Is There Water in Your Boat?

One of the things I miss about my dad being gone is fishing. We did a lot of fishing. Some of my best memories were just of me and my dad going to Lake McSwain in California and fishing for trout. I can’t think of a happier time in my life. There was nothing I looked forward to more than fishing with Jim Tatum.

Sometimes we fished from the bank, and sometimes we took our little flat bottom boat. If you knew anything about my dad you knew he didn’t spend a lot or have extravagant things. He had purchased this quaint little boat for a couple hundred bucks. One thing I remember is that he always sat in the back and put me in the front. He weighed more than I did and he also worked the motor. But there was a slight problem with the boat. It had a little leak in it.

My dad was a humble man and he loved fishing enough to put up with a leaky boat. He decided to try and put a silicone seal in the bottom of the boat. It held for a while and he would always try to reseal it. But eventually the leak would open up again and the water would begin to trickle in. And what were the consequences? It meant that all of the water that came into the boat went to his feet because that is where the majority of the weight was. Over the years I have thought about the many selfless ways of my father. Here was one example. He was willing to let his feet stay soaking wet, deal with a leak in the boat, steer the boat around, and still fish a little while I stayed up at the front of the boat worry free. He even brought an old empty coffee can along to bail out the water when it started to be too much. I had an incredible father!

This past weekend I heard a statement in a sermon by Sam Jones that made me think of our old boat. He said that there is nothing wrong with a boat getting in the water. That’s’ normal. But there is something wrong when water gets in the boat! He connected it to us and the world and raising our kids in it. It’s natural for us to be in the world. It’s even alright for our kids to be in the world…but there is something terribly wrong when some of the world starts getting into us!

Sometimes I think we try to seal the leak. Sometimes I think we try to just steer and fish anyway with our feet submerged in worldliness. Sometimes we allow for some world to come in and simply try to bail it out one can at a time. I even think sometimes we know the boat is troubled and so as parents we take the world in on our end and we try to put our kids up at the front of the boat and try not to let their feet get wet.

But one thing’s for sure. We can’t be all we could be as fishermen when there is water in our boat! If there is enough of the world in our lives that we have to constantly fight off the world and its influences then, like Lot of Old Testament times, we may need to get up and out of Sodom. How can we ever expect to change the world – when in reality – it is the world that is changing us?

We put up with it! We let it in! It’s no big deal! It’s just a leak! How dangerous! There is coming a day when the water is going to become too much and the boat is going to sink and its occupants are going to perish! It’s just never a good thing when water is in your boat!!!

My dad was really a remarkable man. If he had the means to buy a new boat he would have done so. But he managed that little flat bottom boat for me because he loved me. He let me go fishing. He kept my feet dry. And by the grace of God that boat never sank, and believe it or not – yes – he usually managed to catch the biggest fish! I think maybe as the saying goes, “someone upstairs” was rewarding him.

I can tell you this. After my dad died I put up my rod and reel because I just can’t bring myself to go fishing without him. He was my fishing buddy. He was my Rook partner. He was my best friend.

But I know in a greater sense there still is fishing to be done. There are disciples to be made. And I have learned the better lesson. A leaky flat bottom boat is fine for trout fishing. But when souls are at stake there I some things that just aren’t productive. When souls are at stake I prefer that my feet stay dry.

“And He said to them, “Follow Me, and I will make you fishers of men.” – Matthew 4:19

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AUTHOR: Jeremiah Tatum