Chip faces difficult challenges in dealing with a new basketball coach and increased responsibilities at Mr. Grayson's store.

W. W. Melton was born in Navarro County, Texas, in 1879. He began his career as a minister at the age of 23, receiving his Th. D. from Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in 1912 and his B.A. from Baylor University in 1919. He pastored the Seventh and James Baptist Church in Waco, Texas, from 1912 to 1941. Dr. Melton died in Waco, Texas, in 1967 at the age of 88 Robin Hardy's first book, Chataine's Guardian, received the Gold Medallion award of merit for fiction in 1985. Her other books include Streiker saga and Sammy: Dallas Detective. Robin and her family live in Richardson, Texas

Chapter One

TROUBLES

And when the disciples saw him walking

on the sea, they were troubled.

Matthew 14:26

The incident recorded here is a midnight scene. It was in the night following the miraculous feeding of the five thousand with the loaves and fishes. The day had been a busy one for Christ; the crowds had pressed him, and he had taught them, comforted them, and fed them, then late in the afternoon had sent them to their homes for the night.

    Then the disciples had boarded a small boat and started across the lake while the Master had turned his steps up the mountain slopes to spend the night in communion with his Father. It was a stormy night: billows rose like mountains on the sea, and the disciples found themselves outmatched by the fury of the storm. All night they rowed their little skiff in the face of the wind and waves but were unable to hold out. Toward the breaking of day, they began to yield to their seemingly inevitable fate, and one by one they gave up the fight and were ready to die.

    In the account of this incident recorded by Mark, he tells us that Christ "saw them toiling in rowing" (Mark 6:48). Through the storm he watched them. He saw their strength fail them, their fears overcome them, and their hearts fill with distress. He watched them until he saw their last hope give way; then he came to them, walking on the water. He had waited for them to come to the limit of their own strength before he saved them, because only then would they fully realize how much he meant to them.

    For days they had been in his company, watching him perform miracles, hearing his wonderful teachings, and feeling the thrill of his holy presence; but they missed the real lessons he had given them. They had been so attracted to him personally that they had not seen beyond the physical life. They had failed to learn that he was also a spirit--that he was omnipresent and that he was accessible to them even in the storm, or in any condition. Their admiration of him had been stimulated by the fact that he was a wonder-worker, a teacher of strange things, and a reformer of wonderful ability, but when they were separated from him, they felt they were entirely out of the range of his knowledge and power. His miracles had been exciting and intoxicating, but when they were in the grip of a fierce, terrible storm, they felt its physical force must be matched by their physical strength, and in this they met their defeat. Some lessons cannot be written in books but must be written in human experience; they cannot be taught by miracle nor precept as clearly as by adversity and disaster.

    There are four indications in the lesson that the disciples were in trouble. The first one is the plain statement: they "were troubled." They were not being entertained by the storm; they were being distressed nearly to death. Their situation had become desperate. Their fears were not mere hallucinations but as real as life and as stubborn as death. They had not worked themselves into a frenzy over a frivolous matter. Little by little they had been forced to recognize the growing dangers around them, moment by moment the storm had been bearing down upon them, and bit by bit their spirits had been breaking under the strain.

    If someone had come to them in such an hour and such an experience and told them that it was all a hoax, that there were no such things as storms and waves and death, the disciples would have been moved either to anger for the insult or to pity for the maniac who had lost his mind. So the first fact to be learned from the experience is that there are ...

Real Troubles

    Many do not believe it, and try to convince the rest of us that life and the world are made up of shadows rather than substance, of fancies rather than facts, of errors rather than terrors. This group would laugh in the face of the storm and say, "There is no such thing!" They would wave their hand over the storm-swept lake and insist, "This is a fake, for there is no lake" or they would say to the disciples, "Do not cry, you will not die, for it is all a lie!"

    But for the benefit of such optimists let me say that the realities of life are not so easily dismissed . True, many of us create more troubles than are necessary, and we could dismiss many that come on us as trivial things. But after we have brushed aside all that will go so easily and have joked away all that will be settled so quickly and have denied all that can be denied, there still remains a great host of problems that will not be scared off. They are inescapable facts that demand consideration. This storm could not be joked away. The disciples' fears would not be allayed by a magic wave of the hand. They could not work up a positive attitude when the sea was so deep beneath them, the wind so strong around them, and the boat so frail a vessel.

    But the question becomes more complex when one takes into account that Christ watched the struggle but kept himself away from them and allowed disaster to befall his closest friends, his own disciples. This uncovers another important matter: If troubles are to come, why do they come to good people? This has been an unsettled question in all ages. The tormentors of Job asked, "'Who ever perished, being innocent?'" and "`Where [or when] were the righteous cut off?'" (Job 4:7). These questions express the silent thoughts of many who cannot see why a good person should suffer or the righteous should have sorrows and trouble.

    In answer, let me point out at least two things. First, Christianity is not offered as an insurance policy against such things. Nowhere in the Bible is the promise made that Christians will not suffer. The reverse is true; we are plainly told that we may expect all such things, but the promise is given that the grace of the Lord will be a support upon which we can safely lean (see John 16:33). The good as well as the bad have suffered in all ages. Believers have been sick, have had losses and reversals, have had misfortunes and sorrows, and have even experienced death just as nonbelievers have.

    The second answer I would make is that such experiences may be the greatest opportunities to demonstrate the value of the Christian hope. I knew two blind men. One was mad at the world, out of harmony with everything and everybody because of his misfortune, lie cursed God and men because he had to live his life in darkness. The other made his misfortune a blessing. He saw God better through sightless eyes; he felt the warmth and glow of the divine love a little better because of his disability. He seemed to have new occasions for joy and gladness.

    The first man turned his day into night; the second turned his night into day by the same misfortune. Both were blind; one made his blindness a stumbling block while the other made it a stepping-stone. For one, it was a door shut and locked in his face, excluding him from all that was good; for the other, it was a door flung wide open, admitting him into new friendships, new senses, and new achievements. The greatest misfortune in life is not the visitation of sorrow, calamity, or disappointment, but it is to misunderstand, misinterpret, and misuse this visitation.

    So, summing up the first thought: when real troubles develop and appear on the horizon of life, do not be too stubborn to admit them, nor too foolish to give them serious consideration, nor too blind to interpret them properly and use them.

Imaginary Troubles

    But the fears of the disciples were augmented by a new appearance. When they saw Christ coming to help them, they thought he was an evil spirit. They supposed he was some evil thing because they were looking for trouble . If they had been looking for help or deliverance, they would have been quick to cry out for joy when they saw him approaching them.

    It only shows that we usually see what we are looking for. Our fears, prejudices, desires, and passions color almost every scene in life. If we look for slights and insults, any little meaningless thing will be misinterpreted to reflect what we are looking for. The opposite is likewise true. If we consider someone a friend, he may be ever so rude but we take no offense because we are not looking for offenses. When we are scared, everything scares us; when we are expecting trouble, everything frightens us.

    When I was a child, I had to go to a neighbor's house after nightfall one evening. I was afraid of the dark and soon found myself walking very fast; then I broke into a run, and the farther I went, the faster I ran--I knew something was going to get me. Just when I got to the darkest place in the path, a low spot hedged in by tall weeds, a hog jumped out of the way, grunting, "Oink! Oink!" This was almost more than I could stand. I had been expecting trouble, and of course, it came. In all my childhood experiences, I do not recall ever being as badly frightened, and it was over an imaginary ghost.

    It can be said without fear of successful contradiction that most of our troubles are imaginary. This does not deny the existence of the real ones, but it does mean that there are enough real ones without our having to create a lot of fanciful ones. We have entirely too many battles fought out in our minds only and never get further than our imaginations. The same is true of the illusory difficulties that would block our way to success. We can easily see how the drought may ruin our crops, and the insects destroy our fields, and the floods, in time, lay waste our land. How easy it becomes to fret about things that have not happened, and may never happen.

    I was on a train one night. The few passengers were beginning to recline in their seats for a little sleep. Across the aisle from me was a mother with a son about twelve years old. She had gone to the end of the car for a drink of water, leaving the son on the seat. While she was away the child moved forward two or three seats where he could have more room to sleep.

    When the mother returned and did not see the child, she threw her hands into the air and screamed frantically, "My little child fell off the train!" Of course, this brought the rest of us to her side, and when the commotion was at its height, the boy raised his head, saw his mother, and came back to her, crying.

    For thirty miles she made life miserable for that boy. She blamed him for things he had not done and had him weeping over dangers that might come to them. She was going to a new place where her brother lived, and suddenly she became afraid he might fail to meet the train. What would they do? Where could they go? She talked about all of these things to the child until it seemed they were on the most dangerous venture ever made.

    I happened to be going to the same city, so I was interested to know whether her brother would be there. Of course, he was, for she had written him of her coming. After she had left the train, going into the station, she stopped and said excitedly, "I have lost my purse!" I stopped to see the outcome of this matter. After looking carefully through an armful of things, she said, "No, here it is." I went to the hotel very much amused at the imaginary troubles the woman had endured. They were as ghosts in the dark.

    How interesting to trace this vein running through the human family. Cain thought God was partial to Abel, and he became so enraged over the imaginary thing that he rose up in his anger and killed his brother (Gen. 4:8). Abraham was afraid the king of Egypt would kill him to get his wife, so he lied and said she was his sister (Gen. 12:10-20). Elijah was sure all the good people of his day had been killed but himself and that he would not be alive much longer, but God told him of an army of worshipers hiding in the mountains. What was more, Elijah was in no danger of death since God took him to heaven without dying (1 Kings 19:18; 2 Kings 2:11).

    I heard a very interesting story some time ago. A woman awoke in the night and excitedly told her husband she was sure she heard someone in the house. The man had heard that so many times he was not at all afraid. To satisfy the wife, he quietly slipped downstairs and turned the lights on, whereupon he found himself face to face with a burglar

    The intruder pointed his gun at the homeowner and told him to be quiet, that he had already got all he wanted--he had the money, jewels, and silverware in a sack and was ready to go. If the man behaved, nothing would be done, but if he made any noise, the burglar would kill him on the spot. The man, wide awake now, assured the burglar that he had no intention of raising an alarm, but he said, "I have a favor to ask of you."

    "What is it?" replied the burglar.

    "I wish you would wait here until I could bring my wife down. I want you to meet her, because she has been looking for you every night for twenty years." Some of us live in such dread of bad things that might happen we cannot enjoy the good things that do happen.

Satanic Troubles

    The sacred writer leads us on from trouble to trouble. Immediately after the imaginary trouble, he raises a new question. Christ has assured his disciples no harm was about to come, that he was their friend come to help them in their distress. To prove it, Peter demanded that he be permitted to walk on the water to meet the Master. The request was granted, but he had not gone far before he began to sink. Christ rescued him and asked him a leading question: "`Why did you doubt?'" (Matt. 14:31 RSV). He did not ask why Peter sank, nor why he was afraid; he asked why he doubted. This was the core of all his trouble. Who had caused it? The answer to this will solve nine-tenths of our troubles.

    Who always causes doubt? The devil. He had made the disciples forget the power of Christ and had filled their minds with fear and dismay. Doubt is one of the chief weapons of the devil. By this means he crushed Adam and Eve in the garden when he made them doubt God. By this he sank the whole world in the days of Noah because everyone doubted, except Noah and his family. Doubt is a seed the devil drops into the hearts of people, from which will spring a harvest of evils. It sprouts weakness, fears, suspicion, cowardice, false accusations, slander, baseless criticism, and a list of evils too long to be named here.

    Doubt will destroy the reputation of the most innocent person. The question raised by a malicious tongue could take a lifetime to live down. A baseless rumor that questions the honesty of the chief of police, the morality of the school principal, or the fidelity of the minister may not only ruin careers, but lives too. They may be able to account for every private moment and answer every accusation, but the manufactured doubt will hang over them like a dark cloud. Yet nothing will break one's spirit faster than casting aspersions on God. It does not damage his character but ours.

    Let that question be asked in all seriousness: "Why did you doubt?" Can you really tell the reason? Peter had the background of three years of wonderful miracles to brace him and encourage him, and not one single failure had occurred to shake his confidence. The world is full of the evidences of God, but Satan blinds our eyes to them all and makes us wonder whether there is a God. Or, if there is a God, does he care for us individually? Often when the Christian doubts that he has really been saved, he doubts not only in the face of his conversion experience but in the face of the many promises and guaranties of God.

    Why does he doubt? There is but one answer: Satan. It is he who blinds the eyes to all the evidences, makes one forget all the assurances, and constructs a line of false reasoning that will lead one away from the real facts. In order to shake one's confidence, he will magnify the difficulties, point out the weaknesses, remind one of one's faults, and hold up as many contradictions as possible. When you doubt, ask who caused it, why it came, and whether it is well founded. These questions, honestly considered, will dispel most of our doubts.

Divine Troubles

    It will be noted that as soon as Christ came to them the storm ceased. The disciples' troubles were at an end. This same condition existed with the sisters of Lazarus. They each cried out, "'Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died'" (John 11:21, 32 RSV). All of their troubles were occasioned by the absence of Christ.

    And this will account for most of our troubles today. The World Wars sprang out of a militarism that knew no God. When nations forget God, they are soon at each other's throats. Churches also go to pieces when Christ is crowded out. We have yet to find the first example of a minister, preaching to empty pews, who magnified a crucified, buried, and risen Lord. But when he begins to leave Christ out of his message and fills it with all phrases of modernism, it will not be long until there will be space to rent in that church.

    Christ is the bond that holds the home together also. We are facing a most alarming divorce rate as a nation. Why so many loveless marriages? Because they are godless marriages. They have not taken Christ into the new home and have not made him the guest of honor. Instead of settling domestic problems on bended knees, we are too prone to settle them in a battle of words. The same reason can be given for the downfall of so many individuals: the absence of Christ in the life.

    If life is filled with storms, by all means call the Master in. He can settle every doubt, quiet every fear, conquer every difficulty, overcome every obstacle, and drive back every cloud. We try to preach without him, sing without him, and carry on our mission work without him, thinking to offset his absence with physical effort and material organization. But there is no substitute for Christ. What blunders we make when we rely on grit for grace and schemes for power and tricks for Christ! Enthusiasm will not take the place of the Holy Spirit, and moral improvement will never be accepted instead of regeneration. Our great need is for Christ.

Excerpted from Sifted but Saved by . Copyright © 2001 by Broadman & Holman Publishers. Excerpted by permission. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.