Shipwrecked

       The day on the Indian Ocean started smoothly for Canadian school teachers Warren and Julie Lavender.  They set out on a small dive boat for their very first experience with scuba diving.  But once they entered the water they found that all the fish were hiding in crevices in the rocks and coral.  Then the current grew extremely strong. 

       “It was like a hurricane underwater,” is how Warren describes it. Sixty feet below the surface, his mask was ripped up.  It was all they could do to hold onto coral to avoid being sucked away.  “We were hanging parallel to the ocean floor,” Julie says.

       Warren is 6’4” and 280 pounds.  But Julie is only 5’3”. “I was terrified that Julie would lose her grip and be swept away forever,” Warren recalls. “I remember thinking, ‘Gee, I could really learn to hate this sport.’

       They eventually made it to the guide rope and climbed to the sunny surface.  They thought that it was the end of a perfectly normal dive.  They pulled off their masks, looked at each other and said, “That sucked.”  Then Warren threw up. 

       Rick Reilly describes in Sports Illustrated how the Lavenders happily climbed back into the guide boat for the half-hour trip back to the beach where glorious Alka-Seltzer awaited.  But on the trip back Julie noticed something weird in the water.  “Somebody’s wallet,” she said pointing at it.  Then came a chair.  Then a coconut tree.  

       Then Warren noticed something worse – a horrified look on the captain’s face.  He spun around to see that the beach wasn’t there anymore.  It was gone.  So were the docks. Waves were crashing straight into the hotels, some of which were caved in like sandcastles. 

       The Lavenders had unknowingly scuba dived through the 2004 tsunami which was now hammering their vacation spot, the resort town of Beruwala on the western coast of Sri Lanka.  The waves were gobbling up homes and boats and people, pulling them into the Indian Ocean and flinging them back at the town again and again, killing hundreds.  230,000 people were killed in Indonesia , Thailand , India , Malaysia and Sri Lanka .

       The Lavenders were terrified by what they experienced under water.  They would have been much more terrified if they’d actually known what was happening.

       Storms are rough and they can be even rougher if you know what is going on.  It is like the fear of Jesus’ disciples in the storm on the Sea of Galilee .  They aren’t afraid because they are ignorant.  They are afraid because they are knowledgeable, experienced sailors who know they are in a hopeless place.   Then Jesus comes and calms the waters.

       Jesus is with the Apostle Paul throughout his ministry – just as He promises to be with us.  But the presence of Jesus doesn’t mean that Paul doesn’t have storms.  He does.  Some of these are emotional storms.  Some are legal storms.   Some are relational storms.  Some are theological storms.  And some are just wind-blowing, wave crashing, ship sinking storm storms.  Even before these last chapters of Acts Paul had gone through at least one shipwreck.    He tells the Corinthians that he has spend a night and a day in the deep – presumably after being sunk in one ship and being rescued by another. 

       In 2006, a group of us from the church went on a trip to Greece and Turkey following the footsteps of Paul.  Most of these footsteps were followed in an air-conditioned motor coach.  But we were actually on a ship that sunk in the Mediterranean – just like Paul.  We laughed through the life-boat drills but we’ll never do that again. 

        Our ship, the Sea Diamond, left port from Pireaus near Athens and carried us across the Aegean to the islands of Mykonos, Rhodes and Patmos before landing us near Ephesus .  So we weren’t actually on the Sea Diamond when it sunk after it hit some rocks in the harbor at Santorini.  And that didn’t happen until nine months later.  But that was as close as we got to being shipwrecked and it’s as close as I want to get. 

       We were on the Mediterranean as tourists.  But Paul is on the sea as a prisoner – on his way to Rome to appear before Caesar.

       We last saw Paul as he was leaving Ephesus to travel to Jerusalem .  In Jerusalem , he is recognized by Jews who oppose his ministry in the name of Jesus.  They accuse him of profaning the Temple by bringing with him a Gentile from Ephesus named Trophimus.  A riot starts.  Paul is taken into protective custody by the Roman garrison in the Antonia Fortress.  The Romans then hear of a plot to kill Paul so they take him to the Roman headquarters at Caesarea on the coast. 

       Paul is kept in Caesarea as a prisoner for about three years – first under the Roman governor Felix and then under the Roman governor Festus.  Paul realizes that this captivity without charges is going no where.  So he finally exercises his right as a citizen of Rome and appeals his case directly to Caesar. 

       That’s how Paul ends up on the sea physically.  But spiritually, he knows that he is there by the will of God.  So he refers to himself as the prisoner, not of Rome , but of Jesus Christ.

        Luke tells how the cumbersome grain ship is being driven before the wind across the Sea.  Though she is one hundred and forty feet long and thirty-six feet wide and had a draught of over thirty-three feet, she is out of control.  The two paddle rudders are impotent against the raging sea and the relentless wind.  The one mast with the square sail cannot head into the wind.  To try and save the ship and their lives, the sailors strap the hull with cables drawn tight with winches so the ship will not be just twisted apart.  They set out sea-anchors to slow the rate of travel but to no avail.  The clouds hide the sun by day and the stars by night so they have no idea where they are or when their ship will suddenly collide with a rocky coast.  

       Paul had warned them not to set out to sea.  He is a very experienced traveler and he knows the weather signs.  It is already mid-October.  But Julius the centurion wants to get his prisoner to Rome before winter.  The captain if the ship he has requisitioned is determined to get his cargo to Italy for high profit.  Caution has been thrown to the winds. And now the winds are making their reply.

        Gear and cargo are tossed overboard to lighten the ship.  Crew and passengers are willing to give up anything to stay alive.  But at last they even give up hope.  They accept as inevitable the fate of crashing into the Syrtis Sands, a graveyard of many ships off the coast of Libya .  Terror pervades the ship.  It grips everyone on board.

       All except Paul.   The Lord gives Paul assurance that it was His will that Paul stand before Caesar.  Paul must survive and the Lord also promises Paul the lives of all 276 people on board.  So Paul infuses hope into the others on the ship.   He stands before the cowering crew and the fear-wracked legionnaires.  His voice rings our above the howl of the wind in the rigging:  “I now bid you to take heart, for there will be no loss of life among you but only of the ship.  For this very night there stood by me an angel of the God to whom I belong and whom I worship, and he said, ‘Do not be afraid.’   So take heart men, for I have faith in God that it will be exactly as I have been told.  But we will have to run on some island.” 

       Paul’s words prove to be true.   He and everyone on the ship survive.

       On one level, this is a great travel tale. Luke is on the journey to Rome with Paul.  His narrative is a masterpiece of nautical storytelling. It has been thoroughly mined by historians and maritime archeologists who want to know what it was like to sail the sea in those days.  It is the best eyewitness source there is bar none.

        But we have a more important use for Luke’s story than history.  We need to know what it says to us as we live as the people of Jesus Christ in these days.  To that end, let me make three observations about our Christian lives that grow out of Luke’s story.

        Observation one is about the use of our gifts. .

        Paul has the promise of Jesus that the lives of all those in the ship will be spared.  But Paul doesn’t just kick back on the one surviving deck chair and say, “We don’t need to lift a finger, it’s wired.”  Instead, Paul is a model of activity and intervention. 

       The Bible does not drive a wedge between the life of faith and personal action.  An angel appeared to Paul on the ship.  What could be more spiritual than that?   But look at Paul’s action after that. He doesn’t preach some “name it and claim it” message telling the men there is nothing they have to do.  Instead he goes around giving his shipmates something to eat and telling them they must all stay with the ship.  He warns the Centurion Julius that the sailors intend to desert the ship and leave the passengers to the mercy of the sea.  Julius has learned to listen to Paul.  He intervenes and stops the betrayal.

        When Dr. Dale Bruner spoke here at MPC last spring, a group of us had dinner together before the evening program.  As we chatted, Dale asked what I was preaching on.  When I told him I was preaching in Acts, he told me that he was then teaching Acts at Hollywood Presbyterian and that he was frustrated by this story of the shipwreck.  He asked, “What is the lesson here – that pastors are qualified to tell other people how to do their jobs?” 

        That’s obviously not true.  I have no business telling you computer experts about computers.  Many of you know that.  I have no business telling a builder about building or an engineer about engineering.  Paul isn’t a qualified sailor although he certainly knows the sea.  He doesn’t know the skills of the soldier.

       What Paul does know is people.  He knows the warning signs of panic.  He knows the sideways glances of sailors plotting to desert their posts.  He knows that having the Lord’s promise doesn’t mean that we don’t use the gifts He has given us.  Because the use of our gifts may be, at least in part, the way in which the Lord intends to carry out His promise. 

        That’s certainly true of Paul.  He is a practical man of action when he has to be.  There are 276 people on that ship.  But by the end of the voyage Paul has exerted more influence on the situation than all the ship’s crew and Roman soldiers combined.  Instead of letting the situation control him, Paul seizes it and used it to advance the gospel.

        Observation two is about what we model in times of crisis and stress.

        Paul and his traveling companions finally reach dry land on the Island of Malta .  They build a bonfire of the beach to dry out and Paul characteristically does his part.  He goes around gathering sticks to put on the fire.

        Suddenly a poisonous snake emerges from a bundle of sticks and bites him.  If it had been me I think I would have said, “Enough, Lord! I’ve head it with the trauma.  I’m going to flag you for piling on.”  Paul doesn’t.  He simply and calmly shakes the viper off his hand and into the fire.

        The people of Malta read the event through their superstitions.  “This man must be a murderer who escaped the sea only to be pursued to this place of refuge by the gods.”   Nemesis has followed Paul and caught him.  They expect Paul to drop down dead.  But when he doesn’t, the people change their minds.  They decide that Paul must be a god himself.

        Well Paul isn’t a god.  But Paul has spent a lot of time with God.  That is what enables Paul to handle the new crisis with such grace.  It is also what opens the door to a very effective ministry for Paul throughout his time on the island. 

         What do people see in us by how we handle crisis and stress?  Do they see that we have been with God?   That’s what they ought to see.  We will have our snakes like everyone else.  But we should be able to respond in faith. 

       Observation three is about the place of storms in God’s plan.

        Paul writes to the Romans about his plans to visit them and declares that he knows that when he comes, it will be in all of the fullness of the blessing of Christ.   That is true.  Jesus is with Paul on that ship.

       But, as Jesus’ disciples learn on the Sea of Galilee , having Jesus with you doesn’t mean you won’t have storms. Even if you are going somewhere in the will of Christ doesn’t mean that the way will always be smooth and that there won’t be any delays.  Paul never expects that his plans to come to Rome and his actual arrival will involve a three year delay.  He never expects that it will involve shipwreck.  But he does know that the Christian way is not meant to be easy. 

       That’s why Paul writes to the Romans that we should count it as joy when we experience trials – because we know the testing of our faith produces endurance and endurance produces hope.”  Trouble isn’t a mistake.  It’s a plan.  

        That’s something I need to remember right now.  This week you will receive a letter from the Session about some extraordinary financial needs we face as a congregation – beyond what has already been communicated.  We’ll talk about this at the congregational meeting on February 3.  This isn’t an attempt to sneak up on anybody or drop one shoe at a time.  It’s just that the full dimensions of what we face are only now apparent.   The bottom line is that we don’t have enough money to finish the building.  We have almost enough but not enough.  Even though the Session is willing to deplete our operating reserves, and even though every effort has been made to freeze the operating budget including staff salaries and cut the less essential programs, we don’t have enough.  We are at our borrowing capacity and have an agreement with PILP not to borrow any more – even on a temporary basis.  The $100,000 move-in fund we talked about in December – a fund that has been very well-supported by you as a congregation – realistically has to become a $200,000 fund to keep our reserves at a safe level.  The thing, is, the gap is only less than 2% of the total project so we’re not talking bad planning here. We’re still getting a great building at an incredible price.  But at this level of construction, a small percentage swing translates into a lot of dollars – at least for my Scot’s blood.

       I frankly don’t like what’s going on.  I’ve lost some sleep.  But I’m not sure if this isn’t somehow something in God’s will to help us to collectively grow up in Christ.

       The thing is that Jesus wants to turn us into veterans and we won’t become veterans until we’ve been shot at.  Jesus doesn’t cal us to the place of safety.  That’s why Jesus sends His disciples into the teeth of the storm and watches them as they labor at the oars before He comes to them across the water and calms the wind.  That’s why Jesus said of Paul on the very day He called Paul into His service, “I will show him how many things he must suffer for the sake of My Name.”

       Like the Apostle Paul, in our own setting and in our own time, we see ourselves as God’s ambassadors for others. When we love deeply, we become vulnerable to being hurt; our hearts are broken by the brokenness of people. When we see ourselves this way, we are willing to bear the cost. Suddenly our own schedules, conveniences, prejudices, judgments, egos and preferences seem secondary. Like Paul, we suffer the depth of the feelings of compassion and concern. And like Paul, when we see what it produces, we rejoice.

       That doesn’t mean that we should go looking for storms.  We haven’t.  There is no shortage of human wisdom here. Our Building Committee and Session are great storm avoiders. So is Paul. He warns the centurion and the captain of the ship not to set out at that time of year.  He would have been glad to avoid the storm.  But when the storm comes, he doesn’t wonder if God has made a mistake.   He embraces it as part of what it means for him to carry the gospel – part of the delivery cost we are all called to pay.

       That means that as individuals and as a congregation we can expect some rough waters.  We are allowed to try to avoid them if we can – as Paul sought to do.  We are allowed to plan well and try to anticipate the future, as we have.  But we also know that the storms will come and that God will be in the storms that feel so threatening to us.  God calls us to a life of faith – which means that there must always be some things happening around here that really require God’s intervention and not just our good planning.  We can feel out of control and still be in God’s will.  And it is when we feel out of our control that we discover what it means to be in His control.

       Remember Warren and Julie Lavender who scuba dived their way through a huge natural disaster?   They realize how amazing it was for them to have survived – how just that week they had taken up a sport that wound up saving their lives.  “If we hadn’t been diving,” says Julie, “we’d have been lying on that beach.”  Who would have thought,” concludes Warren , “that we were in the safest place of all?  Underwater.”

        But there is one safer place in any storm.   That is in the arms of God.