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[Courageous Fishers of Men, Citation: Eugene A Maddox, Interlachen, Florida; source: The Perfect Storm]
The movie, The Perfect Storm, well described the dangers of the fishing industry through the eyes of the crew of the fishing boat, the Andrea Gail.
Out of their need to bring home an excellent catch of fish, the captain and crew decide to risk everything and travel as far as the remote but fertile fishing ground called the Flemish Cap. It is an especially dangerous trek during the unpredictably stormy month of October.
On their way back to Gloucester, Massachusetts, the Andrea Gail encounters the "perfect storm" of 1991 and is never heard from again.
While improvements in shipbuilding, navigational technology, weather-reporting and rescue support have made boating safer, fishing has become, if anything, a more lethal occupation, killing more of its workers per capita than any other job in the United States.
"There are many kinds of work that are dangerous, but one of the interesting things about fishing is that it really hasn’t changed much over time," says The Perfect Storm author Sebastian Junger. "It’s been mechanized, of course, but the basic reality of going to sea for months at a stretch is the same as it was 100 years ago. You’re way beyond help from anyone else; you’re on your own. I think that forms a certain kind of character. Not only does everyone know someone who has died at sea but everyone who works in the fishing industry has almost died. Every single fisherman you talk to has almost gotten nailed at one time or another."
It takes courage to be a fisherman. And it takes courage to fish for the souls of people.
The longest sermon on record was preached by Clinton Lacy of West Richland, Washington in February of 1955. It took 48 hours and 18 minutes to deliver it. Small wonder someone proposed the adoption of a new Beatitude: "Blessed is the preacher whose train of thought has a caboose." E. Eugene Williams
TOP 5 SIGNS YOUR CHURCH IS TOO CONTEMPORARY:
5. At the annual meeting, you play Survivor to elect new leaders
4. When asked what church things begin with "J", the youth in church shout "Java" before "Jesus"
3. When asked, "Who wrote the Bible?" most members say "Eugene Peterson"
2. To be user-friendly, the building committee installs a Jacuzzi rather than a conventional baptistery
1. The "Left Behind" Bible isn’t the one you forgot at church
“Worship does not satisfy our hunger for God—it whets our appetite. Our need for God is not taken care of by engaging in worship—it deepens. It overflows th...
Eugene Peterson in his book “A long obedience in the same direction says this:
When we sin and mess up our lives, we find that God doesn’t go off and leave us-he enters into our trouble and saves us.....
Quote: Eugene Peterson describes, “Sabbath as that uncluttered time and space in which we can distance ourselves from our own activities enough to see what God is doing” (pg. 134, The Pastors Guide to Personal Spiritual Formation).
Eugene Peterson, Earth and Altar - If I am an atheist in my heart, making myself sovereign in place of God, and therefore arranging things in accordance with my appetites and needs and fantasies, I become a pirate in society. I relentlessly look for ways in which I can get what is there for my own uses with no regard for what anyone else gets. If I am an atheist in my heart, it is not long before I have become a cancer in the gut of the country.
Eugene Peterson in A Long Obedience in the Same Direction writes, “It is not difficult in our world to get a person interested in the message of the Gospel; it is terrifically difficult to sustain the interest. Millions of people in our culture make decisions for Christ, but there is a dreadful attrition rate. Many claim to have been born again, but the evidence for mature Christian discipleship is slim. In our kind of culture anything, even news about God, can be sold if it is packaged freshly; but when it loses its novelty, it goes on the garbage heap. There is a great market for religious experience in our world; there is little enthusia...
In all of sports, there is perhaps no basketball rivalry quite as intense as that between the Universities of Duke and North Carolina. The campuses are only eight miles apart. Both teams have different shades of blue for their primary color, so North Carolinians are told, "Choose Your Blue!"
Duke fans take their allegiances seriously. Every fan is a cheerleader. When the two teams recently played each other in Duke’s Cameron Arena, home fans (or "Crazies") were given instructions.
This is the game you’ve been waiting for. No excuses. Give everything you’ve got, and we will walk away the victors. Cameron [Arena] should never be less than painfully loud tonight.
At Coach K’s request, please focus on our team tonight. Better to bring our team up than put theirs down. Especially coming out of timeouts, we need to be incredibly loud. During their free throws in the second half, forget the novelty stuff, just be unbelievably loud. This is a huge game. Stay in the bleachers and go nuts.
Perhaps we Christian worshipers have something to learn here.
SOURCE:“Duke-Carolina Cheer Sheet,”ESPN.com; submitted by Eugene Maddox, Palatka, Florida
Eugene Peterson writes about seeing a family of birds teaching the young to fly. Three young swallows were perched on a dead branch that stretched out over a lake.
