Oceans & Dry Docks

SCRIPTURE: If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. John 15:7 ESV

THOUGHT: It’s easy to just glide past the caveat and arrive at this promise, isn’t it? To dry dock your ship (which has just come in!) and ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you – totally forgetting ships are made for water and swells and storms and anchors; smelly fish and heavy iron ore and passengers who need to cross oceans. Yes, this promise is the stuff of fairy tales, genies in bottles, and all that – if you can just navigate to the dry dock somehow without touching the waves.

Only there’s a little “if” involved. To get to the promise you have to get wet.

We must go through the abiding, Jesus says. Us in him, and his words in us. Marinated until thoroughly wet: waterlogged with truth, saturated with Scripture, sopping wet in Spirit, and soggy with “thy will be done.” Then we ask, from a place of living, moving, and finding our being in him (Acts 17:28), from a unity between our spirits and his, and God gives us what we ask for.

Dry docks are made for repair – so, go straight there if you wish, but expect the best ships’ mechanic in the world to be hard at work, making you seaworthy.

SONG: Oceans https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DGRz2BJQRXU

PRAYER: I’ve been in the dry docks so often of my own choosing, God, and often of your choosing too. Incapacitated for seeking my will above yours, for treasuring genies in bottles more than abiding. Thank you for the gift of surrendering to soggy, sopping, saturated life in you. The great unknown where feet may fail, but promises don’t.