When Life’s Deep Water Threatens to Drown You

Our city pool opened last week, and so did my childhood memory bank. I can still smell the damp shower rooms and Coppertone dark tanning oil (who cared about SPF?) , and I can still feel the post-swim hunger pangs and exhaustion. But mostly, I remember the high dive. With two older siblings, it was almost a rite of passage. And for years before I was ready to try it, I imagined myself graduating from the baby pool’s safe, shallow steps. I could envision doing a beautiful Olympic-like swan dive as I gracefully flew through the air. I was looking forward to stepping off that high board, and popping back up while slinging my hair back. But I wished I could have avoided the 16 feet of water at the end. My older brother explained to me that the deep water was needed to protect me. (He also told me about an amazing seahorse painted on the bottom of the pool, and the only way to get down deep enough to see it was to jump off the high dive.)

DEEP ISN’T SAFE

Deep involves unknown—possibly unsafe. 

Who can forget the explorers who lost their lives in the implosion of Oceangate’s Titan submersible where analysts now mention  “immense pressures at depth” when speculating about causes of the disaster.

It’s evident from Jesus’s parables about the kingdom of God that the life He calls us to comes at a deep cost. In the parable of the pearl of great price and the parable of the hidden treasure, in fact, the cost is steep—it’s everything we possess.

The bible is full of those who chose to go deep with God, those who climbed the high dive and jumped into deep, dangerous water:

• Paul was accused of anti-Roman teachings and thrown into prison—more than once.
• Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego  were thrown into a fiery furnace. by Nebuchadnezzar for refusing to bow to the king’s image.
• Rather than stop praying, Daniel went into the lion’s den.
• The disciples followed Jesus to Lazarus, knowing that returning to the area could get Him (and them) killed.

The truth is, as much as we’d like it to be different, deep faith does nothing safely. It offers only risk, pain, and reward. Stay in the shallow end if you want comfort and certainty. 

SHALLOW IS WORSE

I knew I didn’t want to miss out on the high dive. And though it involved deep water, I was willing to take the plunge. But in our spiritual lives, we can get comfortable staying shallow.

Most of us who call ourselves Christians do so on the basis of belief rather than experience: We have substituted theological ideas for an arresting encounter.

A.W. Tozer, in his book, The Divine Conquest

In other words, we often opt for shallow and safe rather than deep and rich, perhaps not realizing what we are missing out on. Like being content in the baby pool because we can’t imagine the magnificent seahorse at the bottom of the deep end.

We are far too easily pleased.

C.S. Lewis

The psalmist gives us a glimpse at what we gain from a deep experience:

Deep calls to deep…  

Psalm 42:7

Mysterious words for sure. The “deep” trials he faced kept coming, wave-like—deep after deep. But this phrase also alludes to the fact that a deep need calls for God’s deep remedy, or as the Passion version puts it, “My deep need calls out to the deep kindness of your love.” The Lord’s deep (His Spirit) calls to my deep (my spirit). It is like a lifeline connecting my spirit with His. 

We cannot be deeply satisfied with merely knowing about God. We must experience Him. Encounter Him. We can believe in God’s love, but what we really want is to receive His love.

We cannot be deeply satisfied with merely knowing about God. We must experience Him. Encounter Him.

Lori ann wood

Years ago when the internet was still very young, I read a book I could never get off my mind: The Shallows by Nicholas Carr. The book warned that the internet was ruining our minds and intelligence by training us to scan and skim information instead of reading deeply, and contemplating longform content. Carr warned that we are “losing our capacity for concentration, contemplation, and reflection.” 

In other words, the internet’s design encourages superficial engagement, which can hinder deep thinking: When things come easy, we don’t have to dig in. I started to wonder, Could an easy, pain-free life be doing to our faith what the internet is doing to our brains?

A NEED TO SURRENDER (JUMP!)

Call to me and I will answer you and tell you great and unsearchable things you do not know.

Jeremiah 33:3

(This is the deep.)

Lately, I’m walking into something that feels like a miracle, but it still shakes me a little.

From my journal:

When doctors first mentioned “heart transplant” it seemed so far away, and if I’m being honest, far-fetched. I imagined His intervention looking more like healing. I never imagined staring a transplant in the face. And yet, here we are, with a week’s worth of appointments to potentially list me next month. I think about how much my faith has matured since my diagnosis. Still, my head is swimming as I confirm the appointments online. 

Standing at the top of the high dive for my first jump, I had a similar feeling: What am I doing? How did I get here?  With at least a dozen kids lined up behind me, I knew there was no way I was crawling back down the ladder—the only way out was forward. And the lifeguard’s whistle and command to “JUMP!” (from her safe, nautically-adorned stand) confirmed my thoughts. So I put my nose plugs on, closed my eyes,  and jumped feet first. As soon as I hit the water, I felt myself panic, remembering the “16 FT” stenciled nearby on the side of the pool. 

WE NEVER GO IN ALONE

God sometimes takes us into deep waters, or at least allows it. Not to drown us, but to save us. Because as my brother told me, to dive in, you need deep waters. To dive in is to go all in. And that cannot happen in shallow waters. To go all in on faith, God will often call you to deep waters to do it. 

But He won’t send you in alone. 

Since my diagnosis, I have clung to this Scripture: 

When you go through deep waters, I will be with you. 

Isaiah 43:2

He’s actually shown us this since the very beginning. In fact, in just the second verse in the entire bible, God was present in deep, difficult waters:

Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.

Genesis 1:2

“The phrase “formless and empty” (tohu wa vohu) represents the chaotic waters, the primordial deep—like the swirling uncertainty we all face. But notice what happens next. The Spirit doesn’t abandon this turmoil. Just the opposite: the Spirit of God was “hovering” over these deep waters.

That Hebrew word for “hovering” (merahephet) carries an image of protective care, overseeing life’s deepest uncertainties.

That care is something I’ve experienced, and I’ll bet you have, too.

During our summer mission trips, we often taught about how God is closest to us in our most difficult times. To demonstrate this, we would ask the class members to draw a line graph, with two lines on the same graph. One line represented how well life was going, the other line represented how close we felt to God. The lines always ran opposite from each other – everyone felt closer to God when life was at a low point.

DEEP IS WHERE HOPE IS

Later in that same journal entry:

Something tells me what I will gain most from a transplant has nothing to do with what they’ll see on an EKG. I think it’s hope. It took being down this deep to understand what hope really is. I suppose I didn’t think I really needed it before.

 I remember it all—oh, how well I remember—
    the feeling of hitting the bottom.
But there’s one other thing I remember,
    and remembering, I keep a grip on hope:

God’s loyal love couldn’t have run out,
    his merciful love couldn’t have dried up.

(Lamentations 3:20-22 MSG, emphasis added)

Written during a time of intense suffering, Lamentations whispers this secret: Deep is where hope lives. Even, especially, when you don’t get what you expected. Hope is deciding not to give up.

Hope is deciding not to give up.

Lori Ann Wood

What I didn’t mention is that it took several attempts to actually jump from that high dive. There were a few “walks of shame” down the ladder, past the line of jeering kids. But once I did jump into that deep water, I saw the fabled seahorse. I think. It was worn, faded, and flaking off in places. (I’d never known it was a seahorse if my brother hadn’t told me.) As I struggled to get closer to the surface, I caught a glimpse of something even better: a white life preserver and rope overhead. Swimming toward it, it dawned on me that the white ring on the lifeguard stand was meant for more than decoration. I learned a lesson that day that I’ve had to keep relearning in heart failure:  

Sometimes hope shows up differently than we imagine. 

But your best shot at seeing it is in the deep end.

Listen to this post read by the author HERE.