Today was day 8 of our Greek Island Travel Devotional Tour, and it was a day at sea.
The ship
I haven’t talked much about our ship thus far. Suffice it to say it is a modern marvel. We’ve cruised a lot but have never seen a ship quite like this one.
Like most of the big cruise ships, this ship has a casino, spa, movie theater miniature golf course, basketball court, swimming pool, and of course guest rooms for 3,000 people, amongst Its 14 decks. What makes it unique is that its interior from deck 5 to the roof is an atrium with a “main-street” lined by a cafe, lounge, restaurant, and shops. Walking down main street makes you feel you are in a small, self-contained town.
I spent much of the day though up in a lounge on deck 14, the highest habitable part of the ship. From there one can look out through the large, panorama window and see out over the bow of the ship as far as the eye can see. One is reminded that we are on a ship in a very large sea, that is part of a very large world.
Finding significance in our smallness
Going to the deck 14 lounge is much like what we do when we go to the Lord in prayer.
We live our lives in these self-contained realities in the cruise ship, and our little world becomes the world. Within these self-contained realities we seek significance through accomplishments and achievement. If we do well we feel significant, at least that is what we hope.
Then we go to the Lord in prayer, and when we do we get a new perspective that reminds us that our self-contained world is just a small part of a very much larger one. Moreover, it’s not just a ship floating on a large ocean that is part of an even larger existing world. We see that that existing world is only a small part of all that has existed before and will exist after it, and what we have accomplished or achieved will be forgotten soon after we are gone.
Realizing all that makes our lives so infinitesimally small and what we do so seemingly unimportant. We quickly see that all we thought important and worth pursuing is — to quote Solomon and Kansas’s Kerry Livgren — but dust in the wind.
It is at that point though, when we fully recognize our smallness in the face of the Creator and all He has created, that we find any significance. We recognize that in Him we can become citizens of a kingdom that will reign on earth long after we are gone and forever in eternity. We can now choose to act as part of something that will outlive us on earth and continue forever. Our conduct and accomplishments have the opportunity for lasting and eternal consequences.
For no many can lay a foundation other than the one which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. Now if any many builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stray, each man’s work will become evident; for the day will show it because it is to be revealed with fire, and the fire itself will test the quality of each man’s work.
The martyrs were willing to give up everything, even their lives, because they had been to the deck 14 lounge and had that perspective. They had seen God.
Tomorrow we visit a place associated with the Great Persecution and one of those martyrs.
Until then. GS
