We have words. We have the words of his disciples. We have his words, telling us, “Blessed are those who have not seen, but yet have come to believe.” Belief is a powerful thing, more powerful maybe than chemicals. Belief makes us live differently, and it’s not short-lived like a morning spray of Liquid Trust. True belief lasts.

      Why believe in him? Why trust him?  

      • We trust him because others have trusted him before us.  

      • We trust him because he is trustworthy. 

      • We trust him because he was willing to die for us. 

      • We trust him because he has demonstrated his love for us. 

      • We trust him because his word is true. 

      Your nose may lead you many places, but let your heart lead to a place of uncommon peace, uncommon trust, uncommon assurance and uncommon courage.  

      Jesus is the one person you can always trust. 


Sources: 

Bitan, A. “Lake Kinneret (Sea of Galilee) and its exceptional wind system. BOUNDARY LAYER METEOROL.” CSA Illumina, 1981, Vol. 21, no. 4, 477–87. 

Glassie, John. “Trust spray.” The New York Times, December 11, 2005. 

“Liquid Trust,” Vero Labs, LLC, New York, N.Y., verolabs.com.  

“Sea of Galilee” Bible Places.com, Bibleplaces.com/seagaliee.htm.