The Wandering Soul, on Open Seas …

In the Christian high school I attended, once upon a time, there was a lot of talk about where we’d build our house.

The wise man, Jesus says in the Gospel of Matthew, built his house on the rock, but the fool built his house on the sand, so that when the rains came and the waters rose, the fool’s house fell with a crash.

I suppose I’ve always been a different kind of fool — one who built her house not on rock or on sand … but on the water itself.

I chose a boat with a wide deck, and an anchor that’s perpetually dry.

(If there’s any such place as home, I swear I’m still searching).

And somehow Jesus makes himself at home in my little boat, in spite of the fact that he knows I am the worst of fools — reckless and rudderless, unable to find harbor.

Still, he stays.  Falls asleep in the creaking cabin, in a narrow bunk next to mine.

And when the storms come and the waters churn and suddenly I am terrified at my decision to live on a boat in the middle of a hurricane — well then, Jesus shakes himself out of sleep, climbs out onto the tipping deck, rolls his eyes and crosses his arms and hollers like a cranky neighbor:

“Hey…  I said Hey.  Can’t a God-man get a little sleep around here?”

And when the water is smooth as glass again, He’ll tell me to put down my net (on the other side of the boat, of course), and we’ll haul in our catch and fry fish right there on the deck.  We’ll eat with our hands — the charred flesh still steaming.

Lick the butter from our fingers and laugh.

*

Oh Lord, I have been such a fool.

But thank God — thank God — I’m forgiven. ❤