Holding to the Deep Current

Years ago I found myself on an Arctic journey watching a TV special on National Geographic. During one episode we were standing on deck watching hundreds of ice floes driven by polar winds on beautiful cresting waves. All at once the narrator spotted an ice floe heading back into the wind in the opposite direction. The captain of the boat said: “See that one. It’s not an ice floe; it’s an iceberg, and it’s being pulled along by deep currents stronger than the wind.”

The power of the “last days” can feel so complete, all-pervasive, staining us with its constant and subversive power of narcissism, post-modern autonomy, cultural rage against revealed truth, our own blind compromises. We are in danger of being swept out by the wind, and assimilated. Paul wants Timothy to know how to catch the deeper currents.

This section in contains a small Greek phrase which is gigantic and decisive (su de in vs. 10,14): it means in spite of this; on the other hand; in stark contrast. In opposition to the dark current of the last days, Paul says look at my life to see how God’s power can rescue and overcome, v. 11). One of the things Timothy needs is endurance (10). Endurance (hupomone) stands under; it does not run away. It can bear things, not simply with resignation, but with blazing hope; it is not the patience which waits grimly for the end, but which radiantly hopes for the dawn (William Barclay). Patience sees the fierce wind, and says: …in spite of.

And where do we catch this deeper power? In the God-breathed Word, the Scriptures, which have the power to bring wisdom and salvation through faith in Jesus.

Pray that God shows you where you need biblical endurance and the patience which endures.