Maintaining Balance: How To Manage Through Stormy Weather

Written by Ed Allen
Sunday, 14 November 2010 10:00

Sermons - General Sermons

Man Overboard A True Story

By Michael Jackson, founder of the Stormy Seas Clothing Company

It was a normal night on the Bering Sea. We were fishing for King Crab and had been at sea for twelve days, averaging three hours sleep each day. The wind was blowing 45-50 mph and seas were 25-30 feet and breaking, frequent snow squalls reduced visibility to a few yards.

This night in November began like so many others ... the dull timeless gray of day gradually gave way to the eerie blackness of night. A darkness so complete our universe shrank to the deck of the 100ft King crabber and the small circle of boiling sea illuminated by our sodium lights.

Day and night, day after day the work goes on unchanged. The 700-pound crab pots come aboard ceaselessly. Every three or four minutes another knocks on the steel hull announcing its arrival,demanding instant attention. The hydraulics that in 60 seconds drag it from the bottom 200 ft below now scream as the huge pot is jerked aboard the waiting boat. Fatigue and monotony dull the senses; familiarity with the tasks lull the crew into a false sense of security.

It was in this world I suddenly found myself beside the boat. While performing a task I'd done thousands of times before, a bight of line caught a control valve and reversed the crab block.

Suddenly lines and buoys were flying across the deck. Without warning I was hurled into the frigid dark water. Efforts to recover me were frantic and uncoordinated. Precious seconds were slipping by. In the confusion no one alerted the captain there was a man overboard! I turned toward the boat and desperately reached for an outstretched hand. That gloved hand reaching as far as it dare, was not within my grasp. A passing swell quickly swept me toward the stem. Pots stacked on deck prevented the crew from effecting a rescue. In desperation, I swam to the pitching giant but found no handhold as my gloved hand futilely clawed the smooth steel hull.

The adrenaline that shot into my system as I entered the water was quickly giving way to numbing cold. The limbs frantically working to keep me afloat were becoming heavy and without control as the cold drained my strength. The very clothing intended to protect me from the elements while on deck had become a deadly weight pulling me beneath the waves. By now, seconds had passed to minutes. My desperation was giving way to a chilling sense of calm. The boat so near was beyond my grasp.

Ever felt this way emotionally, spiritually?

Coast Guard regs: in stormy conditions, provide harnesses

Our passage presents a fundamental spiritual truth that is key in our efforts to maintain emotional and spiritual balance in stormy conditions. This passage gives us a truth harness!

• Vocabulary
  • katergadzomai “do, accomplish, produce, bring about, work out,conquer”
  • okopeo “pay attention to, keep one’s attention on be concerned about
  • proskairos “not lasting, temporary” Matt. 13:21; Heb 11:25
  • aionios “eternal”
• Read passage
• thought this passage was about troubles on one side versus far weightier glory on the other – the key being we should look at the glory and not at the troubles. Then it hit me ... our word katergadzomai

Harness Truth

Harness truth: An unimaginable weighty and eternal glory is being produced in us by our troubles … in fact, this glory is growing in us because of our troubles.

• Paul’s catalogue of troubles which he called light and momentary.
  • Corinthian church
  • His own health
  • 2 Cor. 11:24-26
• He sees these troubles as light and momentary – not just because they are far less weighty than the glory that is his in Christ. He sees them as light and momentary because they are producing in him the glory that is his in Christ!
  • Van story from Boston...
• This glory is weighty. In fact, one commentator said, “Paul seems to speak of glory as if it were a substantial entity that could be progressively added to.”
• This glory is also eternal! But did you notice our definition of the word aionios? When Paul used that word, he was thinking quality even more than he was thinking quantity. This is similar to what Jesus meant when he told his followers that he had come to give them abundant life.
  • So the glory that is being produced in us, is being produced in the here and now. In fact, Paul supplies three reasons for his refusal to lose heart in this chapter. Two of those reasons have to do with here and now.
    • (1) His divine commissioning as a minister of this great truth about the good news of what God has done in Christ (v. 1)
    • (2) The immediate task of promoting the Corinthians spiritual welfare and the glory of God (v. 15)
    • These two reasons are part of the glory that Paul sees coming out of his own life – in the here-and-now.
  • But we will ultimately see the glory that is being produced in us fully unveiled after this life. And so, Paul looks forward to his own resurrection from the dead (v. 14) as a third reason that allows him to not lose heart. I believe reflection on these three reasons leads Paul back to his harness truth! “I don’t need to be discouraged, because whatever troubles I may have, they are producing in me a greater glory.”
  • Of course, the future glory is Paul’s greatest hope and this is where he fixes his eyes.
    • Think of the internal space, deep below the surface of our lives, where our greatest joys and fears and hopes and wounds, our very life resides.
    • Think of the space beyond and underneath what we can see – teaming with spiritual life, dominated by the energy of God Himself...
    • The intersection of these two spaces is where Paul encourages us to focus our attention
    • We are to be okopeo with that space, with what we cannot see.
    • It is only as attention is focused on what is unseen that suffering will lead to glory.
    • You can think of the surface of your life. You may even be able to muster... success, relationship, but it is not sustainable and it will not harness you in stormy seas.
    • Only as you give your heart and your hope over to what God has done in Christ, and focus on His work in your life, in the world around you and in your future, only then will you be harnessed.
    • Then, though you are outwardly wasting away, yet inwardly you will be renewed day by day.

Preaching this because came up in last conversations with Christian. He was looking forward to the glory that would be his, but I also got to experience the glory that he had become over the last two years of his life. His funeral was a celebration of that glory.