Ships of Life!

This post was birthed from an online sermon l joined a number of weeks ago by  Pastor Mike White.

A ship is designated for movement. In the natural, every ship you board will take you somewhere depending on the destination of the ship.
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Many of us are aware of the account of Jonah in the scriptures. The Lord told Jonah to go to Nineveh, however Jonah decided to board a ship and go to Tarshish far away from where the Lord had instructed him to go.

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​Jonah intentionally fled unto Tarshish and found him a ship heading that way.

Jonah 1; But Jonah rose up to flee unto Tarshish from the presence of the Lord, and went down to Joppa; and he found a ship going to Tarshish: so he paid the fare thereof, and went down into it, to go with them unto Tarshish from the presence of the Lord.

Jonah therefore knew before he boarded the ship that it was going in the wrong direction.
Sometimes in life, our ships do not have labels. We are unware of where the ships are taking us to. Thank God that we have the greater one that lives in us, who guides us into all truth.

Figuratively, ships include:

FriendSHIPS
MemberSHIPS
RelationSHIPS
CourtSHIPS
PartnerSHIPS
LeaderSHIPS

Where is your ship heading to? Do you need to unboard?

Anything that has the capability to influence you and change your direction is a figurative ship. It is taking you somewhere.

The Lord is gracious and sometimes the Lord will step in and break up the ship. We can find an example of  a natural ship being broken up  from scripture.

Jehoshaphat   started out well. However in the process of time, he joined himself with Ahaziah.

2 Chronicles 20; 35- 37
 And after this did Jehoshaphat king of Judah join himself with Ahaziah king of Israel, who did very wickedly:
36 And he joined himself with him to make ships to go to Tarshish: and they made the ships in Eziongaber.
37 Then Eliezer the son of Dodavah of Mareshah prophesied against Jehoshaphat, saying, Because thou hast joined thyself with Ahaziah, the Lord hath broken thy works. And the ships were broken, that they were not able to go to Tarshish.
 
Yes while this is a natural ship as explained above; anything that has the capacity to take you somewhere or influence you is a ship.

We need to prayerfully consider our various ships in life: Friendships, relationships, etc and we need to ask ourselves? Where is this heading me to?

If it is in opposite direction of where the Lord would have us go; then its time to unboard!

Bisi Oladipupo 

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