Mark 4:35-41 Jesus is Lord of the Material

The Text

Mark 4:35–41 (CSB)
³⁵ On that day, when evening had come, he told them, “Let’s cross over to the other side of the sea.”

³⁶ So they left the crowd and took him along since he was in the boat. And other boats were with him.

³⁷ A great windstorm arose, and the waves were breaking over the boat, so that the boat was already being swamped.

³⁸ He was in the stern, sleeping on the cushion. So they woke him up and said to him, “Teacher! Don’t you care that we’re going to die?”

³⁹ He got up, rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, “Silence! Be still!” The wind ceased, and there was a great calm.

⁴⁰ Then he said to them, “Why are you afraid? Do you still have no faith?”

⁴¹ And they were terrified and asked one another, “Who then is this? Even the wind and the sea obey him!”

The Devotion

It stands to reason that just perhaps if Christ is Lord and God over the spiritual and supernatural, that Christ would rule over the earth--which I have called the Material as oppose to the Spiritual.

For:

Psalms 24:1-2 (CSB) The earth and everything in it, the world and its inhabitants, belong to the LORD; 2 for he laid its foundation on the seas and established it on the rivers

Psalms 47:1-3 (CSB) Clap your hands, all you peoples; shout to God with a jubilant cry. 2 For the LORD, the Most High, is awe-inspiring, a great King over the whole earth. 3 He subdues peoples under us and nations under our feet.

Psalms 57:5 (CSB) God, be exalted above the heavens; let your glory be over the whole earth.

Psalms 72:18-19 (CSB) Blessed be the LORD God, the God of Israel, who alone does wonders. 19 Blessed be his glorious name forever; the whole earth is filled with his glory. Amen and amen.

Isaiah 6:1-3 (CSB) In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord seated on a high and lofty throne, and the hem of his robe filled the temple. Seraphim were standing above him; they each had six wings: with two they covered their faces, with two they covered their feet, and with two they flew. And one called to another: Holy, holy, holy is the LORD of Armies; his glory fills the whole earth.

Daniel 4:34-35 (CSB) But at the end of those days, I, Nebuchadnezzar, looked up to heaven, and my sanity returned to me. Then I praised the Most High and honored and glorified him who lives forever: For his dominion is an everlasting dominion, and his kingdom is from generation to generation. 35 All the inhabitants of the earth are counted as nothing, and he does what he wants with the army of heaven and the inhabitants of the earth. There is no one who can block his hand or say to him, “What have you done?”

This being the case, then why don't the inhabitants of the earth bow and worship God?

The oft-automatic answer to this from most American Christians is the answer of free will. When good-intended Christians give this pat answer, I suspect they do answer with a sense of mercy and grace for those who do not believe and obey God.

Mercy and grace is kind and wonderful. But that isn't the correct answer at all. The real answer is sin--because we are born of Adam, we are born into sin and we continuously sin.

If "free will" is the answer that you want to instinctively give, ask yourself, "I am giving this answer because I think it is the right one, or the one I grew up always hearing, or am I afraid give the truth that God says on why we are not automatically born as sons of God?"

Examine yourselves. But then embrace the gospel of truth of Christ:

John 3:3 (CSB) Jesus replied, “Truly I tell you, unless someone is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.”

The entire earth is under the dominion, lordship, power, sovereignty, rule, reign, judgment, mercy, grace, and love of Jesus Christ.

The Bible is bookend by two major events. The Garden of Eden and the New Jerusalem from the New Heavens descending on the New Earth.

But it is also bookended by the Fall of Mankind and the glorification of the people of God.

But just within that, it is bookended by the wrath and judgment of Christ on high: the Great Flood in Genesis 6 and Great and Final Judgment in the Revelation of Jesus Christ:

Revelation 14:19-20 (CSB) So the angel swung his sickle at the earth and gathered the grapes from the vineyard of the earth, and he threw them into the great winepress of God’s wrath. Then the press was trampled outside the city, and blood flowed out of the press up to the horses’ bridles for about 180 miles.

God promises in Genesis 9 that he will never flood the earth again by water. He never destroys the earth in that way never again. But he will fill a part of the earth with the blood of his enemies that runs so deep, blood will run as tall as three feet deep.

This world belongs to God. But he loved it so much that he sent his Son to live and die so that whosever believes and trust in him will never perish but have everlasting life.

For God did not send his Son to condemn but to save the world through Him.