Creative Writing: Mark 4:35-41

Occassionally, I write a story based on a particular passage I am thinking about. Here's one I did today. I hope you find it edifying.

I call it "Sleepy Jesus".

Look to the hill by the sea. The crowds are coming and desperate. Some are cradling sick children, carrying crippled loved ones, all of them with broken hearts. Can you see the mother with the dying child? Can you see the cloud of death over them? Can you feel her agony as sin’s curse hovers so near? He sees. He feels. He touches. He heals.

Each one healed goes away rejoicing, but he remains. They surge around him like waves. Help my baby. Help my child. Help my mother. Help my son. Help my husband. Help my brother. “If you are willing, you can make me whole!” He is willing. They are made whole. But death and rot infects everything here. There is no end of need and he must carry them all.

He teaches them. He tells them of the Kingdom of God. The press close and he goes out to sea so that they may hear. He wants to heal their hearts. He wants them to listen and live. He teaches from morning till night.

He decides to cross the sea. Sleepy, he lies on the deck of the boat. Images of hurting faces and sin-sick people fill his thoughts. Their burdens are great, and he must carry them all.

They are sinking down. Death draws them into his long embrace and robs them of joy and dreams and love. They are drowning in despair. They are sinking. They are sinking.

Lord, do you not care that we are perishing?! He wakes from dreams with a start. The boat is rocking. The men are frightened. The waves are great and the storm is strong. Peace! Be Still! He commands, and the storm ceases. The proud waves bow and rock no more. Of course he cares that we are perishing. Shouldn't they know that by now?