Beyond The Fog

The California Coast was shrouded in fog that fourth of July morning in 1952.  Twenty-one miles to the west on Catalina Island a 34-year-old woman waded into the water and began swimming toward California, determined to be the first woman to do so.  Her name was Florence Chadwick and she had already become the first woman to swim the English Channel in both directions.

The water was numbing cold that July morning and the fog was so thick she 
could hardly see the boats in her own party.  Millions were watching on national television.  Several times sharks, which had gotten too close, had to be driven away with rifles to protect the lone figure in the water.  As the hours ticked off she swam on.  Fatigue had never been her big problem in these swims – it was the bone-chilling cold of the water.

More than fifteen hours later, numbed with the cold, she asked to be taken out.  She couldn’t go on!  Her mother and her trainer alongside in a boat told her they were near land.  They urged her not to quit.  But when she looked toward the California Coast, ALL she could see was the dense fog. A few minutes later – at fifteen hours and fifty-five minutes – she was taken out of the water.  It was not until hours later, when her body began to thaw, that she felt the shock of failure.  To a reporter she blurted out, ‘Look, I’m not excusing myself.  But if I could have just seen land, I might have made it.”

She had been pulled out only a half mile from the California Coast!  Later she was to reflect that she had been licked not by fatigue or even the cold – the fog alone had defeated her because it obscured her goal.  It had blinded her reason, her eyes, and her heart.  It was the only time Florence Chadwick ever quit.  Two months later she swam that same channel, and again fog obscured her view, but THIS time she swam with her FAITH intact – somewhere just beyond the fog was land!

This week... many of us remember all too well, not the fog, but the smoke that filled the skies above New York City, Washington, D.C. and Shanksville, PA one year ago.  The events of 9-11-01 painfully remind us that in this world there are troubles, trials, and even tragedies.  Much suffering comes from the cold hearts of people filled with hate.  There are “sharks” around us that seek to destroy us.

In times like these... with our eyes filled with tears of sadness and our hearts filled with a mixture of emotions, I encourage all of us to look beyond the smoke and the “fog” to a loving God Who longs for us to look to Him for direction and comfort.  
He has told us through His Word that “in the world we WILL have tribulation” (John 16:33).  However, He wants everyone to know that there is a place – a better place that is being prepared for THOSE who will submit their lives to Him.  This is a place where there shall be “no more death, nor sorrow, nor crying. There shall be no more pain, for the former things have passed away" (Revelation 21:4).

Heaven holds a prepared place for a prepared people!  It is reserved for THOSE who place their trust in God (Hebrews 11:6), repent of their sins (2 Corinthians 7:10), confess that Jesus is God’s Son (Romans 10:9-10),and are baptized for the forgiveness of their sins (Acts 2:38), AND live out their lives in trusting obedience to His will.

We must NOT allow the "fog"  to obscure our goal, nor the "cold" around us to numb 
our sensitivity, rather with OUR FAITH intact, let us look THROUGH the fog in trusting obedience to the One who promises better things to come!

“As it is written: Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor have entered into the heart of man, the things which God has prepared for THOSE who love Him” (1 Corinthians 2:9).

Have YOU obeyed the gospel? (click here)

God bless you!

David A. Sargent, Minister 

Church of Christ at Creekwood 
1901 Schillinger Rd. S.
Mobile, Alabama  36695

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