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"Finding Our Anchor in the Midst of the Storm"

Terrill Williams

"On the fourteenth night we were still being driven across the Adriatic Sea, when about midnight the sailors sensed they were approaching land. They took soundings and found that the water was a hundred and twenty feet deep. A short time later they took soundings again and found it was ninety feet deep. Fearing that we would be dashed against the rocks, they dropped four anchors from the stern and prayed for daylight." Acts 27: 27-29

This is only a portion of a story found in the book of Acts. All the drama found from a major motion picture can be seen in the entire story - everything from hurricanes to mutiny. The storm raged for days, 276 men had tried everything to insure survival - even wrapping ropes around the large vessel and tying them together in an attempt to keep the ship from breaking apart.

Now, in the darkness of the storm filled night, and in fear that the boat was about to be dashed against rock, the men throw four anchors overboard as an act of desperation. Certainly this made sense. The anchors were designed to slow them down, to bring stability to their out of control voyage, and to grab a hold of something solid that would keep them from being dashed against the rocks.

Anchors, as in this story, are no guarantee that the ship won't run aground, they are, however, built of solid material, designed to give stability and hope, and intended to keep one's voyage safe from catastrophe. Hoping that these four anchors would help deliver them from disaster, the sailors secured the riggings, lifted the iron, cast it overboard and then got on their knees to pray. What a picture! Have you ever been in such a state? The storm won't let up. You find yourself closer than ever to being dashed against the rocks, you look for some anchor, something solid, something that makes sense, you grab a hold of that anchor, then you get on your knees to pray.

Did you really identify with what you just read? I mean - identify 100%? Every Christian knows about storms in one degree or another. Sadly, almost all of us know something about being dashed against the rocks. Most of us know about looking for something solid to hang on to in the midst of storms. And who hasn't found himself falling to his knees because of some desperate circumstance. Tragically however, few of us, in the midst of the storm, readily find our Anchors.

Our self-help books don't seem to be very weighty anchors when our circumstances seem out of control. The casual, "Things are going to be alright," doesn't seem very solid when the winds of misunderstandings are penetrating your soul, when the children seem hell bent on destruction, when the attorney fees come at you like a "Northeaster", when your ex-spouse seems determined to drive you into the rocks, when your present spouse can't stand the sight of your children or when you think that the best form of problem resolution would be to get into the life boat and sail away.

Are there really Anchors, solid materials to help keep us stable in the midst of the storms? Yes, I believe there are. When Paul first boarded this Alexandrian ship, he carried with him his own personal Four Anchors. Prior to verse 29 in our story, he had already thrown his anchors overboard. His anchors were not made out of steel and rope. They were however, solid material, able to keep him in the storm.

FIRST ANCHOR - Hang on to the Promise that God would give you

The Angel in verse 23 gave Paul a Promise, "Do not be afraid, Paul. You must stand trial before Caesar; and God has graciously given you the lives of all who sail with you."

Paul's confidence in the truth of that Promise was like an Anchor.

He publicly proclaimed, in verse 25, to everyone on board, "I have faith in God that it will happen just as he told me." Some would have considered him a fool at this point. The hurricane force wind was tearing the ship apart, blowing it off course; sailors were throwing vital cargo overboard just to keep it afloat. "Fool," they would have said, "Stop believing in some God myth. Get a grip, man! There's been no sun or stars for days, the wind is battering us to no end. We've lost all hope. We're all going to die!" Have you ever felt that way? Maybe the missing anchor in your life is a "Word" from God in the form of a Promise.

The angel brought Paul a "Word" from the Heavenly Father in the form of a Promise. Like an Anchor, Paul secured his rigging to those words and held on with everything that he was worth. For him to have let go of those words would have cast him into the midst of the other terrified and trembling men. With the promise, he had absolute confidence in the eternal and powerful Sovereign. Without the promise he could only trust in the ship that had been tied together with ropes. With the promise, he had security in the exact outcome as was stated by the angel. Without the promise, his only security could be found in the sailors who would soon attempt to abandon ship. With the promise he had a "Sure Hope" of salvation, without the promise he had a "Clear Maybe" of survival.

Is your present journey facing some sort of crisis? Perhaps it is your job. There is a sense in the pit of your stomach that all is not well. Your livelihood seems threatened and your future seems out of your control. Perhaps you sense a crisis in your marriage. The same issues loom larger and larger; despair, insecurity and anger seem to overshadow the feelings that originally brought the two of you together. Perhaps the crisis centers around one of your children. The self-destructive decisions they are making are bigger than you are. You are at your wit's end. At night you worry sick over their future. Lost for effective solutions, you know, apart from some Divine intervention, there are no three-step answers that will easily fix the problem. Perhaps your crisis is found in a mountain of bills, or aging parents, or a terminal illness, incidents from your past, manipulations in your present, despair, depression, or fear. Crisis can sport many a face and in every instance, its fear can bring dread of shipwreck. The question, however, that you must ask yourself is simply this: In your crisis, do you have a hold of a "Sure Hope" or a "Clear Maybe?"

Days later; the storm still had not subsided; the ship was still being driven across the Adriatic Sea; the sun and stars were still cloaked in darkness; the coastal rocks were closer than ever to smashing the wooden craft to pieces; for two weeks, everyone on board was in "Constant Suspense". In spite of everything that was still occurring, Paul proclaims in verse 34, with a conviction that had not diminished and seems beyond understanding, "Not one of you will lose a single hair from his head."

Do you see the value of grabbing a hold of God's Promise? The Promise was more than Paul's first anchor; if the Lord Jesus Christ was Paul's true north then this promise was his compass, his guiding light and his rock for faith.

He who has called us to walk by faith would give each of us a specific, personal promise in the midst of our specific, personal crisis.

Let's consider what I have just stated.

First, our Lord has called us to walk by "FAITH". When we first entered the gate to take a hold of our position as a child of the King, we entered through the gate marked "By Grace through Faith". Ephesians 2:8

Colossians 2:6 says, "As you have therefore received Christ Jesus the Lord, so Walk in Him." In other words we are to walk in this life the exact same way in which we entered this life - By Grace through Faith.

Four times in the scripture we read, "The Just shall live by Faith".

The prerequisite to securing our rigging to the Promise of God, is an understanding that we have been called to Walk by Faith.

Secondly, our walk of Faith must be based on His Word. In Romans 10: 17 we read, "Consequently, Faith comes from hearing the message, and the message is heard through the Word of Christ."

Let me Illustrate. Some thirty years ago, I had spent a week in the mountains of Colorado as a camp counselor for underprivileged children. During that part of my life, I was trying to more fully understand this issue of walking by faith. It had dawned on me that if I had a need and prayed for God to answer that need then that should be enough. God was certainly bigger than my need and fully able to meet me where my need was. It also dawned on me that to ask others for help in meeting my need, after I had just asked God, was a tad bit hypocritical. Certainly such action had little to do with faith.

As I was leaving the camp to go home, I noticed that my gas gage read less than half full. "Oh, no!" I said, "I'll never make it home with that little of gas!" My destination was miles and miles away, I was a college student that was broke, my 1964 Chevy was a gas guzzling money trap, and my heart was faced with a dilemma. I had twenty-five cents to my name, behind me were friends that I knew would loan me the money, and ahead of me was a crisis of running out of gas.

I quickly prayed, "Lord, help me!" Then a bigger crisis loomed in my mind. "Lord, Jesus," I said, "I've asked you to help, I know you can. I know that you can even use my friends to answer any prayer...but...there is no Faith in that. I know you have called me to walk by Faith, to Believe You, to Trust You. OK, "I said, "I'm not turning back. I'm going to trust you to get me home."

So, I began a journey of crisis. In some ways it was self-imposed. In other ways, it taught me one of the greatest lessons of my life. Every step of the way, I continued to pray, but mostly I continued to struggle with my lack of faith. I was like the man who heard Jesus say, "Everything is possible to him who believes," and then found my response, "Lord I believe, help my unbelief." You see I was like so many of us. We know He can but we're not sure he will.

I drove past Pikes Peak, continued to pray, continued to look at my gas gage but mostly, I continued to affirm that I did not believe God was going to answer my prayer. I wanted Him to, I needed him to, my soul longed to see a Living Lord who could and would meet me and show me that he cared about the gas in my car. You see there was something inside me that knew if He cared about the gas in my car then he cared about the entire journey of my life. Maybe the reason I drove forward into the crisis rather than turning back to my friends was to find out. I also knew my prayer meant little if I failed to carry it through the gate marked, "By Grace through Faith."

I drove past Colorado Springs. The needle on my gas gaze lay closer to a quarter of a tank than half a tank. My faith level was lower than that. I prayed, "Lord, I know you don't want me to run out of gas, I know you can get me home safe but I honestly don't believe you will. Give me faith to believe!" I looked everywhere for the faith. I looked inside myself - couldn't find it. I tried to recall stories of others that had made a similar journey of faith - didn't help. My crisis was personal. I looked to heaven, "It's got to be there," I said. "How do I reach it, how do I grab a hold of it?"

I drove past the Air Force Academy. The gas needle pointed to less than a quarter of a tank. Most of my journey, so far, was down hill, yet I'd used up more than half of the gas. I still had miles to go. "Lord, how do I grab a hold of the faith that will cause me to believe that you will do exceedingly abundantly above all that I ask or even think?" The heavens seemed silent. I drove forward.

Approaching the giant boulder that towered above the town of Castle Rock, I saw that my gas gaze was now on empty. As a financially insolvent college student I had previously experienced and fully knew the consequences of what was about to happen. There were still forty-five miles to go and my car had no gas. "Lord, where is the faith?" I cried, "Help my unbelief!"

Then it was that the scripture from Romans 10:17 raced through my mind. Like a soothing voice, the words spoke to me, grabbed me and secured me to Him who is our hope. "Faith comes from hearing the message, and the message is heard through the Word of Christ."

For the first time I clearly saw that the prerequisite to Faith was the Word of Christ. The reason I had been struggling with my faith was because I had no Anchor to tie my faith to. I needed an Anchor. The Anchor was a Word from Christ telling me that He would see me safely home. I didn't need faith; I needed a Word of Promise. IF THE LORD WOULD GIVE ME A PROMISE THEN I COULD BELIEVE!

"Then tell me, Lord. Give me the word, tell me that I will not run out of gas." As quickly as I uttered my prayer, he responded. I sensed that still, small, confident reply, "You will make it."

That was my Anchor - the Promise of God. That brief word was the compass that pointed to my true north. Just as surely as Paul held onto the Promise given him on his faithful voyage, I held onto the Promise given me. Forty-five miles later I pulled into my driveway, the gas gaze needle resting clearly above the empty mark.

On your voyage of crisis, is the one missing element - a Promise from God? If it is, then I encourage you, seek his Word, seek the Scriptures to find his voice. At all costs, search the very depths until at last you find yourself listening, waiting before the one who has called you to Faith. In that moment of holy calm, be still and find anew that he is God.

Much of today's theology, as A.W. Tozer has said, would tell us that God has for some reason muted himself. He was silent and then He spoke and allowed his Word to be written in a book. When the book was finished He once again and forever turned silent, wordless. With such theology, how can we believe? He who called us to walk by faith must, by his very nature, equip up with the Anchors for our faith.

Did not Jesus say, "Behold, I stand at the door to your life and knock, if any one hears my voice and open the door, I will sup with him and he with me.”" Again he said, "He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he has brought out all his own, he goes on ahead of them, and his sheep follow him because they know his voice."

To think that God has, in the present world, muted himself is not consistent with either the written word or the Nature of God as we see it in his word. Rather we find that our Lord has never been silent. The second member of the Trinity is called the "Word". To speak is and will forever be a part of His nature. John 1:1 proclaims, "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God."

A. W. Tozer in commenting on this verse wrote, "An intelligent plain man, untaught in the truths of Christianity, coming upon this text, would likely conclude that John meant to teach that it is the nature of God to speak, to communicate his thoughts to others. And he would be right. A word is a medium by which thoughts are expressed, and the application of the term to the Eternal Son leads us to believe that self-expression is inherent in the Godhead, that God is forever seeking to speak Himself out to His creation. The whole Bible supports the idea. God is speaking, not God spoke, but God is speaking."

David wrote, "The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands. Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they display knowledge. There is no speech or language where their voice is not heard. Their voice goes out into all the earth, their words to the ends of the world."

I know there would be those who would recant what I am saying and those who believe that seeking a Personal Word from God would very dangerous. Certainly, I have seen my share of Christians who seem to be living in a world that is not consistent with reality. I remember hearing a radio minister who proclaimed a particularly interesting promise from God. It seems God had told the man that on a certain date; He was going to miraculously replace the man's false teeth with real ones. Each broadcast brought the man closer and closer to the date of the miracle. I tuned in to the broadcast each week with a form of intrigue. The day after the miracle was to take place; the radio preacher declared, "I got my teeth. God miraculously replaced my false teeth with real ones." I was amazed. Could it really have happened? Then the radio preacher dropped these words on the listening audience, "You can't see them yet, but I know they are there."

Certainly our Lord has asked his children to walk this "life of faith" with reasonableness, with a high degree of common sense, with wisdom and intelligence. Our stupidity can certainly get in the way of our walk of faith. Mankind's idiocy and self-depravity has demonstrated over and over again that he can justify every form of sin by saying, "God told me."

On the other hand, we can not allow our intelligence or our reasonableness to keep us from seeking God's voice during our voyages of crisis.

Once we receive the Anchor, we are encouraged to "Hang On" to the Promise that God would give us.

Notice that two weeks after God had given the promise to Paul, the circumstances surrounding the promise had not changed. The storm continued to rage. His shipmates continued to lose hope.

So it is in our lives. Often the Promises of God are not a guarantee that the circumstances will change, rather they are a Promise that at the end of the storm, "Not one of us will lose a single hair from our head."

During the worst storm of my life, the tempest, as it were, was closing in around me and threatened to destroy my home, my future, my marriage and everything I had ever considered to be "life". I prayed night and day that God would somehow change the circumstances, cause the hurricane to pass, keep the ship in tack and hold my family together.

During those days, the light of God's finger illuminated portions of Psalms 46. There was strength in the words, hope in the message. I hand wrote a section of the Psalm, placed it on my computer at work, and devoured the words many times a day.

"God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea, though its waters roar and foam and the mountains quake with their surging.

There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God, the holy place where the Most High dwells. God is within her, she will not fall:...He lifts His voice and the earth melts...Come and see the works of the Lord...He makes wars cease to the ends of the earth; he breaks the bow and shatters the spear...the Lord Almighty is with us; the God of Jacob is our fortress."

This Psalm was filled with promises. With each verse came a greater and more regal promise. There was a promise that God could keep things from falling, a promise that He could surround everything with peace, a promise that those within his fortress would find safety. There were promises of His power and His ability to cause the storms and wars to cease, promises that He could bring peace and tranquility to a humble home once again. Yet the one part of the Psalm that was like an anchor was not found in those verses. My anchor was found in the first two verses.

My storms continued. The ship began showing clear signs of breaking up and nothing I could do or say could change what was happening. My nights became darker. Then on the darkest night of all, when "all hope was gone of ever being saved" the promise in the first two verses was fulfilled. The circumstances didn't change except for the worse. "The earth gave way and the mountains fell into the heart of the sea," yet the Almighty One showed himself in a most miraculous way that he was the "ever-present" one, ever able to "help in the trouble."

Conclusion

At all costs, find your anchor. Find the compass that will guide to your true north. Sit in quietness, at the feet of Him who holds you in the palm of his hand. Wait in stillness, searching the Word of God until at last you hear the voice of God. Then, never stop believing!

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