2026.2.22 TFHC – Abiding in Jesus Through The Storm | Mark 4:35-41

February 22, 2026 Message by Ats Kagawa Transcribed by Beluga AI. Okay. All right, so… let me just move this a little bit so I can see the screen a little bit better. But yeah, thank you, Kevin, for sharing before. And it was my turn to share today. I’m really encouraged by, you know, the works, the Lord’s timing, and how He orchestrates things. I’ve been going through a little bit of a fearful or stormy time the last several weeks, several months, myself. And as I prayed, this is what the Lord has been kind of showing me, that there are storms in my life. But what I’m called to do is to remain in that storm, stand in the storm as Jesus is there. And that’s where, in the fearful, scary, crazy times, Jesus is going to meet me, or has been meeting me, walking with me closely in that. And that’s where peace is. That’s where peace is, in the midst of the storm. I think where Christ is, is the safest place we could be. So through that, I want to share the account of the storm. And I titled this message today: Abiding in Jesus through the Storm. Mark 4:35-41. So I’m going to quickly read that. I’m reading from the CSB version. 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!” (Mark 4:35-41, CSB) So may the words of my mouth, the meditation of my heart, our heart, be acceptable to you, O Lord, my Rock and my Redeemer. 14 May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable to you, Lord, my Rock and my Redeemer. (Psalms 19:14, CSB) So, okay, okay, I’m not in the camera, so I got to move myself. All right, so just going over some background or basics. In this passage, some of the things I noticed, and I wanted to point out, is that Jesus is first of all initiating crossing over the river—I mean, the Sea of Galilee. “Let us cross over to the other side of the sea.” 35 On that day, when evening had come, he told them, “Let’s cross over to the other side of the sea.” (Mark 4:35, CSB) And Jesus is the one who always leads His disciples with all the things that they’re about to experience. This is, you know—according to the Gospel of Mark—this is really early. And shortly after, He appoints the 12 disciples and they’re about to cross over, embark into this new territory, Gentile territory. And I understand that the fishermen often crossed over. It’s not a very far distance. It’s supposed to be like only an hour and a half or so boat ride. And there’s a lot of trade that goes on, and there’s also some synagogues found on the other side. And so there is some interaction and travel going back and forth between the Israelites and the Gentile territory. And yet it was not very common for a rabbi, as a ministry, to cross over to that region. So, you know, Jesus is doing new things, and He’s taking His disciples along with Him. And all the things that happen through this account and the chapter after that, you know, Jesus will lead His disciples through it all. Okay. And the Jewish view of the sea is chaos, danger, and death. It’s, you know, unexpected. A lot of things, storms happen. And so the sea was always considered to be a dangerous place or a symbol of chaos and death. Okay. And here a great windstorm hits. And this is Rembrandt’s depiction of that scene. The waves are high, and the seasoned fishermen, they’re genuinely fearing for their lives. “Teacher, don’t you care that we’re going to die?” They think that they’re going to die. 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?” (Mark 4:38, CSB) So I was trying to see how frequently these kinds of storms happen in the Sea of Galilee. And I was actually having a little bit of a hard time finding, you know, it doesn’t… it’s a rare, not a common occurrence where this huge windstorm suddenly hits and, you know, ships get flipped over and things like that. There was one in 1992. Do I have a picture of that? Yeah, something like that. And more recently there was another one, but there were like 20 years between any account that’s recorded. So perhaps this was not only a purely natural phenomenon. As we can see from the next chapter, Jesus is heading in to confront the demoniac, and perhaps there’s a demonic resistance to prevent Jesus from coming over. So that’s what’s going on. But how does Jesus respond to this storm? He’s sleeping through it. And it’s a powerful model of faith for the disciples, His unwavering trust in God’s sovereignty and protection despite this life-threatening, scary event that’s happening. So I think Jesus is living out some of the passages that King David preached, or wrote. 8 I will both lie down and sleep in peace, for you alone, Lord, make me live in safety. (Psalms 4:8, CSB) Or Psalm 23:4, 4 Even when I go through the darkest valley, I fear no danger, for you are with me; your rod and your staff—they comfort me. (Psalms 23:4, CSB) So Jesus is fully living out that faith in His Father, right? But in contrast to that, the disciples, they’re afraid. And in this passage, there are the two words… what Jesus says—”why are you afraid,” right? That word is delos—I think that’s how you pronounce it. It has a meaning of cowardly, fearful, timid, faithless. So Jesus is questioning His disciples, you know, “Why are you like this?” Right? And then afterwards, Jesus calms the storm, and then they use the word again. In English, it’s the same, you know—afraid, terrified—but actually it’s a different word, phobos. So, you know, now they’ve transitioned from cowardice, you know, fearing over their life to the awe that they have in Christ. They witness this amazing coming of the storm right in front of their eyes. And so that transition… Jesus walks through this transition from one kind of fear, delos, to phobos—awestruck. Okay. And Jesus, as you can see… it’s really amazing to me that He is willing to meet the disciples where they are, at the level of faith that they have. If they had faith, if the disciples had faith just like Jesus has, they would have all maybe slept through the storm together, or at least they wouldn’t panic like the way they did. They probably would have experienced God’s protection through this crazy storm and led Jesus through the entire way. But they didn’t have that faith, and they had to go. But what did they do? They didn’t have that faith like Jesus, but they went to Jesus and they woke Him up and asked for help. By doing so, they got to experience Jesus’ authority over nature and in the spiritual order. Like I said before, by this experience, they’re able to increase their faith. Now their fear—being afraid, panicking, and being cowardly—turns into awestruck amazement towards who God is and who Jesus is. Okay? So either way, with or without the faith of the disciples, Jesus met them. He’s able to handle it and He gets the glory either way. And He’s able to redeem even my lack of faith, the disciples’ lack of faith. And He can bring good out of it. Not only good out of it, but ultimately He redeems it, right? That’s what He does. Jesus is able to redeem all the weaknesses, lack of faith that we struggle with—which is great news. Okay, so in light of fear, the antidote—when I encounter fear, when we encounter fear, the solution… from this passage, we can learn that it is not to try on our own to be brave. You know, pull ourselves up by our bootstraps and be brave and resist that fear on your own. Because really, when life hits, the storm hits, you know, which is completely out of your control—no matter how brave you try to pretend to be… You know, as long as you have control, you can pretend to be brave. But you know, as soon as your situation turns south, I don’t know about you, but I am… I’m just shaking all over. I lose it. I can’t maintain that confidence. I can’t keep on pretending to be confident or be brave. So we need to learn from the disciples. They took their fear and even their lack of faith to Jesus. Abiding in Jesus, in His amazing love, is the antidote to our fear. We were reading C.S. Lewis’s Great Divorce, and I don’t know if you have read it. I highly recommend it. It’s really, really amazing, some of the things that’s been written. C.S. Lewis is really quite something. I’m really amazed. But Sarah Smith is one of the characters that’s in the book. And on this side of the world, she’s a nobody. Nobody knew who she was. Her name is a really ordinary name, but once she died and entered into eternity, she became this great, highly important, glorious figure. And all the people who come into her presence are affected by her amazing love. And the way C.S. Lewis says it is that all the children who encounter this woman, Sarah Smith, become her sons and daughters. She becomes like their real mother. But it’s a different kind of motherhood because with that love that they receive, the kids will go and, in a better way, love their real biological parents. And all men who come and encounter her, they become her lovers. But with that, they can be a more effective, loving husband to their wives. So it’s this completely different kind of love that is possible in her. Well, how does she achieve that? Or how did she become like that? And she shares that she is in Love Himself, implying that she is fully immersed in the love of God. Because of that love that she is in—Perfect Love Himself—she is able to love… that overflows. So it’s not coming from her own, but it’s ultimately God’s love that’s overflowing from her. So she is receiving that. And it’s the same with, I think, each and every one of us. We cannot give what we don’t have. And the only way I can live out a courageous life or a loving life in this world, on this side of eternity, is to receive that from above, from the Lord. 1 John 4:18 says it well: “perfect love casts out fear.” That’s the solution, the antidote to our fear. And yeah, the love used here is agape in Greek. And that’s God’s unconditional, self-sacrificial, and amazing love. And elsewhere in the Scripture, even Apostle Paul, you know… We’re encouraged to—we’re commanded to—love one another. Jesus tells us to love one another. He uses that agape love. 34 “I give you a new command: Love one another. Just as I have loved you, you are also to love one another. (John 13:34, CSB) Even when Jesus reinstates Peter three times, the first two times, you know, “Do you love me?” He asks Peter, “Do you agape me?” Right? And Peter’s response is, “I cannot. I don’t have the ability to agape love you. I phileo you. I can’t do that. But I love you as a friend. I can’t have this unconditional love.” Right? But the third time, Jesus says, “Do you phileo me?” 17 He asked him the third time, “Simon, son of John, do you love me?” Peter was grieved that he asked him the third time, “Do you love me?” He said, “Lord, you know everything; you know that I love you.” “Feed my sheep,” Jesus said. (John 21:17, CSB) So He’s coming down. Jesus will come down. “Fine, I’ll work with what you have. Let’s go from there.” So Jesus is… He will always come down to where I am, where you are. And He will be more than happy to work with you. So that’s what we see. And let’s see. Lamentations 3:22-23. This is in the time where the Israelites are in exile. They completely failed by turning against, turning away from the Lord. And as a consequence, they’re swept away from their promised land and they’re taken into exile. But in the midst of that, still there’s this promise that the steadfast love of the Lord will never cease, and His mercies never come to an end. They are new every morning. Great is your faithfulness. So even to the Israelites who failed so badly, to the point of almost, you know, feeling like being hopeless and having had to live out this terrible consequence of being conquered by another nation and being taken out into exile, God’s love is still there. His mercy is not out of reach. So isn’t that good news that for all of us, you know, God’s grace and mercy? Let’s be accurate there. God’s mercy extends to every situation. We’ll never fall too far away as long as we turn to Him and call upon His name. And of course, ultimately this agape love is expressed in Jesus going to the cross. By us embracing, receiving this amazing love that God has, that’s the only way we can even start to have this agape love back to God Himself and also to one another. Okay, so recently somebody was asking a question: what are you afraid of? And you know, this was in one of the services and the speaker was asking, “What are you afraid of?” And little kids were raising their hands, and what did they say? They were saying, “Spiders.” Yeah, they’re afraid of spiders or, you know, things like that. And I couldn’t come up with anything. Immediately my thought was public speaking. And here, here I am standing in front of you and everybody else. Yeah. But that question really stuck with me. This is about a month ago, I think. But I’ve been trying to write down or think about—trying to be honest—okay, what am I really afraid of? And public speaking… Okay, I’m afraid of public speaking, you know, but why, why am I so afraid of public speaking? I try to keep on asking why and try to go deeper to that reason. But these are some of the things that I can come up with. And part of my testimony—I want to share a little bit later—I was going through this financial instability. And that’s scary. Public speaking, of course. Making mistakes, whatever I’m doing. Or failing. Failure is scary. Showing incompetence, looking foolish in front of others. Showing, revealing some of my shameful things. Losing control over… anything, really, in life. Or being a disappointment to others. Being a bad parent, bad friend, neighbor and colleagues. Also scary… we had some health scares in our family, and you know, that’s kind of scary. That’s fearful. And ultimately, of course, death. Those are some things I could think of, you know, that I’m afraid of. But you know, God is good. Even through our recent book study—we’ve been reading Imagine Heaven, and you know, just to hear about the near-death experience accounts by some people who, you know, died and met the Lord and came back to share what they experienced… You know, it’s amazing. Come to realize I don’t really have to fear death. You know, because of resurrection—and it can easily become a cliche that I’m not afraid because I’m gonna, you know, I can die, but I’m not gonna die. But really, based on some of the people who share who actually went through death, yeah, death is really not gonna happen. It’s almost a continuous transition from now to even more real reality. And there’s nothing to be afraid of. Because of Christ, what He has achieved to conquer death once and for all. So the end part, the final journey on this side of eternity kind of got resolved for me. I don’t have to be afraid of that anymore. But even before that, today all these things are still scary. Okay, I know my end of life is secure, and yet today I have to worry about how I pay my bills or standing in front of people and speaking. And you know, all these worries, all these fears still linger. How do I deal with that? Even as a Christian, I feel like oftentimes… I’m constantly negotiating that. Do I measure up as a Christian? Am I praying enough? Am I reading the Bible enough? Am I devoted to the Lord enough? Am I evangelizing enough? There’s always this fear. Ultimately, will God tell me, “Well done, good and faithful servant,” or “I never knew you”? I thought that was always scary. And is that really how I suppose I’m supposed to operate? Being in fear before the Lord? And when I try to dig deeper to ask why am I afraid of this, I think maybe there’s more to it. And I encourage you to think about it yourself, be honest too. But for me, I think rejection from people and ultimately God is what I’m afraid of. And that fear paralyzes; it causes me to become timid. Once the fear sets in, it doesn’t leave enough room for others because I’m so focused on myself or what I’m scared of. Even good behaviors become a fear-driven thing, so even if I’m trying to live out a good Christian life, am I really doing it out of fear so that I get accepted by the Lord or not? And that’s the problem that maybe a lot of us struggle with. And yet still, the solution to that is what? It is that perfect love, the agape love. We are called to remain in that love, abide in that love. Okay, so… Call to action. When you run into fear—fear is a great indicator, almost like a warning sign on your car, “check engine” sign or something like that. It’s an indicator. I encourage you not to ignore it. But that’s such a wonderful indication that there’s something that the Lord is inviting you to work with Him on, I believe. So that is a time to bring that fear to Him, just like the disciples. “We are perishing!” Or “I am so afraid,” or “I don’t think I am good enough,” “I don’t have enough money.” Bring it. Take it to the cross. Take it to Jesus. Bother Him and abide in Him, and wait and see what Jesus will show you, show me. And I’ve been doing that actually. This past several months—and I shared with some of you too, and I asked permission from my friend Jared, so he said as long as I don’t go too much into detail, I can share. But I’m working, as some of you know, I’m currently working with my friend in a cabinet building business. He owns the business, and he’s running it, and he does really good, pretty amazing high-quality cabinetry, mainly in the Bainbridge area, but also in Poulsbo and anywhere in this North Kitsap region. But he had some fallout with his business partner, and there’s a money issue, and he was going through the brink of bankruptcy. And I’m working there, and you know, we don’t have enough money to get paid, but you know, he’s a believer. We’re praying together, we’re trying to, you know, trust in the Lord. It’s so stressful. I’m just kind of a friend walking alongside with him. But for him, it’s his, you know, his life. He has six kids that he has to, you know, feed. And so it’s been a really stressful, scary time for the people who are involved. And we’ve been praying, and so that’s when the Lord told me to stand in the storm, remain in the storm, because that’s where Christ will meet you. And it’s been quite a crazy journey. But the last three, four months, Jesus has been really showing, making really clear that when we turn to Him, He is so into all the details, and He knows, He cares for us so deeply that He gives us just enough to cling on to and keep going. And He has come up with ways so that we’re now at the point where we were able to evade the possibility of bankruptcy, and the business will probably survive. We’re not 100% sure yet, but… Before, there was no way that it was going to survive. The partner, the relationship issue was going, but—all the equipment, all the machinery, vehicle, everything got into a repo state. So the bank was calling him, asking when they could come and pick up all his equipment. If we lose all this, we can’t do the business, but we still have several projects that we’re in the middle of trying to complete. If you lose the equipment, then all the money that the customers paid us… it’s going to be a serious, big problem. But because of this status, the partner decided… There was a money problem. He was taking some money that he wasn’t supposed to. And because of that, the company was running out of money to pay for completing some of the projects. Because of this financial situation we ran into, the partner decided—initially he was refusing to, but he realized that there was too much risk, and he decided to leave. So he came in and signed a contract to just completely remove himself from the relationship. And this is what my friend, he was trying to accomplish all along. And the day that he came and signed, the bank called again and said, “Actually, we reconsidered your case, and we will give you grace. You can try to pay off, make at least a few payments, and we won’t repossess your equipment.” So all this timing is just perfectly aligned. But the enemy was constantly attacking, and vehicles would break down, something would happen. You know, his truck broke down, and Jamie and Stevin happened to have a car that they were trying to get rid of. And so, timing-wise, you know… They generously donated to Jared. He was so grateful. But you know how God arranged all that… and we experienced that firsthand. And personally too, I’ve been praying and asking the Lord to help me make it through this process, and He’s been just so amazing. A few weeks ago, I was running this machinery to do a thing called edge banding. Basically, the edges, furniture, you have to—there’s a machine that, you know, glues and pastes all this, and we have rolls and rolls of this. And we’re at a tight deadline to deliver these cabinets to our client, and so we’re running full speed trying to complete this. I made a pretty big mistake in the setup of the machinery, so I wasted a huge chunk of this roll of edge banding. We calculate how much we need for each color, and we paint them and we prepare them. I just realized I made a huge mistake. And I got on my knees and I prayed, “Lord, okay, I knew that I wasn’t, you know—I had to be careful, but, you know, please help me, my situation.” And thankfully, the material, we had just enough to redo everything. But what was amazing is when I went to the machine, this was what was left. Basically, this is the end of the edge banding, and the tape is where you can’t use that anymore. And literally, that’s where we were able to complete the, you know, the project. And like, the Lord is telling me, “Yeah, okay, I got you. You know, be careful. But, you know, I got you covered,” right? So I’m so thankful. And this is one amazing—I’m gonna keep this. And, you know, maybe I need to frame this. But there were other close calls here and there. We are constantly having close calls, and yet we’re making it through. The other day, we had this major shipment for the parts that we needed to use to complete some of the projects. And we have this huge packing list on a pallet that comes. We check the packing list, and it’s all there, but a couple of pieces are missing. Once we were about to start installing them, we realized, wait, we can’t find those pieces. Where did they go? We’re looking all over the office, the shop—can’t find it. It has to be here somewhere. Or did we take it to the site? You know, we went over there. We can’t find it. So you know, my partner, he was really, you know, nervous and anxious. “We have to reorder again, but it’s gonna push us several days back again we’re waiting on the mail…” So I’m on my own, praying, “Help me find it, Jesus.” And a few hours later, the package just by itself shows up on the floor of the office. And it’s most likely that there’s a delivery man who came and dropped it off. They couldn’t see us, so, you know… I don’t think it was just miraculously up here. Maybe it was, but I’m still, you know—I haven’t concluded which way or the other. But even if it was a delivery that came in later, it’s strange because the packing list that arrived a few days beforehand should have included all that, and now it shows up right there. No way you can miss it. It was on the floor right there. Oh, okay. Here it is. Thank you, Jesus. So things like that are happening, you know, continuously and just enough to have, you know… And we’re still in the process of completing—there’s one project hopefully next week and a few more down the line that we’re trying to finish. And everybody’s working around the clock, weekends trying to complete so that we can finally kind of get out of the financial difficulty. But yes, I think personally it’s been an amazing… This woodshop that has been such a cause of anxiety and storm, it has become such a precious place for me as a place where I can meet Jesus. One great thing about working in this kind of environment is that you’re just constantly sanding or doing all this work, and I can have an ongoing conversation with the Lord. It’s been such a precious place for me that I can do this. Of course, I’m thankful to, you know, Aiko. She’s at home, I’m away at the woodshop and Aiko’s at home, you know, dealing with the kids and homeschooling. And so I can only do this because, you know, I have a partner like that who’s on the same page with what the Lord is leading us into in this season of our lives. But yeah, so that’s… Praise the Lord and coming to Him in the midst of the storm because Jesus is willing to meet me in the midst of chaos. Either pain or fear or anything that you experience, Jesus is going to meet you as long as you’re willing to turn your eyes and look to Him and call upon His name. So that’s what I wanted to share today. And I want to extend this call to action to everybody. I really, truly believe that the Lord is working in our midst in a powerful way and a new, fresh way this year. I encourage you, this is such an opportunity for us to really experience his amazing agape love. I really believe that that’s the beginning of our personal revival, our newfound excitement and joy and peace that we can find in Christ, which we really need now. So that’s it. Let’s pray and close real quick, and I’ll have Kevin come up and lead us into communion. But let’s pray. Lord, you are amazing. Oftentimes… how many times have I looked at myself thinking I’m inadequate or not good enough? And it caused me so much fear and anxiety in this world trying to be brave and walk confidently. But deep down I know that oftentimes I don’t feel I’m good enough or I’m not competent enough or I’m not smart enough. And yet… That has so many times in the past led me to fear and anxiety and cowardice. But Lord, your amazing love. You invite me, invite us into this perfect love of yours—unconditional, all accepting, loving. And as we dwell in that and abide in that love, we’re so thankful that all fear and guilt and shame is cast away. And we can walk with you with newfound boldness and strength and courage because of you. And Lord, we really need that because that’s the only way we can be effective in this world, and we can effectively spread your kingdom in this world that is in so much need of you. Lord, here we are as we invite you into our hearts, our minds, and our daily lives and all the details. Lord, use us for your kingdom work. We’re so grateful. And Jesus, thank you so much for the cross. You shed your precious blood so that we can have this restored relationship, that we are redeemed, beloved sons and daughters of yours, that we can walk closely with you. So, yeah, thank you so much for today. And yeah, we love you. We worship you for who you are. In your mighty name we pray, Amen. Okay, thank you. Well, I think he does a pretty good job public speaking. On the night that He was betrayed, He took bread and He broke it. He gave it to His disciples. He said, “This is my body which is given for you.” In the same way, after supper, He took the cup, poured it out, gave thanks to His Father in heaven, and He said, “This is my blood which is shed for you and for many. It is for the forgiveness of sins. It’s the blood of the New Covenant.” 19 And he took bread, gave thanks, broke it, gave it to them, and said, “This is my body, which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” 20 In the same way he also took the cup after supper and said, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is poured out for you. (Luke 22:19-20, CSB) And we are New Covenant people. God has made a New Covenant with humanity through His Son, our Savior, Jesus Christ. And the very entry point of that covenant is this: your sins are forgiven. As you come to Him, your sins are forgiven. That’s the entry point. That’s not the only point because your sins are also defeated. You will not forever be a sinner. You will not forever sin, but you will forever be immersed in the love of the Father. And throughout all eternity, He desires to show you His kindness. It’s free, but it’s very expensive. All it costs you is your life. But as you lay that down, you will find His life giving you new life. And in this meal, you’re saying “yes” to that. You’re saying, “Yeah, I want the bread from heaven. I want the blood of the New Covenant. I want to be like Jesus. I want to be like Jesus.” And He will honor that. So come and take. The post 2026.2.22 TFHC – Abiding in Jesus Through The Storm | Mark 4:35-41 appeared first on The Firehouse Church in Bremerton, WA.