Catch Wind…

0:00 We are continuing our series on the Book of Acts. There should have been notes in the foyer if you're looking for reasons to stay awake, or to follow along. Whatever benefits you. Did you get notes? Here, you can have mine. Come here, kiddo. They didn't get put out. Oh, they didn't get put out? No. Oh, so if you can hold up your hands, someone will bring you notes. Even better. Great. Last week, Rabbi Sean walked us through the opening verses of chapter 27 of the Book of Acts, and it covered the launching forth

0:48 of Paul on his journey to Rome. And this group stopped at several points along the way. And they finally boarded a ship in Myra of Lycia that was headed to Italy. So just so you know, this is perhaps an example of what it could have looked like. One commentator's rendering of what the voyage up until today looks like. So you can see where they change ships is where the

1:34 color changes from, I don't know what you call it, orange or reddish to green. And then they continue, and now they are in Fair Havens. And it's this ship that they boarded in Myra and have taken, this is now where we pick up the narrative in this week's text. But before we pick up the narrative, I want you to consider a couple things, or to keep them in the back of your brain as we're moving forward. At this point in time, in the first century, there are two

2:21 primary boating stories that would be well-known. In fact, they're probably still the two well-known... In fact, we probably could add a third today called the Titanic. But other than the Titanic, if I were to ask you of the two most famous boating stories in the history of the world, you could probably tell me, first, that in the Jewish world, which has now influenced the rest of the world, that there's the story of Jonah. The story of Jonah is very well-known in the Jewish world, so well-known that you read the book on a holiday every year. And you study that book. And you study what Jonah did and

3:06 all of the contents of the book. So the Jewish world would've known that Jonah had gone out in the Mediterranean on a boat, fleeing the same direction, got caught in a storm that was overwhelming, so much so to the point that every person on the ship is praying to their gods. It's a ship full of lots of different nationalities. Everybody on the ship is praying to their gods, and Jonah's fast asleep. I don't know about you guys, but that dude must have a stomach of iron. He's fast asleep in the belly of the ship, and finally, they're like, "What's wrong with you? Pray to your god for us." And he goes, "I don't really need to pray to my god, because I know I'm the problem."

3:54 "Just throw me off the boat and the storm will stop." And I don't know if you've ever been in a situation like that, and they're like, "Sure, we'll throw you off." They throw him off the boat, and sure enough, the storm stops. He gets swallowed by a giant fish, and he lives in the giant fish, in the belly of the fish for three days. This is the Jewish story that is known throughout the Jewish world, and I suspect is probably making its way into the rest of the world at this point also. But it's not the only famous boating story. There's another one that's probably, at this point...

4:39 Actually, it's interesting. I hadn't really thought about the two stories, but they might even be in the same time period, in terms of occurrence. But the other story is super famous. The rest of the world, everybody in the world knows it. Even today. Actually, today, we have a minivan named after it. It's so famous. The Honda Odyssey. Oh. Yeah. There is this story of Odysseus, who goes on a journey. He goes off to war. He fights in war for 10 years. Perhaps you're familiar with the war. It's the Trojan War.

5:25 He goes fights in the war for 10 years. He wins. He leaves with his men, his fleet, or his ships. He has about 600 men, so I assume he has multiple ships. And he leaves to go home. And the story of Odysseus is a story of his journey home. And it's a story that should take a couple months, but it takes 10 years, and at the end of the story, there's one man who survives. Only one. The rest of them, all of the rest of the men... they fell victim to various monsters or storms, or the consequences of their own internal monsters and

6:13 storms. These two stories would be at the back of the mind of anyone who's hearing the Book of Acts read in the first century. Can you just imagine that? If I said, "There's this man, and he got on a boat and he's going to sail west." Yeah, boats. There's this man, he gets on this boat, and he's sailing west, and all of a sudden you're like, "Okay, Odysseus. Also Jonah, but now we're talking about Paul. Is there some sort of theme?" Oh, perhaps. Guess what? Odysseus-- Oh, wait, I'm jumping ahead in my story. I'll get there in a minute.

7:01 In both of these accounts, both Odysseus and Jonah, the protagonist is left by himself at the end of the story. So you can imagine as Acts is being read or listened to, they already might be thinking along the same line. Maybe it's just Paul who's going to survive this boat journey. Maybe they have in their minds, we don't know the circulation of the Book of 2 Corinthians, when it might have circulated, but they may even know that Paul has already been in three shipwrecks. He probably didn't tell them when he was getting on the boat, "By the way, guys, I've been in three shipwrecks," because they probably would've said, "Not this

7:48 boat. Please get back off." I don't know about you, but I wouldn't let somebody on a boat that I'm on if they've been in three shipwrecks, because that's bad luck, if you believe in luck. So we're continuing onward in the text. And so where we left off, I'll just reread a couple verses so that we can pick it up. I'll start in 27:11. "But the centurion was persuaded more by the pilot and the captain of the ship than by what was said by Paul." As a reminder, Paul said, "Men, I can see," going back a little bit further, "the voyage is going to end in disaster and great loss, not only of the cargo and the ship, but also of our lives, if we

8:36 continue onward." They're in this place called Fair Havens. And so we continue on. "And the centurion was persuaded more by the pilot and the captain of the ship than by what was said by Paul. And because the harbor was unsuitable for wintering there at Fair Havens, the majority reached the decision to set out to sea from there, if somehow they might reach Phoenix, a harbor of Crete facing northeast and southeast, and spend the winter there." And now we continue on. "When the south wind blew gently, supposing they had obtained their purpose, they raised the anchor and started coasting along the shore by Crete." Can you guys flip back over to my maps for a moment?

9:25 Here is potentially what we're talking about. They have this Fair Havens harbor, which I want you to note is not suitable for the ship to winter in. So no matter what, whether they move forward, and like us, we know the ending, or if they stay, the cargo is lost, because they say it's not suitable for winter. So here we go. Here's Fair Havens. Their idea is to go ahead and sneak up here and try to make it to Phoenix, where they can harbor for the winter, because apparently the harbor there was sufficient for them.

10:12 So the text tells us that the south wind blew. In other words, they had fair winds. And the south wind blew, and it caused them to suppose that they had obtained their purpose. What was their purpose? Let me just remind you, their purpose was to get to Phoenix. Not Phoenix Sky Harbor, Arizona, but to Phoenix here in Crete. Their goal is to make it there so that they could winter in Phoenix. They had just a little bit farther to go. In fact, it's probably about 40 miles, 30 to 40 miles.

11:00 And if you're thinking, "I don't know how far 30 or 40 miles is," Downtown Dallas to Downtown Fort Worth is about 30 miles. So they have just a little bit farther to go. And they get this nice fair wind, and they're like, "See? Everything's going to be fine. We are going to make it to Phoenix." So they bring in the anchor, and they start to sail, and they start to go, and you can even see that they make it just a little bit. And then what happens? Actually, before what happens, let me just share this. Let me share a couple of examples of what this is like. Because I don't know, maybe we've never been on a ship

11:50 at the end of sailing season, trying to make it to a destination so that we don't die on the ocean. So let me put it in terms that we might understand. It's kind of like those of you, or us, who are building a sukkah in the fall time, and we get to the top of the ladderAnd we reach, because just a little bit farther and I don't have to get down to move the ladder. It's just a little bit farther. I'm going to go up one more step. Just a little bit farther. You all know what happens. In the aviation world, when I was in the aviation world, this was called get home-itis.

12:37 It happens when you just want to get home. I don't want to sleep in the hotel room. I don't want to sleep in somebody else's bed. I want my bed. I want my pillow. I want to listen to my spouse snore. I just want to get home. Can I tell you? The most unfortunate thing is this usually ends with the airplane flying into the side of the mountain, and the rest of the aviation world asking: How did this happen? Because when we have that mentality, we are willing

13:23 to overlook certain dangers. In fact, I have my own story of this from when I was in the aviation world, and I'm not going to share all the details, but I'll share a little bit. I was on my way home from a different state where there was probably 20 of us flying multiple airplanes together. I mean, in a group, not in formation, but in a group. And we were all talking to each other, and I was in the lead plane. And I was flying the lead plane. And they're all like, we're stretched out over probably a 40-mile stretch, 30 to 40-mile stretch.

14:11 And the last plane is like, "How's the weather up there?" And I'm like, "The weather, it's a little bit cloudy, but we're doing all right." I want to get home. Well, I don't want to get home. I want to get to our next destination, which is a nice big town with a nice hotel room, not the little town with the motel room that we would have to sleep in if I landed right now. And I'm like, "We're just going to go a little bit farther. We're just going to try it out, see what it's like." The clouds, they continue to get lower, and I continuing to fly. At some point, I'm not going to tell you the point, we decided

14:58 that we had gone too far. And at that point, it turned very dangerous. And very well could have ended up in the side of a mountain, except it was very helpful that there were three pilots in the airplane, and all of us were coaching one another as we were flying. These incidents very rarely have a positive outcome. Again, like I said, they almost always end up in the side of the mountain. So here we are, they get this nice fair wind, and they start to sail out. They're heading to Phoenix. They may even be able to see Phoenix. I want you to think about that. Somebody may be up at the top of the mast looking, and they may be able to even see Phoenix in the distance.

15:47 And then all of a sudden, the weather circumstances that were so nice and fair, they change on a dime, and their entire outlook changes. So here we're going to move on to the next set of verses. We'll continue in 14, verse 14. "But before long, a hurricane force wind, called the northeaster, swept down from the island. When the ship was caught and could not face into the wind, we gave way to it and were driven along, and we ran under the shelter of a small island called Cauda, and we were barely able to get control of the dinghy. When the crew had hoisted it up, they made use of the ropes

16:33 to undergird the ship." Okay, so let's walk through this. Oops, not that way. Let's walk through this for a moment. They're sailing along like this, and there's a, what is in my text called a northeaster. So this is actually a combination of both a Greek word and a Latin word that is utilized to translate as a northeaster, and it means an east north wind. So this hurricane-type storm would quickly sweep down from the northeast, which is why it's called the northeaster, and it had a special name in that part of the world called a eurocchio,

17:23 eurocchillo, and it's known today as a grecale. So I want to point out something before we move on. The storm is coming from the northeast, and if you look, you can see a mountain here and a mountain here and a valley that runs between them. I don't know if you've ever been in mountains, but when you have mountains on both sides and a valley in between, it just takes whatever wind is coming and amplifies it. So whether the wind originated here or whether it originated up, I know I said it on Wednesday night, the Caspian Sea, I meant the Black Sea, which is north of modern-day Turkey. Storms would often originate on the Black

18:08 Sea, and then they would come sweeping down, if you can imagine, between Greece and Turkey, and they would sweep through here, and then they would come right through this channelWhich would just amplify the winds, and now all of a sudden you can imagine it just switches on a dime, and all of the forecast has changed. Now, if you've been in Texas, I'm going to say probably anything more than probably five years. We have these, and they're called Blue Northers. I also found out they're called Texas Northers, which is a new one to me. I've always called them Blue Northers in my life. A Blue Northern occurs

18:55 when you look to the north, and you look to the north and all of a sudden it's that almost midnight blue, and you can just see it rolling. I'm using words on purpose. It's rolling across the horizon and it's coming straight towards you. So if you've never been in Texas, never experienced something like this, that's your cue to either get inside or get a jacket and a sleeping bag and a tent and prepare for the worst storm you've ever had in your life. Because I experienced one of these on November 29th, 2006. I was fresh back from college.

19:42 That day was almost 80 degrees in Texas. I think it was just after Thanksgiving. Almost 80 degrees, and I'm going to the concert of one of my favorite bands with a couple friends. And we set out and I checked the weather ahead of time. I'm like, "Okay, we're supposed to get some weather while I'm in the concert." So I grab a nice little very lightweight jacket, which ironically, it's one of those jackets which it just sits on you to warm you. If you're in the wind, it's got holes and it doesn't do anything for you. So I go into the concert, I don't know, 6:00, 7:00 PM.

20:29 Turns out this is the last stop on this band's tour because the, I think it was the bass player or one of the musicians broke his leg, so they had to stop the tour that night. So we had an extra long concert. They decided to do an extra, I think it was an hour and a half extra, maybe two. It was amazing. We're there until, I think they broke at 1:00 AM. So I went into the concert, and it was 75 degrees about around 6:00, 7:00 PM. Went into the concert, 75 degrees. I come out from the concert around 1:00 in the morning, it's 28

21:14 degrees, and so far we've had two inches of snow that has stuck. I walk out and I was like, "Well, I was expecting weather, but I wasn't expecting this." So we got into the car, I drove my friends home, and it actually changed my plans for the next several days. But that's what happens in Texas. It will drop, in that temperature log, I actually went back and looked at the weather reporting sites. It dropped 20 degrees in one hour. And it may have even been in like a 30-minute period. When it happens, it happens. So this is the type of storm that we're talking about. The storm swept down from the island. The ship is caught. It can't face into the wind, so it has to yield to the wind.

22:00 By the way, I want you to understand, there's not motors on the ship. It has sails. It's not like today where we can just, okay, we're just going to use all the gas and oil that we want. We're going to point ourselves into the wind and chug along. No, you have to use the wind. So it stops pointing into the wind and yields to the wind, and they ran under the shelter of the island, Cauda. So here you can see they come this way, and here's the little island. Very little. And so you can see that they probably right around here, they have just enough time under the shelter of the island to bring in the little boat that's behind them.

22:47 It's a skiff, a dinghy, a john boat, something like that. It's a small lifeboat, if you can think of it. And they bring it in and likely they store it on the deck. So what's amazing is Luke says, "We used this opportunity to bring the boat in," which means that Luke is a part of the group pulling the ship in. But then he switches and he says, "The sailors brought the ship up." So Luke was part of the passengers who brought it into the ship, and the boat was then lifted onto the deck. Why is there a boat behind the boat? Well, there's always an issue behind a question.

23:35 No, I'm just playing. No. They would just tow their little boat so that it didn't use up space on the bigger ship. And in some cases, they could put a soldier or a sailor in it, and the sailor could help actually steer. If you pull one way, it'll cause the boat to push the other way, if you can imagine the two are connected together. So they pull this little boat in, put it on the deck. They take the ropes, and they decide to undergird the ship. That's what the text tells us. Undergirding the ship could be done in a couple different ways. Maybe they ran the rope under the ship.

24:20 I don't know if you can imagine that, but on the outside in the water and attach on both sides. Why? Because perhaps the ship is swelling, and it's a wooden ship, and they're trying to hold it together. Or another way they could have done it is run the ropefrom side to side on the top deck and hold it together that way, or they could've run it from bow to stern, and to hold the ship together longwise. Or they could've done all of it. We don't know. The text doesn't tell us. But they're holding the ship together. It seems at this point, they're afraid the ship is going to burst. That's the only reason you would run extra ropes, is if you're afraid the ship is going to burst.

25:06 So, let's move on in verse 17. "Then, fearing they might run aground on the Syrtis, they let down the anchor and so were driven along. But as we were violently battered by the storm, the next day they began throwing cargo overboard, and on the third day, they threw out the ship's gear with their own hands." Here we have, at some point prior, they had an illusion that they could control the ship, that they controlled where they were going. But here we have the loss of all illusion that they're in control

25:52 and that they're secure. The crew is struck by fear. They're afraid that they might run aground on the Syrtis. Well, what is the Syrtis? The TLV gives a footnote, if you have the TLV version. The TLV gives a footnote that it is an area known for shallow water and shifting sandbars. Let me get out of here. The Syrtis... Okay, so this is just another map of they're being driven like this.

26:40 This is where you can even barely see, it says Syrtis right here. This is where the Syrtis is. The Syrtis, if you're familiar-- Well, first of all, the Syrtis was legendary in the sailing world. Odysseus' fleet was driven toward it when he was on his journey home. If you're familiar with Odysseus' story, it's where the Lotus Eaters lived, and they were feared people. And some Western Mediterranean literature links the Syrtis with Scylla and Charybdis, which if you've gone through any sort of literature, you probably recognize those terms.

27:27 But if you don't, let me say this. Scylla was a terrifying multi-headed sea monster who lived in a cave on a high cliff, and if a ship sailed too close to her side, she would snatch and devour a specific number of crew members. Odysseus lost six to her. On the other side was Charybdis, a monstrous whirlpool situated just across the channel, and it would swallow and spew forth massive amounts of water three times a day, which meant navigating too close to her meant losing the entire ship and everyone on board. So, you had to navigate it just perfectly. By the way, this could be partly where the saying comes from, between a rock and

28:15 a hard place. Because you're between a rock and a hard place. This is often associated with the Syrtis. And so the sailors are deeply afraid of the Syrtis, so they let down an anchor. Now, I would lean toward, if you remember earlier, they pulled up an anchor, and now they've let down an anchor. They're in the middle of the Mediterranean. An anchor's really not going to do much if you're talking about one of the metal anchors that goes down below the ship. But it could be this term in Acts could be a technical term,

29:00 which would, if I can describe it this way, would be called something like a floating anchor. It would be like if you put a hot air balloon on its side behind the boat in the water, or a big open sheet, if that makes sense. What it's doing is it's catching water and it's producing a significant amount of drag, which slows the forward progress of the ship. A good example of this is seen in one of my new favorite movies, introduced to me by my children, called "True Spirit." I think it's on Netflix or something. Right, Netflix? Yeah. Yeah.

29:46 You don't have to give credit to other people. No, I'm just playing. Anyways, this "True Spirit" is about a story of a girl who's a 16-year-old Australian teenager, and her desire is to be the youngest female to sail around the world. And it occurred, I think it was in the late 2000s, maybe 2010, '11, somewhere right in there. And she does it. Her name is Jessica Watson. If you're looking for a good movie to watch, it's a great movie. But in that movie, she has one of these anchors that she puts behind her. She encounters a storm. Yeah, sweetie? It's called a drogue. It's called a what? A drogue. A what?

30:31 Drogue. Spell it. D-R-O-G-U-E. It's called a drogue. D-R-- I should've asked you when I was preparing my notes for my message. If you ever want to be corrected, children are always happy to do it. She does it, she uses it, survives a storm with it, and it's quite fascinating. But here the ship is being driven along, and they're being violently battered by the storm, and they start throwing cargo overboard the next day because they think the weight of the boat is too much, and so they have to shed weight. In other words, the boat is sitting too low in the water. So they start by throwing cargo over, and the

31:17 use of Luke's term, they, indicates that it's the sailors who are doing the labor, and it's likely the cargo that is stored on the deck. Though, they may have gotten into the grain because we're told it's a grain ship on a commercial run, which means it has grain in it. Though they could have taken some of the grain and tossed it overboard also, maybe even up to half. I would say they don't do it all because we find out if you read ahead in the story, there is still cargo to be thrown overboard later in the story. But if you've considered grain, grain number one would've been the ship holder's primary method of

32:03 financial well-being. So it's going to be the last thing that goes overboard. But also, you're going to throw some because grain at this point was either transported, it would be in holds if that makes sense. So it would be loose, but in a section, or it was in bags. If it's loose and getting wet, can you imagine the water getting in through the sides and getting wet? If it's wet or not wet, it doesn't matter. Grain acts like, I don't know if you've ever carried an aquarium in the back of a truck full of water, and when you go, the water goes back, and when you stop, the water comes forward and it exerts a lot

32:49 of pressure. So think about that in the ship. It's being battered on the outside by waves, but on the inside, it's experiencing the opposite reaction from the grain moving, and it can exert an extreme amount of pressure on the hull of the ship. And if the grain is getting wet, grain expands. And if you're full and it expands... I don't know if you guys have ever stuck something in the freezer and it's full and it expands. What happens? It busts. So they want to keep the ship from doing that. So they're probably getting some of the grain out.

33:37 And then Luke tells us on the third day, they started to jettison the gear of the ship. This again could be another technical Greek word referring to tackle or spare gear that might be stored, especially on the deck of the ship. The sailors throw the gear with their own hands. It indicates that Luke was not one of the ones who was throwing it, but it was the sailors who did that. And here it is. It says in the text that they're throwing the gear with their own hands. In other words, it could be indicating that they're doing it with their own strength, which would seem almost impossible. So maybe it's heavy gear, but they're doing it in the middle of the storm and with their own strength.

34:26 But also, I want you to consider the gear that they are throwing overboard is meant for their security and safety on the ship. So by throwing the gear, they're getting rid of their own security and safety. Luke goes on in verse 20, "With neither sun nor stars appearing for many days and no small storm pressing on us." In other words, this is a really big storm, guys. "Pressing on us, all our hope of survival was vanishing." Luke switches his narrative at this point. He can no longer count the days.

35:14 Why can't he count the days? Because he can't view the stars or the sun. He doesn't know if it's day or night. He doesn't know how long they're going in this way. It's extremely dangerous to actually not have view of the stars or the sun because that's how you would navigate. So if they're being pushed towards Syrtis, they don't know which way they're going because they can't see the stars or the sun, day or night, and they go for days like this. They probably still know their forward speed, but they don't know their relative position in the rest of this area where the Syrtis is. And now

36:01 because there's been no sunlight, no stars, no let-up of the storm, Luke says, "All hope of our survival." Here it is. Luke is including himself in this. "All hope of our survival was vanishing." Even Paul's companions are losing hope of survival at this point. I want to just for-- Just so you guys are aware, this is a modern map of the Syrtis. You can see on the bottom right Benghazi in Libya. You can see Tripoli right in the middle. And if you go up to the top left, you see Carthage,

36:48 which in modern times is Tunis in Tunisia.So Tunis in Tunisia is the very top part of North Africa if you zoom out and look at the Mediterranean, and you'll see this really large bay. This is where the Syrtis is, and still sailors are afraid of it today. It hasn't gone away after 2,000 years. So I was thinking about this, of being stuck in a boat, being thrown constantly back and forth, forward and backward, side to side. You're not seeing any stars. You have nothing to orient your own body.

37:36 And it reminded me, a couple of friends and I, we took a deep-sea fishing trip a couple of years ago, and we took the boat out, and it was great. First of all, we had to delay because we had thunderstorms the day before, so it delayed us by 24 hours. So we go out. We had to leave, it was like 6:30 or 7:00 in the morning. We left out of Galveston. So we drove all night to get down to Galveston, and we get on the boat, and it's just beautiful that morning. And I was like, "I'm tired. I'm going to go lay down. I'm going to fall asleep." So I fall asleep in the boat. I wake up.

38:24 It's now time. We're going to fish right around lunchtime. We're going to fish, and we're going to catch, I think it was red snapper, maybe. And we're catching red snapper. It's fantastic. But I'm not really thinking about the heat of the sun that's beating down on me at the moment. So we're out there for probably two hours catching fish. And they're like, "Okay, we're going to move to our next spot." And I go inside, and now the waves are getting a little bit bigger. And I go inside. I haven't eaten anything since about 6:30 in the morning, and I realize, oh, no, you always have to eat a little something. It kind of keeps your stomach settled. I don't get seasick. I don't get any of that business.

39:12 But I'm sitting there in the cabin, and the galley is right behind me, and they're cooking up fried burgers and fried everything, and the stench is overwhelming. And I'm sitting there. I'm like, "Okay, I got to eat something." So I'm eating a little something, trying to keep it in my stomach. I'm doing a great job. And then there's this big dude. We're on this boat with like 40 other guys because women aren't dumb enough to do this. Only guys. I'm sorry. Only men have the degree of sensibility to go out on a ship to try to catch a living thing. Anyways, you guys, you know what I'm talking about.

40:01 There's this big dude, and he's got like every fishing pole known to mankind, and he's out there, and I'm like, I'm watching this guy. I'm like, "Oh, if he can do this, I can do this. I'll be fine." I'm just eating a little bit, eating a little bit. I'm like, "Stay calm. Stay down." And then I see him go outside, and I'm like, "Oh, he's probably getting a little fresh air." And then I look out the little port window or whatever, and he just goes, "Ugh." And I was like, "Oh, no." I don't know if you've ever been sick. If you see it, it has an effect. Thankfully, though, that effect did not take place. But all of that to say, we were in the middle of the night.

40:49 We're fishing from 10:00 p.m. to 5:00 a.m. And in the middle of the night, the waves start getting huge. All of a sudden, there's clouds. They cover the stars, and I'm like, "Uh-oh." I'm thinking how much the ship is moving, and I'm in zero control of it, and literally, I think we were 200 miles from shore. 250 miles from shore, out in the middle of the Gulf of America. Sorry. At that point, it was the Gulf of Mexico. But anyways.

41:34 We were out there, and thinking back, I can be like, oh, I can imagine going days like that. You haven't eaten. We'll get to this next week. Paul says we haven't eaten for days. They've lost everything that they ate. They've been over the side of the boat. They have nothing in them, and they go for days of that. And you can imagine how all despair would sink in. All hope was vanishing of any level of survival. But that's next week. Let's end with a few reflection questions. Number one,

42:22 I want you to think about in your own life, where has fair wind or weather blown you? Have you ever been in that moment where you're like, "I almost have my goal. It's so close. I just have to go up one more step on the ladder. It's so close. I can reach it." Where in your life has fair weather taken you?And then you experienced a storm in your own life. And in your initial panic and your thought about a little bit of a loss of control,

43:08 you decide, probably rightly so, that you're going to strengthen the ship that you're in, the ship being your life. You're going to do everything you can to keep the ship together. What have you done in your own life to avoid shipwreck? By the way, these are not bad things. I just want you to think about them. What sort of ropes did you tie around the hull of your ship to keep it together? What sort of Band-Aids did you put on to stop the bleeding? And at what point did you finally lose the illusion of control

43:53 and security? I know I've said it so many times, and I tell my children at least once a week. You have control of one thing. That's it. You can only control one thing in your entire life. Anybody know what it is? Oh, I heard it from back there. You can only control your response. That's it. That's the only thing you can control in your life. You can't control your circumstances. You can't control anything. It's all an illusion. You say, "Well, I go to work five days, six days a week. I work hard." Great. Work hard. That's what God tells us to do. Work hard for six days and then have a seventh day.

44:43 The seventh day removes the illusion that we have control in our lives. We think we have control by working hard. You don't. Nobody does. So when the illusion of control is gone, what are we willing to throw overboard that has provided us security up until this point? What is it in our lives that we've been relying on to live a safe and secure life? I'm not telling you to go dump your 401k overboard. That's not what I'm telling you.

45:28 I'm telling you that if your trust lies in your 401k, guess what? The illusion of control will be gone at some point, whether it's from the stock market or from the Lord. It will be gone. Is a safe and secure life even what Yeshua promised us? Again, I'm not saying don't try to be safe and secure. But I'm saying, is that what he promised us? Or are you fighting to hold the control of illusion that that's what he's promised us? And when we've discarded everything, where do we find ourselves?

46:16 You see, Paul and his shipmates in the crew, actually they haven't even really discarded everything. They've only discarded half of the 401k. They've discarded half of what their earnings are. They haven't discarded the rest yet. But where are they? They're turning to despair. All hope of survival is vanishing. When we are in the midst of despair, what do we do? Where do we look? How do we respond? What do we do in the moment when we can no longer see our place or our position relative to the rest of the world or to the universe?

47:06 When we're in that place, how do we behave? Let me tell you, if you haven't experienced that level of despair in your life, you probably will at one point or another. I'm not trying to be a negative Nancy or a dire prophet. I'm just telling you, everyone experiences bad circumstances in our lives. Whether it's at a certain point or throughout our lives, we all experience circumstances that will cause us to despair. What do you do in that moment?

47:54 How do you respond? How do you respond? The way you respond in that moment is prepared now. It's prepared in a moment when you are sitting in a nice comfortable chair for an hour while I talk. It's prepared in a moment when our economy's doing fine, gas has finally dropped $0.50 a gallon. What do you do in that moment? Because the moment will come later. What do you do in that moment when you have nothing, and you have rent to pay, and you say, "I don't know what to do, Lord"? Well, that's actually what you do.

48:42 That's how you respond. I've done everything in my capability, which by the way, I know I've already said it, our capability is vastly inferior to the Lord's capability. You say, "Lord, I've done everything. I don't know what else to do."You know what he wants? He wants you to be dependent upon him, and it's really hard. I don't know. I can't speak for women. To me, I think it's a little bit harder for men because we like to be the carer providers. We like to be-- We earn the money. We bring home the turkey bacon.

49:32 You know what I mean? We do all the things. We're the provider. We're going to take care. We're going to supply for the family. What happens when you can't? Because at some point, you're going to have to really depend upon the Lord. The reality is, the reality of the institution of Shabbat, the seventh day, is this is a day where we are wholly dependent upon God. We can't work to provide for ourselves. In fact, it's both almost the most amount of grace that we could receive and also one of the most challenging things to do.

50:18 To live in a day, to live in a moment where you are wholly dependent upon the Lord. And to be frank, I actually think it's far more difficult in our society today because we live moment to moment, in every moment we get satisfaction. Oh, by the way, if you don't have toothpaste, order it on Amazon. It'll be here in two hours. If you don't have whatever you need, Amazon's got you. It'll be here in two hours. Okay, maybe it's not available in two hours, but it'll be here in the morning. You'll wake up, and Amazon has provided for you.

51:04 Don't get stuck in the illusion that anyone other than the Lord himself is our provider. When we are in a boat, and again, most of us don't sail, most of us don't boat, but when we're out in the ocean and there's land nowhere to be seen, and your supplies are gone, who do you turn to? When you need

51:51 to catch a fair wind, who do you turn to? When you need to catch a storm, who do you turn to? The reality is, from the Lord comes forth everything. I think we say this on Shabbat mornings sometimes, and now I just forgot the reference. Maybe I have it up here. What do we say? We say, "I form light and I create darkness. I make well-being, I create woe, I, Adonai, do all these things." The Lord is the source of everything.

52:39 It's best to be with him. And we'll find out next week-- This week, the way I split it, it kind of leaves you hanging in despair. And we'll find out next week that there is still hope. But let it sit for a week. What do you do in that moment of despair when all hope is vanishing? How do you live your lives? How do you behave? Avinu shebashamayim, our Father in heaven. Lord, we thank you for this opportunity to study your word, to study the book of Acts, to study Paul's journeys and Luke's journeys, and Lord, we thank you for your provision in all of these moments.

53:27 Lord, we pray today for those who are stuck in a storm at this moment. Lord, I just pray that you would remove any fear and any doubt, that you are in control. Lord, and I ask that you would just reveal yourself to that person. We bless you in Yeshua's name. Amen. May the Lord bless you and keep you. May the Lord make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you. Oh, you're getting too tall. May the Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace.

54:13 Yevarechecha Adonai ve'yishmerecha. Ya'er Adonai panav elecha ve'chunecha. Yisa Adonai panav elecha ve'yasem lecha shalom. Beshem Yeshua, mashichenu. In the name of our Messiah, Yeshua. Shabbat shalom.