(A Sea Storm Story by The Son of a Fisherman)
I like to tell people that I am the son of a fisherman and a fisherman for the Son. It’s all true.
My dad, great-granddad, and great-great-granddad were all commercial fisherman. Yes, genuine watermen all their lives. I was raised where the waves meet the shoreline. Yes, along the Atlantic Ocean near Cape Lookout, North Carolina.
We ate fresh seafood at least five times a week at our house. Occasionally, we ate like the rich people and mom would bake us a boxed, Chef Boyardee, cheese pizza. It was like we had died and gone to heaven. Really.
Anyway, you get it. I was raised by trawler-boat captains and trawler-boat captains’ wives. And, we were God-fearing people. Seems along the coastline people are either God-fearing people or sold-out pagans. (I am glad I was born into the former, not the latter.)
I started working on the family trawler in the summer after my eighth grade year. Not that I didn’t work in the family trade earlier, but that’s the first year I remember getting paid. I mean other than room and board, I actually was paid cash money as a rising, high-school ninth-grader.
I learned a lot about hard work laboring alongside my dad and granddad. However, I really learned more about being in a storm at sea and that lesson
has proven to help me spiritually the rest of my life up to now.
You see, my dad and granddad had strong reputations as seaworthy men and as men of God. And I am here to report, they lived up to and beyond those reputations from my point of view.
I never remember being afraid in a sea storm. And there’s only two reasons why. I was with dad and granddad. Their presence was my assurance. Some storms on the ocean were like mini-hurricanes, yet I never had fear because of the confidence I had in dad and granddad. I suppose you could say they served to be my stabilizers in storms.
One day on the Pamlico Sound in North Carolina, I remember seeing three water spouts headed straight for our boat. I know it sounds a little bit crazy, but it actually felt more like fun than fear to me. I almost felt sorry for any and all stormy weather with my dad and granddad ever-vigilant and ever-present at the helm.
In this COVID-19 season, I know the storm has been raging. Nevertheless, I know Who is in charge of this storm and all storms. Storms obey his desires. Strong winds bow at his nail-scared feet. The tempests all run to hide at the mention of His Name. Waves fall to a slick calm at the sound of His voice: "Peace, be still!"
Do not miss what I am not saying. I know this COVID-19 storm is bad, even deadly. However, my Master is much more "gooder" than this storm could ever be bad. In fact, My Master walks atop the "baddest" of billows and has been known, at times, to beckon his own, yes, even fishermen, to join Him in wave-walking.
What am I saying? I am saying that regardless of the storm we find ourselves in, His Presence with and within us makes everything different. Delightfully different. Dare I say his children might even find some measure of fun in something as fierce and fearful as a scary squall? After all, doesn’t our Lord Jesus have a reputation as The Storm Silencer?
In Mark’s Good News account of the Life of our Lord, Jesus proved to silence both external and internal storms -- one on the wind-tossed Sea of Galilee and one along the demon-possessed shores of the Gerasenes. Don’t take my word for it. Read Mark 4:35-5:20.
Remember, with Jesus onboard as The Captain of our Souls, we can have comforting calm in the very midst of complete chaos.
Shalom, friends of Jesus, friends of mine.
Pastor Kerry Willis
District Servant
Philadelphia District
Church of the Nazarene
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