Day 267 - March 8 - Plumbing the Depths

Briefly - Joélle got in safely the other night, and we've been really enjoying her presence for the last couple of days. Connor in particular has really been enjoying her company - it's so good to see them together again.

Tonight I want to touch on something I said the other day that has stuck in my head - I made the statement that I believe I'm supposed to plumb the depths of faith. Now, for me that word picture conjures up the idea of submarines, and that conjures up the memory of my brother Brad. Brad's an old submariner from the heyday of the Cold War, so he's got a lot of experience in submarines, while my experience underwater consists of seeing if I can hold my breath from one end of the pool to the other. So he can correct me when I get the facts wrong.

But I can speculate about the underwater world, and draw some corollaries as well, so allow me to ramble a bit.

First, when I say I'm supposed to plumb the depths of faith, I don't really mean "plumb the depths". That phrase literally means to take a weighted rope and measure how deep the water is. That's all well and good, but I don't just want to know how deep the water is. Knowing that there's 3000 feet of water under my keel does me no good if I don't know how to swim! There's so much more to know about developing a functional faith, but where to start?

Well, what else should I know in order to function in the ocean of faith? And why should I know it? Well, the image I have of Christianity today is like a bunch of people floating on the surface of this sea, dabbling and splashing in the shallows, but with no understanding of what lies beneath the surface. In fact, the idea of trying to function under that surface is at the very least foreign, and often is anathema to many believers. And I have to include myself in that statement - a year ago I didn't want to know anything about the extremes of faith. It took an incident on June 16, 2008 to teach me that submerging in the sea of faith doesn't kill me.

Have you ever seen a submarine? Nearly every picture you'll see of a sub is of it plodding along the surface with a miles-long wake behind it. It looks ungainly and awkward - there's no prow to cut the wake, so water pushes right up over the deck. There are these weird, winglike things sticking out like my dog's ears, serving absolutely no purpose except to shade the CO from the tropical sun, I suppose. And that's all you'll ever see of a submarine, and they don't really leave an impressive, well, impression, for lack of a better word.

But that's because submarines aren't creatures of the surface. Floating next to the tender, they look out of place, and not nearly as impressive as an aircraft carrier or a battleship. But that appearance belies the reality - that beneath the waves, the ungainly and awkward submarine becomes a creature of silent elegance, that slides through the deep unseen and lethal, supremely effective for its task. And that, I believe, is a lot like what we as believers are called to be - creatures of faith, which is different from what we often are.

So, a list of the things you and I need to understand in order to be effective creatures of faith -

First, going underwater doesn't kill you; it just introduces you to what you're going to be. A raw recruit in a sub for the first time can decide to either A) focus on the crushing weight of thousands of feet of water over your head and slowly go insane about being underwater; or B) realize that this unnatural act hasn't actually killed you and go about learning how to function in the new environment. Over the last 8 months, I've done too much of A and not enough of B. You too, if you're honest about whatever situation you're in. And when I say "learn how to function in the new environment", the environment I'm speaking of is not the situation - I'm talking about the faith you learn in the situation.

Second, you have to spend time underwater in order to learn to live and function there. And that's nerve-wracking. In the Navy, they make you go down and you don't really get a choice - the only option you have is to obediently do the task you've been assigned, or defiantly rebel. This seems to be an accurate picture of our life - none of us asked to be here, and now we either learn to do what's been required of us, or refuse. Again, you too, in your faith situations.

Three, there's a manual to study in order to learn the basic precepts of submarining. Crack it open and you'll learn where to get your power from, and how to dive the boat, and how to ensure that water doesn't leak in and kill you - all sorts of helpful stuff.

Fourth, the Navy doesn't put you in a submarine, dive the boat, then give you the book and say "come back in a few years when you're comfortable with the information". No, they say "sit down in that chair and do the job". It doesn't matter if you are comfortable or not. It doesn't matter if you want to do the job or not. The only thing that matters is your obedience to the Chief of the Boat. You get to study when you're not on watch and try to get better at your job while you do it.

Fifth, knowing all this stuff isn't worth a hill of beans if you don't know where you are, where you're going, and who you're fighting for.

So for starters, if I'm going to thrive in the ocean of faith, I have to get over being under the surface; I need to take advantage of this time of trial to practice the skills the Chief of the Boat wants me to learn; I need to crack the Manual to make sure I'm learning the right things; and I need to practice it - over and over again until I get it right. Oh, and not forget Who I'm doing it all for. And all in realtime.

You too.

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