Wednesday, March 3

by Dale Maddock

As a young man, soon out of high school I joined the Navy. After boot camp and Navy photographer’s school, my first assignment was to be part of an aircraft squadron. It certainly seemed to be a long way from the ocean.

Soon enough though, we were deployed for service onto the USS Independence, a mighty ship indeed. Fully 100 feet from the waterline up to the flight deck, and over 1000 feet long—it was quite awesome to me. Once underway, the sight of the ocean was even more spectacular. As far as the eye could see there was nothing but water. No signs of life other than my fellow sailors and the occasional schools of flying fish. Too much water to comprehend.

Our first port of call was Singapore which back then was a less than pristine, orderly urban environment. It was a cacophony of colors, sounds and textures. I most remember seeing up close a sampan . . . just like in the movies. Small, less than 20 feet, it was the home for an entire family of at least six people. There may have been more but I could not tell. I remember thinking how amazing it was that they could spend their lives on such a boat; that they could eat, talk, sleep, and play in a space so small. What a miracle—all on the water of a small river. It seemed incomprehensible that it could be a home.

The second port of call was Hong Kong. This was back in the time of its British ownership. Mainline China. . . close and forbidding. I took a bus tour to the countryside. Along the way, as the guide spoke, we observed tiny spots in the distance on a brown plain. Many, many spots. As we drew nearer, the spots grew larger and eventually resolved into a village of sampans on a sea of mud. Most confusing. The answer to our questions of how these boats came to be so isolated so far inland was that a typhoon had recently blown through and the sampans were carried into the bay by the winds. Then when the winds subsided, so did the water.

The sampans remained, waiting, waiting for the next rise of water to carry them from the mud. I thought then and now, how do they survive, these people of the small boats? I knew from Singapore that the boats actually represent families and that without water they were stuck. Their lives were, and are, dependent on God’s water for life itself. It is a visceral image of God’s grace. I had not imagined a sampan without water to ride upon, or families so dependent on the tide and rains.

I came to see then that my mighty aircraft carrier, home to over 5000 people, was as reliant upon God’s good graces as those small sampans. Water is God’s gift of life. Its abundance makes it easy to take for granted. At least until it is gone. Then life becomes very fragile indeed. It is God’s grace that keeps our boat afloat.