Weekly Update – 21st May

The month of May is one of my favourite times of the year, the newness of the green growth, the lighter evenings and mornings and the best bit for me, the dawn chorus. It also means that we are hopefully looking forward to holidays away somewhere.

I’m no exception to this and am looking forward to my first holiday since lockdown. I’m off to Cowes in the Isle of Wight to stay with friends.

 

Cowes is one of the most famous sailing and maritime centres in the UK, so it got me thinking about sailing, or rather floating along in a boat and travelling somewhere. (I’m no sailor but can just about muster up some sea legs for a ferry crossing to the Island.)

 

There are many examples in the Bible of where God has used the sea in people’s lives to show his message of love and mercy, relevant for both then and now.  I’d like to think for a few moments on one of the earliest stories and probably the one we learned first in Sunday School, Noah’s Ark. However, I don’t want to talk about the animals or Noah but about the Ark itself.

 

God is a maritime engineer and I’ve no doubt the blueprint for his design of the Ark was technically brilliant but also deliberate.

In Genesis 6, God sets out the detail of how Noah is to build the Ark and what to use, how tall, how long, where to put the windows and the door, precise engineered instructions.

 

In 1993 there was a major scientific study on the design of the Ark and whether it would be seaworthy and safe, as per the instructions received by Noah in Genesis. Their findings were that the proportions of the Ark were stable and capsize resistant and this 4,300-year-old design if modified by the tiniest measure, or if Noah had cut corners and not followed God’s “blueprint”, it would have failed. God’s design lifted Noah and the animals up above the waves, safe and dry above and away from the trouble below.

 

I want to reflect on God’s design for our lives, planned for a purpose, held together by love, engineered by the message of the cross. No one is here by mistake, unwanted, lacking in any purpose, but designed as a precious human being, here to live the life God has given us, for which Jesus died for, to the full. The Gospel of John sums this up quite nicely, “Jesus said I have come that you may have life in all its fullness” (John 10 vs 10)

 

So, maybe you feel adrift at the moment, bobbing along, not sure where the current will take you, battered by the wind and waves of life? Or perhaps you are cruising along, enjoying the view and life is feeling pretty good. Wherever and however your voyage is taking you, God’s design is perfectly engineered to make sure you get to your destination. When the waters get choppy or life is throwing some big waves in your direction, trust in God’s design for your life and while he doesn’t promise to take the waters away, he does lift us up and will be sailing alongside. Bon Voyage!

 

Jackie