Matins Devotion: February 26, 2026

Mark 4:21–41

When I was a sophomore in college, my sister lived just a couple blocks away from my apartment. And one day she called me and frantically begged me to come over to her house. She was terrified of something. Something had paralyzed her with fear. A problem had appeared in her life that she could not escape and she needed me to rescue her from it immediately, lest she perish! The problem, of course, was a spider. So I walked over to her apartment, smashed the spider with my shoe, wiped it up, gave my sister a hug, and went home. 

Now, I love this memory. It’s one of my favorites, in large part because I just find something beautiful about any situation where one person is terrified down to the depths of his or her soul and the other person is entirely at ease because he’s completely in command of the situation.

And so, when it comes to our reading from Mark today, there’s something really quite beautiful about it. The disciples are terrified, not at something comical like a spider, but at the real threat of death, at the threat of their boat being torn apart and death wrapping its watery claws around them and dragging them into the deep as they gasp for a final breath they cannot find. The violent thrashing of the sea, a vicious storm that no one can possibly control, that’s the source of their terror. And then Jesus squishes it like a little spider on the wall. He wakes up from His sleep, immediately commands creation to do what He says and creation obeys. 

Such is the power of your Lord over this world. The Son of God through whom every molecule of the air and the sea was created still has authority over every molecule of the air and the sea. And He has authority over every molecule of your flesh, which means that you don’t need to fear death. The Lord of the wind and the waves is also the Lord of your soul, the Lord who destroyed all your sins with His blood at the cross, the Lord who has clothed you in the power of His resurrection, the Lord who will command the earth to spit you up on the last day and command every cell of your flesh to shine with His glory. For Jesus Christ, destroying the power of death and giving you eternal life is as easy as smooshing a spider.