Jesus revealed a principle of spiritual warfare while He was asleep in the back of a boat, as a severe storm struck while the Lord and His disciples were crossing a lake. Water began to enter the boat as Jesus continued sleeping. His disciples, men experienced in handling storms, feared they would perish. The disciples became so concerned that they shook Jesus awake from His sleep and asked, “Teacher, don’t you care that we are going to drown?” (Mark 4:38).

When Jesus was awakened, “He got up, rebuked the wind and said to the waves, “Quiet! Be still!” Then the wind died down, and it was completely calm” (vs. 39).  This act was a principle of spiritual warfare that’s important for us to see.

Jesus rebuked what was causing the waves- the wind – and then He addressed the byproduct of the wind – the waves-  and commanded them to cease. His rebuke preceded His command.

Many times, we pray against the terrifying waves of life to stop, but bypass what is causing them.  That course of action leaves the source of our storm unchallenged.  When Jesus rebuked the wind, He assigned fault to the source of the waves, and after rebuking the source, He commanded the waves to cease.

Many of the issues we will face in life can resemble the violent waves produced by a storm. This is where Satan wants us to focus because what is causing the problem remains hidden and free to do its damage. Deep within all of us are issues we bring forward in life that may have been buried for decades, doing their negative work unhindered. 

Only by the revealing work of the Spirit will we be able to see what we missed in our lives that’s causing the storm. Some of these causes can seem so insignificant that we ignore them. A wounding word from an insensitive parent, a painful betrayal from a friend, even something embedded in us in the womb, can be the cause of our current storm. We need the Lord to reveal to us those things so we can remove their influence upon our lives. 

As the Spirit walks us back to these embedded sources of spiritual and relational turmoil, we will discover that Jesus was always there with us in the storms of our lives. It’s in that revelation of His presence that our faith can rise and help us do what Jesus did, command the wind to stop and the lake to become calm.

After the disciples saw what Jesus did, “He said to his disciples, “Why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith?” They were terrified and asked each other, “Who is this? Even the wind and the waves obey him!” (vs. 40-41).