Spiritual Coast Guard
by Pastor Tony Cervero

Theodore Wedel wrote a parable decades ago that effectively portrayed a trap today’s church can face. It goes something like this:

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On a dangerous seacoast where shipwrecks often occur there was once a crude little lifesaving station. The building was just a hut, and there was only a small boat, but the few devoted members kept a constant watch over the sea, and went out day and night tirelessly searching for the lost. Many lives were saved by this wonderful little station, so that it became famous. A growing number of people wanted to become associated with the station and give of their time and money and effort for the support of its work. New boats were bought and new crews trained. The little lifesaving station grew.

Some of the members of the life-saving station were unhappy that the building was so crude and poorly equipped. They felt that a more comfortable place should be provided as the first refuge of those saved from the sea. So they replaced the emergency cots with beds and put better furniture in the new enlarged building. Now the life-saving station became a popular gathering place for its members, and they decorated it beautifully and furnished it exquisitely, because they used it as a sort of club. Fewer members were now interested in going to sea on life-saving missions, so they hired lifeboat crews to do this work. The life-saving motif still prevailed in this club’s decoration, and there was a liturgical lifeboat in the room where the club meets.

About this time a large ship was ship-wrecked off the coast, and the hired crews brought in boatloads of cold, wet, and half-drowned people. They were dirty and sick – from nations around the globe – so very few of the refugees identified with the club members. The beautiful new club was in chaos. So the property committee immediately had a shower house built outside the club where victims of shipwrecks could be cleaned up before coming inside.

At the next meeting, there was a split in the club membership. Most of the members wanted to stop the club’s life-saving activities as being unpleasant and a great hindrance to the normal schedule and lifestyle of most club members. Some members insisted upon life-saving as their primary purpose and pointed out that they were still called a “life-saving” station. But they were finally voted down and told that if they wanted to save lives of all the various kinds of people who were shipwrecked in those waters, they could begin their own life-saving station down they coast ... and they certainly were not welcome to make those who were too busy to save lives feel guilty about their lack of involvement. So, this small group started another life-saving station.

As the years went by, the new station experienced the same changes that had occurred in the old. It evolved into a club, and yet another life-saving station was founded. History continued to repeat itself, and if you visit that sea coast today, you will find a number of exclusive clubs along that shore. Shipwrecks are frequent in those waters, but most of the people drown.

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Many many years ago, it was common for people to openly confess their sins at church. It was a common thing to see people waiting at an altar for hours. It was a common practice for all church members to witness, be a regular part of outreaches, feeding the homeless, sharing the love of Jesus ... but today, we are busy and our schedules are overloaded. We don’t own up to our sins – we call them shortcomings. We hire people to minister to the hurting and evangelism is something we reserve for trips to Mexico. Many years ago, it was common to see people healed and to witness the supernatural when God’s people meet. Today, it is common to have lattes and coffee when God’s people meet.

The mission of the church has never changed ... Our society needs the people of God to keep its mission because countless ships filled with many people are sinking in the waters of today’s culture in Ventura.