Today my wife and I spent the afternoon on the Jersey shore. The beach was nearly emptied of the summer crowds because it's autumn. The weather is changing rapidly with temperatures falling and the afternoon sunlight fading fast.
Before leaving, I glanced over my shoulder for one more look at the icy, blue Atlantic ocean, its vast beauty and danger lurking below her depths. The tide was quickly rising. Waves curled and tumbled, spitting out foam as it fanned across the sandy shore.
As a child I'd spent many summers on the beaches of Rhode Island. As I grew older, I'd returned to the beaches in Newport to mediate. Once I sat perched up on a cliff reading the Scripture on His faithfulness that stretches to the sky. Below me was the Atlantic sometimes placid and other times moody and angry. My life felt much like the ocean, it's currents pulling me to some unknown place, often far from what is familiar and safe.
James describes it well about a man who doubts,"...is like a wave of the sea, carried forward by the wind one moment and driven back the next. That sort of man cannot hope to receive anything from God, and the life of a man of divided loyalty will reveal instability at every turn." (James 1:6, Phillips).
How many stormy seas are the cause of our unbelief?
Psalms 98:7 says, "The seas have lifted up, LORD, the seas have lifted up their voice; the seas have lifted up their pounding waves." But the Lord who walks on stormy seas will always respond to our stormed toss soul, "Peace be still!" (Mark 4:39).
God not only calms our hearts but He will lead us to a safe harbor. Psalms 107:30 says, "What a blessing was that stillness as he brought them safely into harbor!" (NLT).
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