By Quin Hillyer at PJ Media;
The author Madeleine L’Engle, most famous for A Wrinkle in Time, interspersed all sorts of Christian references into her series of novels for adolescent readers, albeit often with a sort of New Age-y twist. In one of her later books, Many Waters, she has seraphim repeat several times a passage from the Song of Solomon, 8:7 – namely, “many waters cannot quench love.”
Somehow that line sticks with me when I read this week’s Gospel story of Jesus walking on storm-tossed waters to come to the aid of his disciples in their boat far from shore.
The Bible, of course, is full of other passages that use similar themes. Psalm 77, verse 6 and verse 19: “When the waters saw you, O God, when the waters saw you, they were afraid; the very deep trembled…Your way was through the sea, your path, through the mighty waters; yet your footprints were unseen.” Or Psalm 18:16: “God reached down from on high and took me; he drew me out of mighty waters.” And, of course, there are passages relating the Israelites’ Exodus from Egypt, along the route between the sea that God parted for their escape.
This theme of God controlling the waters would have been quite familiar to the disciples, which is why they proclaim at the end of today’s passage – as if finally, fully understanding it for the first time, that this Jesus who is not sunk by the waves is “truly…the Son of God.” The disciples know that God can rule the waters, and that only God can rule the waters. Ergo, Jesus must be one with God.
There are lessons here about God’s majesty and about his power. As many others have noted, there also are lessons about how amidst life’s storms we can look to God for help, just as Peter, momentarily walking on water as well, was saved by Christ’s hand when Peter’s sudden doubt made him sink….
[For the rest of this column, including a return to Madeleine L’Engle, please read here.]
