The Family Vessel

A friend of mine passed this along to me a few years back.

Every family is a ship with a captain, a crew, and sometimes passengers and cargo. It may be a pleasure liner, a research vessel, a boatload of pilgrims headed to a new city, a mercy ship, a cargo vessel seeking riches, or a stinking old tub hanging around port. There are many ships leaving port, each with its own captain, crew, cargo, and passengers. Every ship has a purpose or destination before it leaves port; all on board are participants, regardless of the degree of their commitment, their lives affected by the passage and the destination. No ship is alone. Others are sailing nearby, and the crew becomes acquainted with many ships and their crews. In each port, there is a mingling and exchange of news and gossip. Every crew member is always weighing the possibilities and deciding if he is on the best ship.

No ship is an island unto itself. If a captain were to simply anchor offshore to avoid the corruption of society and to prevent his crew members from being tempted to switch ships, the hands would become very discontent. The ship must be going somewhere with a meaningful purpose, otherwise the crew would not long tolerate the drudgery of their daily duties. There is no romance in simply retreating, in seeking one’s own survival. The thrill of life is in the conquest of the obstacles of life. Many fathers/captains are afraid of failure, so they go nowhere and do nothing but seek to stay afloat just outside the influence of other ships. The crew of a self-quarantined ship will stand at the rail and longingly watch other ships sail past to destinations unknown. They know that those ships going someplace, any place, are certainly more interesting than the stagnant calm in which they must exist. Younger kids will wish for something different, but fear and insecurity will keep them at the rail. However, there will come a day when they can swim well enough to risk going overboard to catch a ride on a passing vessel.

To keep kids from jumping ship and booking passage to a different port, they must have confidence that their ship is going somewhere, sailing to a port that offers tremendous possibilities. They should be able to stand up there on the bow and imagine the great new world to which they are sailing. They must have an exciting vision of great things to come and a hope of being significant in the coming events.

They must have a sense of mission, a full understanding of the history of their captain’s and ship’s endeavor. They should be familiar with those who have gone before and made to know that they are needed to carry on the worthy tradition. Only then will they endure the hardships of the voyage without crumbling under the burden of daily, monotonous routine.

They must be learning to pilot the ship. They should be made to know that they are in training to become a captain of their own ship and that they can be trusted with real responsibility.

They must taste of the glory and the triumph from time to time. They must be kept on the edge of expectancy.

There must be authority on the ship that provides security and promotes admiration. There is nothing more emotionally dissatisfying to young people than disorganization, lack of a top commander who is decisive, resolute, even hard and unyielding at times, but always accessible. The ship must have one authority that is respected. If the chief officer is subversive and disrespectful, it will cause the crew to commit mutiny or to abandon ship in some promising port.

Posted on 10/06/2008 under Pastor Scott's Blog. Comments RSS feed.
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