<p>8:25&nbsp;<i>And they came to Him</i>- 'Coming to' can be understood in the sense of worship. His apparent silence led them to an intensity of prayerful approach to Him. See on :24.</p>
<p><i>And awoke him</i>- Literally, to raise up. 'Asleep' in 8:24 can also mean simply to lay down to rest. It seemed He didn't want to do anything- until they imposed upon Him with all their energy and intensity of focus upon Him and Him alone as their Saviour. And the whole situation was raised up to that end.<br />
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<i>Saying, Save us, Lord!</i>- Peter used the same word when he urged the Lord in another storm &quot;save&nbsp;<i>me</i>&quot; (Mt. 14:30). We see how the Lord repeated the storm experience in the lives of the disciples, hoping they would learn the lesson of faith and focus upon Him, and repeating them so that they might be learnt. The two incidents are again connected by the rebuke &quot;Ye [plural] of little faith&quot; (8:26) and then to Peter &quot;You [singular] of little faith&quot; (Mt. 14:31).<br />
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<i>We perish!</i>- The same Greek words for 'save' and 'perish' also occur together in Mt. 16:25, where the Lord teaches that if we seek to save our lives in this world then we will perish. He could thereby be making a criticism of the disciples' plea to be saved from perishing; His sense would then have been 'You should have an even greater, focused intensity upon your need to be saved spiritually and not to perish eternally'. Again the two words occur together in Mt. 18:11, where the Lord says that He came to save those who are perishing- and again, He has in view spiritual, ultimate salvation. The perishing disciples on the lake, in need of saving, are therefore being set up as a picture of the intensity of desire we should have for forgiveness and salvation. The way essential intention is understood as prayer is perhaps reflected in the way Matthew records that the disciples prayed during the storm on the lake: &quot;Lord, save us, we are perishing!&quot; (Mt. 8:25). Mark records that their actual words were &quot;Teacher, do you not care if we perish?&quot; (Mk. 4:38). Perhaps this was read by Matthew's inspiration as prayer. An alternative would be that they firstly said the words recorded by Mark, and then those by Matthew- in which case we could perhaps notice the difference between &quot;Teacher!&quot; and &quot;Lord!&quot;, as if the higher they perceived the greatness of the Lord Jesus, the more moved they were to prayer.</p>
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Mark records that they actually said:&nbsp;&ldquo;Carest thou not that we perish?&rdquo; (Mk. 4:38). His whole life and death were because He&nbsp;<i>did</i>&nbsp;so care that they would not perish (Jn. 3:16). It&rsquo;s so reminiscent of a child&rsquo;s total, if temporary, misunderstanding and lack of appreciation of the parent&rsquo;s love and self-sacrifice.</p>