Glyn Cardy writes in the Guardian
Archbishop Helder Camara once wrote: “Pilgrim: when your ship, long moored in harbour, gives you the illusion of being a house; when your ship begins to put down roots in the stagnant water by the quay: put out to sea! Save your boat’s journeying soul, and your own pilgrim soul, cost what it may.”
…
Yet the biggest difference between the two models of church and God is risk. The house, even an open house, speaks of security, stability and safety. The occupants know where they are, what to expect, and even whom they might meet at the door. The ship, on the other hand, is heading out into unknown waters. The familiar towns and headlands are no longer there. The good old ways become more irrelevant day by day. God, faith and community have or will change.
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
Kim 08.29.07 at 10:11 am
Or in biblical imagery, temple - or tent? The Man had nowhere to lay his head.
ee 08.30.07 at 9:39 am
Interesting. I had some words in my head about this theme for a song I’m trying to write - the images are putting your boat out into the Spirit’s flow, and hoisting your sail to the Spirit’s wind. The Christian life should be about an adventure, where you’re not quite sure where God is going to blow you next, you just go with it in obedience.
But it does lead to a feeling of imbalance between where you want to be, and where you actually are, that’s difficult to resolve. And it doesn’t seem right to me to say that the journey we take with God is merely ‘inward’, it must affect how we practically live.