Introducing the ‘Ship of Dreams’
It had ... and still has ... all the
ingredients of a legend. Imagine a 46,000 gross ton British luxury ocean liner,
11 stories high and four city block long, the largest ship of its kind at that
time. A technological wonder, it also replicated society as a whole since it
was, in essence, a floating city. Of course, there were the poor Irish peasants
at the bottom, hoping to have a new start in the New World. Yet the rich and
famous also booked passage on the maiden voyage: the Astors, Guggenheims,
Morgans, and other high society folk. They would lose none of their opulent
creature-comforts: bone china, the finest sterling silver, crystal chandeliers,
and carpets so thick you felt you were on velvet quicksand. Prestigious French
cafes graced the top decks, instead of the minimal number of lifeboats. Indeed,
many consider this ship a ‘work of art.’
More impressive was the part that no
one saw. It was double-hulled with 16 watertight compartments. So confident
were the designers of its extraordinary design and durability that they
pronounced the ship ‘unsinkable.’ It was supposed to sail many times for many
years, worldwide. One man even bellowed that ‘God Himself could not sink this ship!’ For this reason, there were only
twenty lifeboats for the up to 3,000 passengers this ship was capable of
holding. Why clutter the deck with puny unadorned little lifeboats when this
ship was one big lifeboat itself?
The Dream Turns to A Nightmare
This liner set sail from Southampton,
England en route to New York City. On the fourth day of its maiden voyage, it
was approximately 650 kilometers south of Newfoundland, Canada, sailing at the
rather speedy pace of 22.5 knots. At around 11:40 P.M. on Sunday night, 14
April, 1912, while some passengers slept and others danced the night away, the
crew spotted a sinister looking object coming out of the dark. On closer
inspection, they discovered it was a 30 metre high iceberg and the ship was
heading for a collision. Using every tool available, the crew did everything
they could to avoid a head-on. When it
appeared that they succeeded, then it happened: boom!
The ship and the iceberg met with a
bang. What actually happened was open to speculation ... was the ship
sideswiped, or did it have a well aimed puncture? The results, however, were
beyond dispute. After impact, while the iceberg floated back into the darkness
and into history, the ship was seriously stricken. Indeed, the unthinkable
happened: the ‘unsinkable ship’ was about to sink!
There were only 1,178 boat space to
service 2,224 passengers, there had been no drills, and so chaos was about to
ensue. ‘Murphy’s Law,’ which says that anything that can go wrong will go
wrong, came into play.
• A ship called the Californian was nearby and could have rescued everyone. But the telegraph
operator was sleeping;
• The ship received six ice
berg warnings ... and ignored every one of them;
• There were lifeboats ...
but lack of space and lack of drills meant they would only be half filled;
• The ship Carpathian did come to the rescue ... but it arrived at the scene one
hour and twenty minutes after the stricken liner sunk;
• The watertight
compartments were plentiful and strong ... but they were not high enough and,
perhaps, one compartment too many was hit;
• Had the iceberg been
sighted sooner, or later, or had it been hit some other way, it would have been
okay ... but it wasn’t.
Yes, everything that could go wrong,
did go wrong. In less than 3 hours, at 2:20 AM on Monday morning, 15 April
1912, the ‘unsinkable’ Ship of Dreams broke into two parts and sunk in the
frigid dark waters of the North Atlantic Ocean. The ship rested 3,950 meters on
the ocean floor with the two parts of the ship separated by a kilometre of
littered seabed. Its fatal voyage cost of 1,500 lives. Only 700 survived. What’s more, death was so egalitarian: not
only did the poor passengers below get washed out immediately. Rich men like
Isidor Strauss, Benjamin Guggenheim, and John Jacob Astor IV (richest man on
board) also went down with the ship.
Why It Matters Today
“See that you do not refuse Him who speaks. For if they did
not escape who refused Him who spoke on earth, much more shall we not escape if
we turn away from Him who speaks from heaven, 26 whose voice then shook the earth;
but now He has promised, saying, "Yet once more I shake not only the
earth, but also heaven." --Hebrews 12:25,26
This ship, of course, was known to
the world as the Titanic. If the Titanic seduced the world while it was still
afloat, its untimely, unthinkable sinking captured the imagination of
generations, as few events could. Since wreckage of the Titanic was covered by
Dr. Robert Ballard in 1985, people had parted with $30,000 and risked lawsuits,
just to explore those quiet ruins in the deep undersea canyon.
While this maritime disaster has all
the ingredients of a Greek tragedy, the Titanic is iconic, having inspired
philosophers, scientist, screen writers, and, yes, preachers too. As we observe
the centenary of the sinking of the Titanic on April 15, 2012, it is a story
that matters a lot to our world. The reason: the Titanic is a parable of the ‘last days!’
Several reasons are offered. First,
it makes a fitting starting point of what Hebrews 12:25-26 describe as the
‘great universal shaking of the last days.’ God ‘promised’ in Haggai 2:6, as
well as Hebrews 12, that one more time, He would shake the earth and heavens.
The purpose is to wake up the ‘sleepers’ (I Thessalonians 5:7) and remove the
temporal realms in order to make room for God’s unshakeable kingdom.
Prior to the sinking of the Titanic,
there was relative peace and prosperity. The western world was prosperous,
complacent, self-sufficent, and arrogant. After April 15, 1912, the shocking
news that the unsinkable ship had sunk was like a ‘wake-up call’ of even
greater tremours to come. These ‘tremours’ included World War I (1914-1918)
with the deaths of 25 million people; the Spanish flu pandemic (1918-1919) with
the deaths of 50 million people -- think about it, more people died in peacetime
than in the war1; the Great Depression (1929-1939); World War II (1939-1945)
with the deaths of 55 million people; the Cold War (1945-1989); and now our
current yet-to-be named era of postmodernism, war on terror, new world order,
etc. This catalogue of woes is unprecedented in human history. Just 2011 alone
had enough ‘shakings’ to set new world records, including the ‘Arab Spring,’
‘Euro Zone crisis,’ and a multitude of natural disasters that cost $10 of
billions in damage.
In Jesus’ famous last days discourse
of Matthew 24:37, He says ‘like the days of Noah, so shall the coming of the
Son of Man be.’ It speaks of intensity of living which is carnal and careless;
it ends with sudden disaster, swift disappearance, and complete separation of
the righteous and unrighteous. Could the Titanic, its pre-voyage publicity and
cautionless sailing been an example of this in part? Like the shutting of the
door of the Ark, once the Titanic hit the iceberg, the whole world suddenly
changed. In less than 3 hours, she was gone for good. Is that how the ‘end of
the world’ will be? Read Matthew 24 for yourself and see.
Despite the dire description, there
is one note of hope. The most neglected element became the most priceless of
all: the lifeboats. Yes, the Titanic lifeboats: unadorned, limited and ignored;
they nevertheless became the only means of safety to anyone who was able to get
in. The simple yet powerful gospel of Jesus Christ also presents people today
with the opportunity to escape the kosmos, world order, which is led
by Satan and, like the Titanic, is stricken and doomed to destruction.
Evangelism is the sincere attempt to get as many people off this Titanic-like kosmos and into the life-boats of salvation? Far from being some
arrogant, exclusive, intolerant rant, evangelists are people of love on a
mission of mercy to fill the life-boats to the brim. If we can bear this
parallel in mind, then perhaps the victims of the Titanic, who met the dreadful
and dramatic end 100 years ago, did not die in vain.
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