Hearts Still Hardened
And he got into the boat with them, and the wind ceased. And they were utterly astounded, for they did not understand about the loaves, but their hearts were hardened. (Mark 6:51–52)
On the heels of feeding the 5,000, Christ separated himself from the disciples, sending them to Bethsaida by boat. He remained to dismiss the crowds and to pray.
Though Christ desired to include his disciples in everything he did — he was training them, after all — there were still many tasks they were not yet ready for. Dispensing the crowds that had come to hear Christ and be healed by him, and were surprisingly fed by him, was among those things they were not yet fitted for. Oliver Wendell Holmes once said, “Knowledge, like timber, shouldn’t be much used till it is seasoned.” These men were not yet seasoned enough.
Christ blesses the people: The Levites were commanded to bless the people of Israel, and it is implied in the phrase in verse 45, “he dismissed the crowd,” that Christ gave such a blessing to the people as he dismissed them. A blessing instilled hope in people, that despite their problems and even their sins, God would forgive and cleanse and fulfill his purpose in them. The Levitical blessing was:
The LORD bless you and keep you; the LORD make his face shine on you and be gracious to you; the LORD turn his face toward you and give you peace. (Numbers 6:24–26)
In English translations of the Old Testament, whenever the word LORD is spelled in all caps, it is a translation of the covenant name of God, that was spelled in Hebrew YHWH. This was the specific name of God, his personal and holy name. To the Levities God added to this command the intent behind it, “So I will put my Name on them, and I will bless them” (Num. 6:27).
The disciples were not yet “in love with the people,” that is, they still saw them somewhat as adversarial, as a burden, a distraction, a necessary encumbrance. Not long before this these disciples were catching fish, or taxing men, or doing whatever other occupation they had. The abrupt call of Christ brought them into the world of people, ministering to the weak, worried, anxious, conflicted, and burdened, and burdening, people of this earth.
We recall the words of Christ to Peter in his post resurrection appearance to him, asking him if he loved him, then commanding him to feed his sheep (John 21:15–19). It is well noted that Christ did not ask Peter if he loved his sheep, but if he loved him. Our love for Christ, which is really only the response of our hearts to his love for us, is the steadfast reality that brings us to the point of loving others. The disciples had still not come to this point.
They thought, perhaps, like people mistakenly do today, that through their ascendancy in his service that they would rise above the need to deal with them, that they would be suited to more authoritative tasks, where they command people to do their bidding. But the only thing that rises above this sense of burden in dealing with people is the love of Christ in our hearts for the people. There is no position of service for Christ that rises like they were imagining (as I suppose). The only peace we will ever know in dealing with people is the profound act of God to touch our hearts with his love for them. Those whom we love are not a burden to us in this way. Though they make demands and challenge us, we respond, like Jacob did for Rachel, “So Jacob served seven years for Rachel, and they seemed to him but a few days because of the love he had for her” (Gen. 29:20).
There is all the difference in the world between a parent who feeds his children to shut them up, and one who feeds them to nourish and bless them. Certainly we will be weary in dealing with people — just as parents get weary in dealing with their children. There is all the difference in the world between a husband who gives his wife a gift to keep her from nagging, and a husband who gives his wife a gift out of love for her. Though love is patient and kind, it does not always dote on its object and spoil them beyond reason. Love that is mature brings discipline as well as mercy (Hebrews 12:3–11).
Christ comes to them on the water: Faith sees all of life different from unbelief. Here is another miracle that shows Christ’s authority over the elements of nature. He defied the laws of gravity, but as the Creator of gravity and all of nature’s laws, he stood over them. No miracle was ever performed by Christ for grandstanding’s sake, just to show what he could do. They all met a genuine need and this one in particular revealed the priority Christ put on prayer. He sent the disciples away and the people away that he might spend some time in prayer with the Father.
The need for spiritual nourishment is even greater than our need for physical nourishment. He fed the thousands with bread and fish, but he fed his own spirit with prayer to the Father. Again, John’s gospel helps us with a balance here, for Christ also received nourishment from his service, as he said to his disciples in Samaria after speaking to the woman at the well, “I have food to eat that you do not know about” (John 4:32). Christ lived a spiritual life and he enables us also to live such a life, a life that sees the reality of God all around it and rejoices in him always.
The “wind was against them” in the boat and they were barely making any headway. He came to them on the fourth watch of the night — meaning the early hours before dawn. The disciples misperceived his presence, thinking he was a ghost. Again, the scripture highlights the difference between the vision of life of the disciples and of Christ. They saw problems where Christ saw opportunities, they saw the people as bothersome and Christ saw them as objects of love, and they saw the presence of Christ as a frightening thing, where Christ had come to them in love.
Christ’s words to them are kind and encouraging, and these types of expressions are the most common quotations of Christ in the gospels: “Take heart. It is I. Do not be afraid” (Mark 6:50). We may also trust that these are the most common words his Spirit will say to our hearts today as well. “I am here. Do not fear.” Augustine said of this event, “He came treading the waves; and so he puts all the swelling tumults of life under his feet.” Whatever we experience that causes our world to rock and reel, to make us feel as though we are in a stiff wind battling the waves, making little or no headway, Christ comes and speaks peace to us.
Christ got into the boat and immediately the wind died down and the sea became calm. We are tempted to make more of this point than perhaps we ought, for Christ certainly does not promise us constant peaceful sailings or calm seas. We read the testimony of Paul:
But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us. We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our bodies. For we who live are always being given over to death for Jesus’ sake, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh. (2 Cor. 4:7–11)
Their hearts were still hard: The gracious patience of Christ is demonstrated here, the same patience he exercises toward us. How slow we are to believe, like the disciples. We prefer the peace of solitude to the opportunities of ministry. We prefer a simply physical task to the challenging and frustrating exercise of ministering to people. We choose entertainment over prayer, even to the point of confusing the two, thinking that distraction is the same as devotion. We are bothered by the people and frightened and uneasy when we see God do what we did not expect him to do. We would, I am afraid, run the other way from Christ if it were possible — just as the disciples would have rowed away from Christ if they could have. It takes a miracle of God to convert a human soul, to bring us to the point that we see with our souls what we cannot see with our eyes.
He wants to open our eyes that we see the reality of the Spirit. But he also desires to bring us even further, to the point that our spirits filled with him reinterpret what our eyes do see and our hands touch. That a Christian can see the hand of God in everything, and even dedicate himself and his life and possessions to the glory of God reveals a special miracle in his heart.
They did not reject Christ — this is not what hardness of heart means here — but rather that they had not yet perceived all that he needed them to grasp. They did not understand about the loaves and fishes, they did not grasp the power of Christ. It would take much more for them to do so — even to the resurrection. Their pride and selfishness still haunted their thoughts and patrolled the corridors of their minds. They were rational men, not enthusiasts. They were practical men, not extremists. When there was not food enough you sent people to go find it — one did not do as Jesus had done. When a boat does not make progress against the waves, you do the best you can or you wait for more seasonable weather — one did not come walking on the water to rescue them. The fact that these men were the ones whom God used to be the pillars of the church shows that the reality behind it all is the power of God, and not of men.
Let us let God soften our hearts. Are we not also too hard toward God? Are we not also apt to think in mere practical terms? Do not we also struggle to believe in the power of Christ? The repeated message of the Bible seeks to awaken our hearts to the reality of God. It is easy to slink into a mere pragmatic state of mind, where we only do what we know to do based on the physical known realities around us. The prayer of Paul for the Ephesian Christians tells us our great need: to see the hand of God in our lives and in our world.
That the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of him, having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that you may know what is the hope to which he has called you, what are the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe, according to the working of his great might that he worked in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the one to come. (Eph. 1:17–21)
