All the water in all the oceans is not enough to sink one ship unless the water gets inside the ship. So it is with us; we are to be in the world but we should not let the world get in us. Some of the last words of our Lord before he died are recorded in John, as he was praying for his disciples. He said to his Heavenly Father, “I pray for them: I pray not for the world, but for them which thou hast given me; for they are thine…And now I am no more in the world, but these are in the world, and I come to thee.” Jesus was worried about what would happen to his disciples left behind in the world after he ascended to his Father.
He asks, “Holy Father, keep through thine own name those whom thou hast given me, that they may be one, as we are… .I have given them thy word; and the world hath hated them, because they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world.” Jesus asks God to keep his disciples in the way of life. Does he ask for them to be removed from the world which hates them? No. He continues, “I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that thou shouldest keep them from the evil. They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world.”
We are not of the world but we certainly are in it. The problem for us, as for a ship, is not how deep is the worldly water, but how much of the water is getting inside? Jesus wanted the disciples to be proteoted from the evil of the world just as a ship bobbing on the high seas battens clown its hatches to keep from being flooded by the raging waves.
The same water that drowned all the people on earth lifted the ark up and in symbol baptized Noah and his family. To have been outside the ark was certain death. To be inside was life and safety. So it is with us. We want to navigate the troubled seas that engulf the world, and we need to keep our ship watertight to avoid the waters of the world from seeping inside and sinking us.
The prophet Isaiah compares the wicked to the constantly churning sea: “But the wicked are like the troubled sea, when it cannot rest, whose waters cast up mire and dirt. There is no peace, saith my God, to the wicked.”
The wicked of our day, like the wicked of Noah’s day, have filled every imagination of their hearts with only evil continually. They are troubled; they have no peace, and yet the prayer of Jesus was that we should have peace. “Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.”
As we must make our ship a watertight vessel against the raging waters of this world, so we need to fill our minds with the pure teachings of the God of our salvation. Then Christ will be the captain of our ship, and we can smile at the storms of life. Jesus could sleep peacefully in the bottom of the boat while all those around him were in a state of panic. He calmed the sea, and he can calm our fears also.
We have been given the promise, “Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on thee because he trusteth in thee.” Let us keep Christ in our vessel by keeping our minds pure, meditating on the word of God, and may the peace of God that passes all understanding fill our hearts and minds as we wait on him.
The Origin of the Organic World – Part One