Sea Sunday – The Parish Church of Slimbridge

Thoughts words and worship for Sea Sunday

Sea Sunday is when we have the opportunity to remember and pray for seafarers, their families and all who support them. It is a day of remembrance, prayer and celebration, and an opportunity to think about and thank those seafarers who work tirelessly throughout the year bringing us goods we often take for granted.

There is no better opportunity than Sea Sunday to pause for thought, to remember the men and women who crew the ships that serve us all. And there is no better time to remember those many Mission teams around the world who work so hard to address their needs and share God’s love in so many different ways.

“Sea Sunday is a day set aside, usually in July, each year for the past 170 years to give thanks to the seafarers (1.6 million today) who quietly, and often anonymously, transport up to 95% of the world’s goods. Seafaring can be a dangerous, lonely and demanding job, with little in the way of official support for the workers who keep the global economy afloat. The Mission to Seafarers was set up to cater for the welfare and pastoral care of seafarers, and Sea Sunday is one of the most important dates in our calendar. It represents a chance to bring seafarers and sea-faring ministries into the heart of our communities, and for us to celebrate all they do for us.” Mission to Seafarers

Readings

Part of Psalm 107

¹Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good;
his love endures forever.

²Let the redeemed of the Lord tell their story—
those he redeemed from the hand of the foe,
³those he gathered from the lands,
from east and west, from north and south.

²³Some went out on the sea in ships;
    they were merchants on the mighty waters.
²⁴They saw the works of the Lord,
    his wonderful deeds in the deep.
²⁵For he spoke and stirred up a tempest
    that lifted high the waves.
²⁶They mounted up to the heavens and went down to the depths;
    in their peril their courage melted away.
²⁷They reeled and staggered like drunkards;
    they were at their wits’ end.
²⁸Then they cried out to the Lord in their trouble,
    and he brought them out of their distress.
²⁹He stilled the storm to a whisper;
    the waves of the sea^[^b^] were hushed.
³⁰They were glad when it grew calm,
    and he guided them to their desired haven.
³¹Let them give thanks to the Lord for his unfailing love
    and his wonderful deeds for mankind.
³²Let them exalt him in the assembly of the people
    and praise him in the council of the elders.

Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit,

as it was in the beginning is now and shall be for ever.

Amen

John 6

¹⁶When evening came, his disciples went down to the lake, ¹⁷where they got into a boat and set off across the lake for Capernaum. By now it was dark, and Jesus had not yet joined them. ¹⁸A strong wind was blowing and the waters grew rough. ¹⁹When they had rowed about three or four miles, they saw Jesus approaching the boat, walking on the water; and they were frightened. ²⁰But he said to them, “It is I; don’t be afraid.” ²¹Then they were willing to take him into the boat, and immediately the boat reached the shore where they were heading.

This is the Word of the Lord

Thanks be to God.

Mark 4

³⁵That day when evening came, he said to his disciples, “Let us go over to the other side.” ³⁶Leaving the crowd behind, they took him along, just as he was, in the boat. There were also other boats with him. ³⁷A furious squall came up, and the waves broke over the boat, so that it was nearly swamped. ³⁸Jesus was in the stern, sleeping on a cushion. The disciples woke him and said to him, “Teacher, don’t you care if we drown?” ³⁹He got up, rebuked the wind and said to the waves, “Quiet! Be still!” Then the wind died down and it was completely calm. ⁴⁰He said to his disciples, “Why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith?” ⁴¹They were terrified and asked each other, “Who is this? Even the wind and the waves obey him!”

This is the Word of the Lord

Thanks be to God.

Thoughts for Sea Sunday Today is Sea Sunday so I have dug out the last talk I gave at the Sea Sunday Service at the Coastguard Station at Sharpness back in 2013 to share with you today.

It was 1979, our first holiday, I don’t know why we chose it but we set off on a small 30 foot narrow boat called Daisy into a passion for life.

I’d been brought up in the Midlands, ‘The Black Country’, famous for having more canals than Venice, but they were just the back drop to our mining communities, little used, mucky, rat infested.

When we set off, from a more rural spot near Stafford, things had begun to change due to the efforts of a growing band of enthusiasts who became the Inland Waterways Association, and to British Waterways (now transformed into the Canal and River Trust). Narrow canals had begun to be rescued from the brink of destruction.

Round here, of course, things were different, though we didn’t know it up there in the ‘far north’, bumping our way between the floating oil drums, filling bits of canal between locks as we went where local youths had drained them. In Gloucestershire you still had a viable commercial waterway. I remember well, in the early eighties, our shock when we first made it down to the Gloucester Sharpness, on another little hire boat called Muttley, at meeting huge heavily laden barges, carrying oil still I think. And others plying the canal from Gloucester to Purton, dredging out the mud from the city docks and squirting it back into the Severn from an amazing structure which has only relatively recently been taken away from the Purton canal bank by the cottages.

In those days, in most places, the world turned its back on the narrow canals. They were fenced in, walled off and this was part of their charm.

Though central Birmingham, for example, has now embraced its waterways heritage and surrounded it with development making it a tourist attraction, there was something very special about mooring up in Gas Street basin amongst the old working boats along the Worcester Bar, a silent and smoky haven right in the centre of the city, knowing that no one knew you were there.

There was a certain pioneering spirit still that meant we were the only hire boat to make it all the way up to Ellesmere Port on the Mersey for an early Easter gathering of working boats. We were welcomed and included and began to feel what we have felt ever since, that we are part of this gypsy community, a travelling band, who may meet only rarely but who remember the name of the boat or the type of engine rather than the names of the people, but who always, without fail, greet each other with a cheery wave. A vagrant community, who warn each other of problems ahead, who share tall tales of the exciting things they’ve had caught round their propellers. Our two top ones actually are 30 feet of polythene that had been used to wrap a carpet and a length of the thick wire used to strengthen reinforced concrete structures – that was fun – not!

Of course all waterways are potentially dangerous places as the canal and Severnside communities know to their cost. On only our second trip, we arrived at a broad section of canal called Tixall Wide. to find the police divers frantically looking for the body of a father lost overboard trying to save his son. And in one of the more recent flood years we became trapped by waters filling and overflowing canals and rivers down in Oxfordshire whilst boats nearby were deposited in car parks and a woman in Banbury was swept away when her boat became trapped against the uprights of a bridge.

Here in our own docks down at Sharpness, as in many other places on the system, those who have reached the end of their tether have chosen to find a watery grave to the huge distress of those who have to deal with the consequences. And only two years ago, on our annual two month holiday we met staff of The Canal and River Trust at Stourport, having to deal with the tragedy of a child drowned in one of their locks.

The joy of the canals, however, is that still they are a place set apart, a place where the pace of life is slower, a place where different communities of boaters, walkers, cyclists and fishermen find a respite from what they might call real life or in these last 18 months from lock-down.

But everywhere real life goes on, even on the waterways, and it is the strength of these communities, however dispersed, that they offer mutual support in times of distress. I wonder if we realise just how fortunate we are around these particular waters to have specialist teams available to pluck us from the jaws of disaster – voluntary organisations like SARA who have been around for years and whose availability and heroism gives me confidence every time we set out onto the unpredictable waters of our local and potentially most dangerous river.

I wonder as well if those from time to time propose to save money by cutting back on coastguard services and CRT lock and bridge personnel, understand the safety net of huge local expertise they provide for those who ply waterways and coastal areas for work or for leisure.

Whether they realise it or not I want now to offer a vote of thanks to all those people, SARA, our coast guards, our dock authorities and workers and all who work for The Canal and River Trust as well as the volunteers and members of local preservation and restoration groups.

Now given my role in the Benefice you may be waiting, with baited breath or some other feeling, for the moment when God comes into this. Well – he doesn’t ‘come into it’ at all, rather he is, and always has been, an integral part of all that I have been saying.

It is the love of God which inspires and sustains all communities, including the transient water people; that moves people, whether they realise it or not, to serve and support one another in selfless and sometimes sacrificial ways. It is his creation that we celebrate as we gaze on the glorious countryside, wonder at the size of the huge lazy carp in the Marina or battle through the horizontal rain and gale force wind high on the embankments of the Shropshire union canal. It is his creativity, reflected in the engineering feats of humanity that amaze us as we pass, incredulous, across the Llangollen aqueduct 150 feet above the River Dee whose Welsh name I won’t even try to spell or pronounce. And above all it is his generosity, reflected in the generosity of spirit of so many of you, especially the other members of this ministry team, that allow us, Paul and me, a time set apart to take our boat and once again to take to the waterways to refresh our jaded spirits and come back renewed and refreshed to the daily life of this place.

So to you all and to God I offer my sincere and hearty thanks.

Prayers