The Cursed Waters and the Blessed Ship

They were once a mighty and magnificent ocean- as beautiful as you could imagine. They were formed and established by a great and awesome Being, whose name was Awesome and Holy. He was infinitely creative and took great pleasure in what He made. Oh yes, He was a good and powerful Creator. And the waters ebbed and flowed at His kind Word. They danced happily to His song and leapt with joy at His voice. Yet, once, a long, long time ago, soon after the water was made, the same Almighty Creator crafted a beautiful ship. And this ship was the most magnificent of all the Maker’s creations. He even called it His masterpiece. It was designed, just the same as the water- to live and move and have its being joyfully at the Word of its Creator. Yet, unlike any other creation, it was made to experience a personal relationship with its Creator- to speak and sing to Him with a voice, to think about Him with a mind, and to love Him with a heart and soul forever. But, one day, the ship was deceived by the great and cunning sea Beast, and told to set its sail to follow its own course, for its Maker was withholding from it a course to a more desirable shore. And so, the ship, believing the lie, decided to chart its own way to this mysterious distant shore. It forsook its joy in following its Maker’s will, and abandoned His course for its own. When the ship’s loving Creator found the ship sailing towards a different land than the one He had lovingly set out for it, He was deeply grieved. And since He was of infinite dignity and worth, the offense His very own ship had committed against Him could not be overlooked. This horrible act was guilty of death forever for it had violated the will of the most honorable Being in the universe. But because of this Maker saw it pleasing to Himself, He did not destroy the ship entirely and immediately as He could have, but He pronounced a curse upon it and all of the water- a curse that brought hardship and sorrow, grief and pain, and ultimately, death itself. And so the curse remains to this day.

This story you must know before you take sail. The waters you wish to travel through are cursed by their Maker. They hold the curse of death in them. Therefore, you cannot sail in them and hope to overcome this curse. Either they will kill you through ease or through storm, but one way or another, they will kill you. Yet, there is something more to the story you must know as well. The curse pronounced upon the water was pronounced upon all of creation- including any ship that may happen to voyage across them. Yes, just as this ocean, this world, was made subject to the curse, you yourself were affected by the very same curse as well. Your ship is cursed. Indeed, your whole ship is infected with it: hull, deck, mast, sails, rudder, stern, anchor, and wheel. All you are has been contaminated by the same stuff that has contaminated the water. For that first ship was the head of all other ships, representing them all, even yours. So the curse brought about by that ship’s actions carries down to you. This is why it is so hard, even impossible, to master the waters of this life. The water isn’t the only problem, or even the main problem, you are- your ship is. You are trying to sail across cursed waters in a cursed ship.