The Captain of My Soul

"Well, some say life will beat you down
Break your heart, steal your crown
So I've started out for God-knows-where
I guess I'll know when I get there"
-Learning To Fly by Tom Petty

  The origin of the phrase, "Burn the ships" can be traced back to 1519 as Spanish captain Hernan Cortez and his crew arrived in Veracruz.  They were there to conquer Mexico, and he sent a powerfully strong message to his crew by burning the ships they had sailed on.  Can you imagine as the crew watched their ships light up the sky?   Now, their survival depended upon them moving forward at all costs.   

The crew led by Cortez had their options minimized by his decision.  They were forced to turn their eyes towards what is ahead.  I'm sure they questioned this action, and I would think that they probably struggled with the gravity of what he had done.  Their captain was leading them, and he took an incredibly strong stance.  This crew was forced to follow his lead or die trying.  Does that terrify you?    If you are like me, then it sends a shiver down your spine.  

"Nothing is more painful to the human mind as a great and sudden change."

-Mary Shelly

When surveyed most people say that they would choose staying with a job that don't particularly like than venture out with a new career opportunity.  The problem is that the new opportunity involves uncertainty, and we tend to cling to the familiar even at the expense of forfeiting something that might actually be better for us.  We like familiar and we struggle to embrace change.   I believe that fear is tied at least in part to the delusion that we are at the helm,  that we are in control.  How much do we relate to the poem below:

"Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds, and shall find me, unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gait,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul. "

-Invictus by William Ernest Hemsley

 In that poem, you can hear the human cry to be in control.  One of the phrases that really got my attention was "my head is bloody, but unbowed."  Deep within me is the broken logic that I can figure out how to fix whatever is wrong in my life.  I  want to prove that I am competent to be able to overcome any set of obstacles or challenges.  I certainly don't want to admit that I need help nor am I comfortable when I feel that control of my life rests with another.   I get anxious when I think that he might want to burn the ships in my life.  Those ships of control, comfort, or the things that are familiar in my life even if they aren't the best for me.  We all desire to captain our own souls.    

Chronophobia is defined as the persistent and often irrational fear of the future or the fear of passing time.

It was this struggle that reared its ugly head in the lives of the Israelites  when they had left slavery in Egypt and were being led as a free people to the promised land.  On that journey, they realized how hard it was to admit total dependence upon the Lord.  He supplied Manna and quail to meet their physical needs each day.  He traveled with them in the form of a cloud by day and a fire by night.  Yet, the uncomfortable nature of surroundings that were new and different and the constant awareness of their utter dependence upon him led to this: 

"And the whole congregation of the people of Israel grumbled against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness." -Exodus 16:2

They had provisions and none of them were in danger of starving.  Yet, the situation challenged them greatly.  They looked at the Godly leadership that had been given to them, and they all began to complain about them.  The second guessing and the distrust began to rise to the surface.  The discomfort of the present situation had them in a place where they would have gladden chosen the shackles of slavery in Egypt of their new and scary freedom in the wilderness.  At least they knew what to expect in Egypt. 

  When Jesus taught the disciples to pray, he mentions daily bread.  I know that in our kitchen, we posses much much more than a daily supply of bread.  In fact, if we were forced to live off the food we already have at home, most of us would be able to survive for a while.  So, that leads us to the false pretense that we have all that we need, and we aren't dependent.  The truth that can be hard to digest is that we aren't in control and we have to learn to trust him with our lives.

"Hope prevents us from clinging to what we have and frees us to move away from the safe place and enter unknown territory." -Henri Nouwen 

The lesson isn't really about whether our cupboard is bear or not; no, the focus is on the state of our hearts in relation to God.  The most common command in the Bible is, "Do not fear" and that mantra is repeated as time and again people in the Bible displayed their fears.  This calls into question our view or understanding of who God is and what he is like.   The Bible describes him as a loving Father, and Jesus even used a scandalous word for God the Father when he called him "Abba."  It evoked a childlike phrase akin to us saying Daddy.  

  However, if we see him as a tyrant or absent or distant or uncaring, then the terror of uncertainty with the horror of watching our ships burns overtakes us.  We don't want to follow someone that we don't trust, and that is even more keenly felt if He calls us to trust him with an uncertain future.  We are forced to face the false assumptions or wrong interpretations that we have made about Him as we wrestle with the decision to follow where He is leading us. 

There are many times in our lives when God calls us to step out into something new and unfamiliar to us.   What sort of response will we have when He asks us to trust him and to let go of what we have grown accustomed to experiencing? The sting of that fear is removed if we know that we follow a captain who deeply loves us and cares for us. Psalm 136 repeats this phrase, "His love endures forever" 26 times, so that we will get that truth driven into our heads.  It is then that we can trust him when he hands us a torch and says, "set your ship ablaze." 

"Jerusalem will be told:
    “Don’t be afraid.
Dear Zion,
    don’t despair.
Your God is present among you,
    a strong Warrior there to save you.
Happy to have you back, he’ll calm you with his love
    and delight you with his songs."

-Zephaniah 3:17 (the Message)