Volume Two Number Three

- 2.3 pages, 1398 words -

Expectations

I am composing this portion of my adventures update while at sea on our way to Israel. We have traveled 4,050 nautical miles and have 3,304 to go. We’ve passed the high point in our voyage across the Atlantic, the “vertex” of our great circle course at 40o-43’N. The Azores are not far away, just a few hundred miles east southeast.

I find the weather quite agreeable just now. The dry bulb temperature is 66o F, and the wind is out of the north at 17 knots. The sun breaks through the clouds occasionally, sometimes in shafts and beams of light onto the white flecked dark blue surface. Despite the local weather, our current base course has us beam to in a 15 to 18 foot, 11 second swell that is coming from a distant storm. This swell has forced us to tack back and forth along our trackline to avoid excessive rolls. Even so, one of my crewmembers stumbled and hurt herself today and my bike, mounted in a trainer and oriented athwartships, upended itself and flailed around like a wild mustang. They tell me that roll was almost 40 degrees.

It has been difficult to make headway on this voyage. I was pushing hard to get out in front of Hurricane Florence, but in the end I had to give up and back off. Then I was even forced to turn around and run south. Back on track for Israel, a full week behind where we ought to have been, I had to concern myself with Hurricane Gordon. Initially he gave us plenty of room and crossed our planned route 600 miles ahead of us, but then he stalled and jerked hesitantly northward. I was compelled to reduce speed again until he made up his mind, at which point he bolted east with a will. Now I’m zig-zagging, swerving across the ocean, eating up time and fuel, but not necessarily mileage.

Some of you may not have known that I left Friend Ships in July. It’s a real challenge for me to serve with Friend Ships, and after the Haiti mission, I really needed a break. I planned on staying away for a long time, maybe six months or more. I drove home with all of my belongings and began the process of moving into my folks abandoned log cabin above Lake Chelan. I was going to fix the place back up – plumb hot water to the taps, install outlets and electrify them, sweep up the carpet of moth wings and mouse droppings, and line the walls with my books.

I visited my mom and dad, saw the opening of the Bach Fest in Chelan, rode the Seattle to Portland bicycle classic with some friends, went river rafting and hiking, and spent four days at the Creation West Christian Music Festival. I spent time with my kid brother and his wife and their cool new baby boy, Preston. I was relaxed and relaxing, looking forward to what I had planned for the rest of the year at home in Washington state. I was exulting in the glories of the North Cascades as seen from the Lake Ann Trail when a voice mail was left on my phone.

Just that quickly, everything changed. The moth wings still blanket the floor of the cabin and my books are still packed away in twenty some liquor boxes. I finished a too short visit with my family and drove back to Louisiana to load the ship for Israel. Returning to Port Mercy was surreal. This can’t be happening! I said goodbye! I wasn’t supposed to come back for months! Maybe Friend Ships won’t be there when I get to the address, and I’ll be able to wake up and go back home again. It was there and now I’m here.

My job as captain requires me to be on call all the time. The phone often rings in the middle of the night. Sometimes it’s a question I can answer from my rack, at other times I must go to the bridge to assess a developing risk of collision situation for myself. I check the weather regularly and compare the forecasted paths of hurricanes to our own projected route. I look at the relative positions of high and low pressure areas and the wind and waves that will result. Deciding what to do with the information I process is the most difficult aspect of the job. Should I try to run for it? Stop? Turn around? Wait just a bit longer to decide? I want to make the best speed possible, but I can’t burn too much fuel. I can’t permit the ship to roll or slam like a bucking bronco either. The circumstances change fairly often or develop complications, so I must continually revise or rethink my decisions.

We ran out of fresh water the other day. Our reverse osmosis water maker was clogged with rust and mud and stopped working. Then 44 tons of fresh water drained from the forepeak tank into the engine room bilges over night. We still had 27 tons in the after peak tank, but a stuck valve or plugged pipe prevented us from getting the water to the faucets and shower heads. One of our engineers jerry rigged a hose to the salt water flushing pump and we could take showers and wash our clothes in sea water. Four or five days later, it seems like three weeks, we discovered the water hadn’t actually drained out of the forepeak. We have plenty of water after all. The stress of considering every option, communicating with the office and trying to look out for my crew gave way to awkwardness and embarrassment. I don’t know which is tougher to bear.

I was reading a Christian fiction novel to escape today, and it lead me to a significant insight. I acknowledged today that I’ve been hampered in my relationship with God by a thought that resides in my mind, always just below the surface – I think that being a Christian ought to make my life easier. I’d never say this out loud, no way! But the fact that I really think this way is manifested when something goes wrong and I get angry. This is God’s ship! It shouldn’t suck so much! We’re on our way to Israel to bless God’s people, and He slows us down with two hurricanes! We’re suffering a drought in the middle of the ocean and the home office is unsympathetic! Hey God, where are You? Can’t you see I’m struggling here? Is this Your plan? Am I lacking in faith or not confessing a certain sin? Are You mad at me?

I have created a set of expectations for how God is to act in my life. Stay within the bounds of this box, Creator, or I’m going to be disappointed in You and dissatisfied in our relationship. . . Be my genie and we’ll get along fine. Where’s the slot for the quarters, I want my candy bar?!
Here, from the book – “[Jesus] was greater than any building you could put him in or any tradition you could wrap around him or any expectations you could impose on him. Throughout my life, in a variety of ways, I’d tried to do all three of those things, but now I was learning – again – that it is only when you’re willing to know him on his terms, for who he is, that you really start to know him at all.” – Frank Peretti, The Visitation, p 475.

So I apologized to the King for having a bad attitude and I have asked Him to help me get to know Him on His terms. I’ll try not to view God through the lens of my experiences or project onto Him my own understanding of who He ought to be and how He ought to act. Who God is does not depend on whether there are storms or smooth sailing, a drought or abundant water, or a difficult or magnificent boss; He’s so much bigger than that! I’ll try not to reach conclusions of who God is based on my circumstances. I don’t think I’ll be disappointed.

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18 days later and we’re moored port side to in Ashdod, Israel. I’ll send an update on the last 3,304 miles sometime soon.