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Photo courtesy of Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Boston/Art Resource, New York, N.Y.

ON THE COVER: Their boat on the verge of foundering in the Sea of Galilee, the disciples awaken Jesus, asleep in the stem, and implore him to save them (Matthew 8:23–25).

Rembrandt van Rijn (1606–1669) captures this moment of fear and pleading in his Christ in the Storm on the Sea of Galilee, which oddly portrays l3 men besides Jesus in the boat, one more than the expected 12 disciples. The story’s denouement has Jesus question the disciples’ lack of faith and then rebuke the wind and sea, bringing on a calm and leaving his disciples in awe.

Attempts to explain this and other miracles by rational means miss the point of the Gospels’ miracle stories, argues Jarl Fossum in “Understanding Jesus’ Miracles.”