Mk 4:35-41 & 2 Co 6:1-13

25 June 2006

“Impossible is Nothing”

            For the past two weeks and two days, the most important sports event on planet Earth has been unfolding.  I trust you understand that it’s not the Olympics, or the Super Bowl, or the Stanley Cup Finals, or the World Series.  (And, by the way, it really isn’t the World Series.  That’s merely the baseball champions from the US—plus the Toronto Blue Jays!  If they played the champs from the other world leagues, then that would be the World Series!)

            No, the most important sports event on the planet is the World Cup!  At no other time are the words, “the thrill of victory…and the agony of defeat,” more vividly realized.  No other sport—only Americans call it “soccer”; everyone else calls it “football”—brings people together with such passion, such spirit.  Sometimes, too much spirit!

            During the World Cup, Adidas has run a series of commercials with the motto, “Impossible is nothing.”  Especially featured are a couple of boys (from somewhere in Latin America) who choose players from all over the world for a game on a dusty field.  Thinking about today’s scripture readings[1] reminded me of that motto:  “Impossible is nothing.”

            However, the disciples in the boat with Jesus, as well as certain members of the Corinthian church, might take issue with that motto.  Impossible is nothing?  What exactly does that mean?  Impossible is definitely something!  Impossible is…impossible!

We’ll look at what’s going on with the Corinthians in a few moments.  But first:  what’s the deal with Jesus taking a siesta in a storm-tossed boat?  (That’s the very definition of a deep sleeper!)

            There’s plenty of symbolism in this story.  One writer sees it as representing the mission of the church to the world.  Jesus says, “Let us go across to the other side” (v. 35).  And to continue the metaphor, venturing out into the deep leaves us exposed to the storms and sea monsters out there.

“Often, the alternative to risking the dangerous, stormy crossing is to stay tied up on the shore.  Unfortunately, that is the picture of many churches—a peaceful, restful club house on the shore, rather than a boat following Jesus’ command to take the fearful risk to cross the lake.  We are often more willing to be safe than to answer Jesus’ call to go to the other side.”[2]

And that can be to the other side of the water, the other side of the street, or the other side of the many walls we put up for ourselves.

Here’s a story that has appeared in various places, so if you’ve already heard it, please bear with me:[3]

On a dangerous seacoast where shipwrecks often occur, there was once a crude little lifesaving station.  The building was just a hut and there was only one boat, but the few devoted members kept a constant watch over the sea, and with no thought for themselves, went out day and night tirelessly searching for the lost.  Many lives were saved by this wonderful little station, so that it became famous.  Some of those who were saved, and various others in the surrounding area, wanted to become associated with the station and give of their life and money and effort for the support of the work.  New boats were bought, and new crews were trained.  The little lifesaving station grew.

Some of the members of the lifesaving station were unhappy that the building was so crude and poorly equipped.  They felt that a more comfortable place should be provided as the first refuge of those saved from the sea.  So they replaced the emergency cots with beds and put better furniture in the enlarged building.

Now the lifesaving station became a popular gathering place for its members, and they decorated it beautifully and furnished it exquisitely, because they used it as a sort of club.  Fewer members were now interested in going to sea on lifesaving missions, so they hired lifeboat crews to do the work.  The lifesaving motif still prevailed in the club’s decoration, and there was a liturgical lifeboat in the room where the club initiations were held.

About this time a large ship was wrecked off the coast, and the hired crews brought in boatloads of cold, wet, and half-drowned people.  They were dirty and sick, and some of them had black skin and some had yellow skin.  The beautiful new club was considerably messed up.  So the property committee immediately had a shower house built outside the club, where victims of shipwreck could be cleaned up before coming inside.

At the next meeting, there was a split in the club membership.  Most of the members wanted to stop the club's lifesaving activities as being unpleasant and a hindrance to the normal social life of the club.  Some members insisted upon lifesaving as their primary purpose, pointing out that, after all, they were still called a lifesaving station.  But they were finally voted down and told that if they wanted to save the lives of the people shipwrecked in those waters, they could start their own lifesaving station down the coast.  And so they did.

As the years went by, the new station experienced the same changes that had occurred in the old.  It evolved into a club, and yet another lifesaving station was started.  History continued to repeat itself, and if you visit that coast today, you will find a number of exclusive clubs along the shore.  Shipwrecks are frequent in those waters, but most of the people drown.

I don’t suppose I need to connect the dots for you.  Symbolically, shipwrecks are frequent in the waters around all of us.  Here’s a question:  do most of the people drown?  Friends, we have a say in that.  Here’s another question:  do we care?

There are many people in the church who, like the crowd that saw their lifesaving station as a club, don’t want to be bothered.  “Just leave me alone!”  They’ve hardened their hearts, and it’s difficult to get through to them.  But there are others who do care, or at least who want to care, people who find themselves bound by fear.

Here’s something I shared as a devotional at last Tuesday’s session meeting.  In Mark 4:38, the disciples wake Jesus up and ask him, “Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?”  The Greek word used here is melei, melei, which means “to be a care” or “to be concerned.”  But it also can mean “to be anxious about.”  So we can see the disciples asking, “Why aren’t you as anxious as we are?”  Why aren’t you all worked up?

We’re often like the disciples.  We expect others to share our panic or distress.  (Some of us are more prone to this than others!)  If they seem detached from the situation, we might assume that they don’t care about our suffering.  Panic reactions can divide us from others who might help, just as they can cause us to doubt God’s love for us.

Lutheran pastor Brian Stoffregen quotes figures from a stress management resource.  I can’t vouch for these numbers, but see how they sound to you.  According to the experts he quotes, only 2% of what they call our “worrying time” is spent on things that might actually be helped by worrying.

Here’s how they break down the other 98%:  40% on things that never happen, 35% on things that can’t be changed anyway, 15% on things that turn out better than expected, and 8% on useless, petty worries.  (Maybe my dismay over America’s poor showing in the World Cup fits in that category!)

Here’s his conclusion:  “There are times in our lives where trusting God means that we can take naps in a stormy boat.”[4]  It seems that Jesus as a non-anxious presence is a good model for us.

So having said that, how do we show that we care for others?  Sometimes it’s by speaking an authoritative word to bring stability during chaos.  Sometimes it’s by doing nothing, and helping others understand that they, too, have the power of Christ to weather the storms around them.  And sometimes it’s by putting into practice the motto, “Impossible is nothing.”

The apostle Paul finds that he needs to help the church in Corinth get a grip on this.  In some ways, though, his situation is the exact opposite of what Jesus faces in the storm.  There, the disciples are freaking out, wondering why Jesus doesn’t do something.

But for many of the Corinthians, they don’t expect much from Paul.  He lacks the flash and flair of other preachers who’ve come through town.  In chapter 11, he refers to these characters as “super-apostles” and “false apostles” (vv. 5, 13).

All Paul and his friends can offer is that they haven’t been an obstacle to anyone.  They’ve made every effort to be the servants of God, through all kinds of horrible circumstances—if you will, through all kinds of storms.  For those who value spectacle, this is, to quote the wise philosopher Homer…Simpson:  “boring”!

If those other guys boast about their style, then Paul does some boasting of his own.  It’s been noted that he boasts “of his vulnerability and service.  Rather than shrinking back in inadequacy because he cannot match these successful and obviously popular and influential [so-called] ‘apostles,’ Paul makes a virtue out of what people see as his weaknesses.  He points to Christ’s weakness…as something which reflects the powerful powerlessness of God.”[5]

Paul says, “We are treated as impostors, and yet are true; as unknown, and yet are well known; as dying, and see—we are alive” (vv. 8-9).  He says that we are treated “as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, and yet possessing everything” (v. 10).  As having nothing, and yet possessing everything…as dying, and see—we are alive.  What a blessed contradiction!

Is this a picture of us here at Westminster?  Do we realize what a gift that would be?  I would love to see myself in that picture.  I pray that it would be so.  I pray that I can be that non-anxious presence.  I pray that I can live the words “impossible is nothing.”

            Paul and his friends are holding nothing back from the Corinthians.  “Our heart is wide open to you,” he says (v. 11).  Paul wants “to convert people at Corinth and their leaders to an understanding of ministry and spirituality which puts,” not glitz and glamour, but “compassion and vulnerability at the forefront.”[6]  In verse 12, he states, somewhat indelicately, “There is no restriction in our affections, but only in yours.”

            I like the way Eugene Peterson sums up these last three verses in his paraphrase, The Message:

            “Dear, dear Corinthians, I can't tell you how much I long for you to enter this wide-open, spacious life.  We didn’t fence you in.  The smallness you feel comes from within you.  Your lives aren’t small, but you’re living them in a small way.  I’m speaking as plainly as I can and with great affection.  Open up your lives.  Live openly and expansively!”

            I think that’s a message for us, too.  There’s no question that a major chapter in the life of our congregation will soon draw to a close.  But it’s not the end of the story.  If we answer the call to go across to the other side, we’ll see that impossible is nothing.  The best is yet to come.

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