The Christian life is like being on a sailboat. You’re either sailing, rowing, or drifting.
The person sailing has the wind of the Holy Spirit in his sails, feeling the gusts of God’s favor propelling him across the seas of life. This man is filled with joy, perseverance, and optimism in his prayer life and time alone with the Word.
The person rowing is grinding away at the oar. He knows where land is, but nothing is coming easily. He’s not full of sin and rebellion; he just finds himself in overwhelming circumstances with no choice but to row. He feels the winds blowing contrary to his destination and refuses to let go of the oars. He believes letting go will cause him to be blown back from where he’s come.
The person drifting began by sailing, and things were going well until a rogue wave arrived and knocked him off course. Then the winds died down. This led to him to start rowing. After some time, his spiritual muscles became exhausted, his body depleted from the effort to keep making forward progress. Now he has collapsed in the boat, unable to continue. A storm rolls up and he takes down the sails. With hopelessness filling his heart he lets the wild and unpredictable winds of life blow him wherever they will. He is, in many ways, dead in the water. Discouragement has won.
We usually spend more time rowing or drifting than sailing. We feel abandoned and fearful. Our spiritual lives are aimless. Our prayer life is sporadic and impersonal. Our Bible reading is shallow and unfruitful.
How do we move back to rowing, and eventually sailing?
I usually recoil at well-meaning but trite spiritual advice. “Let go and let God!” sounds like nails on a chalkboard. So does, “God’s got it!”
But that’s my pride doing the recoiling. It’s trite, yes, but it’s also true. Annoyingly so.
David experienced every level of God’s presence and provision, from joyful sailing to dreadful drifting.
Sailing:
“Blessed be the LORD, the God of Israel, who alone does wondrous things. Blessed be his glorious name forever; may the whole earth be filled with his glory! Amen and amen!”
-Psalm 72:18-19
Rowing:
“O God, you are my God; earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you; my flesh faints for you, as in a dry and weary land where there is no water.”
-Psalm 63:1
Drifting:
“How long, O LORD? Will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me?”
-Psalm 13:1
It’s comforting to know that even the Lamp of Israel, whose men followed him everywhere through suffering and bloodshed, became frustrated with God. How did he overcome it?
The answer:
“My soul will be satisfied as with fat and rich food, and my mouth will praise you with joyful lips, when I remember you upon my bed, and meditate on you in the watches of the night; for you have been my help, and in the shadow of your wings I will sing for joy.”
-Psalm 63:5-7
David discovered that you move forward in the Lord by looking back on what He has done for you. Countless times in the Psalms, David sings about remembering and recounting the works that Yahweh has done.
This is where it stops being trite. Think of it more like a chant or a military cadence. With every pushup of pain, he chants, “God has been good to me.” With every sit-up of fatigue, he grunts, “He saved me that one time.” When every enemy hunts him, he whispers to himself, “He gave me victory before, and He will do it again.”
We look back to the times of sailing so we can remember them when drifting comes. How joyful and blessed we felt and how sweet our communion with Him was.
We look back to the tough times of rowing and see how it was Him who was giving us the Spirit-inspired determination to put our hands to the plow and keep laboring, no matter the difficulty.
When we do this, we realize that even though we are drifting, mentally and spiritually exhausted, our Father’s sovereign hand has never left us.
This mysterious process is how the Lord Jesus lifts us out of the miry clay and renews our spirits by His Holy Spirit. We have to look back in order to move forward.
Remember the days of sweet fellowship. Remember the feeling of God’s favor. Remember that Jesus promised the Father would hold you in His hand and no one can ever pluck you from it.
Remember and return.
Praise and arrows.