Living on Puget Sound, my husband, Rick, and I love putt-putting around on the Willie C, our 45-year-old, 25-foot Swedish troller boat. Life is grand cruising at 6-7 knots (8 mph), the 3-cylinder diesel engine sipping about a half gallon an hour.
So why was I hunkered down amidship praying? I wasn’t lifting up my usual “nice” pastor-type prayers. Not even my occasional when-I-am-beyond-scared prayers, peppered with cuss words. On the roughest seas I have ever encountered, as we rode up the 5-foot waves and took a nose-dive slamming us back down and taking water over the bow, all I could eke out was, “O God,” as I tried to hope that the boat could take more than I could.
Moments later my hope faltered when the force of the waves busted the anchor out of its holder on the bow, and the pointed ends of the anchor started banging into the fiberglass hull, threatening to punch a hole in the boat. In addition, from my perch on the inside step I saw the door on the anchor rope storage box pop open and the rope tension tighten with each bang. If the anchor let loose, the rope could drag under the boat and foul the propeller — leaving us powerless and stranded at the mercy of the enraged sea.
“Take the helm,” Rick directed. I staggered over, taking the wheel. “Steer directly into the waves.” Perhaps it occurs to you that this was the last thing I wanted to do. I willed myself not to cry or throw up. Rick went below into the V-berth and I watched in near terror as he came up through the front hatch to reach out and retrieve the anchor. Thankfully, his life preserver acted as a cork, preventing him from popping out of the hatch onto the deck and being swept away. Three giant herculean lifts, and he had the anchor safely stowed below deck.
Twenty minutes before this chaos ensued we had crossed the shipping lanes on flat water without incidence. It was a beautiful sunny day! But then, as we approached Foulweather Bluff (yep, that’s what it’s called) everything changed. In hindsight we discovered we were caught suddenly in a deadly concoction of current and wind opposing each other.
So, a few lessons learned — and I’m pretty sure everything here applies to the church, which after all, from earliest days was symbolized as a boat:
When you hit your Foulweather Bluff, and are caught between (at least two) opposing forces, head straight into it and hang on. Maybe pull back on the throttle a bit, but there’s no turning around. The only way through it is (gulp) through it.
Although that sheer terror feels like forever, it isn’t. All told, ours lasted maybe 40 minutes. And in the end (I do not like admitting this) I was a better boater for it.
And, besides, if it wasn’t this challenge, it’d be something else. In fact, when this one is over, sooner or later it will be something else. It’s called boating (or life).
This summer as Rick and I head back out on the Willie C north to the Canadian waters of (wait for it) Desolation Sound, I realize what I fear most is the unknown. My favorite part of boating is safe harbors. But boats exist to get out on the water, to go. Churches, too. Church is more verb than noun. We are made to get out, to love and serve God, especially in hard places.
So here’s looking at you General Assembly: Take the helm of this boat where current and wind are colliding; steer directly into the waves. Do not fear being blown out to sea, even to drown in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ our Lord — the One who ever lives and reigns and will not leave us desolate.
Heidi Husted Armstrong is transitional pastor for First Presbyterian Church in Seattle.
