This Boat’s Not Moving
We just finished Memorial weekend in the US. One of the things we did over the weekend was listen to an audio message by Michael Horton from the Liberate Conference that was held in February of 2012. In one part of his message he used the analogy of an expensive sail boat dead in the water because even though it had all of the expensive gadgets on board to make it something to be envied, it had no wind in it’s sails to keep it moving and make it a thing of real beauty. I related to this on so many levels because it describes what happened to us and our own journey away from, and back to, the gospel.
We had all the gadgets – the theology, the hermeneutic, the pat answers, the proof texts, etc. But our sails were empty of gospel wind, so while we may have looked good on one level, we were powerless to move. We were motionless in the water. The sail boat we were on needed wind in the sails and the wind was the power of the gospel. We had some good data, but without the gospel in our sails it was only data, and like the sail boat without wind in it’s sails, we were powerless to navigate the waters of life with grace and mercy at the helm. Here’s the ironic thing; until the Holy Spirit made it plain to us through some pretty severe trials, we didn’t even know we were in trouble.
-Mike
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