What's your boat? (Lessons from Dunkirk)

         Yesterday we went to see the new movie "Dunkirk."  Whew!  It was great...and so incredibly griping that my stomach was clenched in a knot the entire movie.  I've known the story of "the miracle at Dunkirk" for a number of years, so I'm thrilled it's finally been made into a movie.  But it's remarkable how many folks (and especially those from the younger generation) have never heard about this amazing, inspiring, and crucially important event that may well have prevented Germany from steamrolling over Great Britain and potentially altering the outcome of World War II.
         In light of this new movie, I thought's I'd include an excerpt from a talk I gave a while back about this event.  Dunkirk has countless lessons for all of us, but here's one or two of them that really convicted me--
         God has ALL power, ALL wisdom, and ALL ability, yet He has sovereignly chosen to use us as His instruments on this earth.  The Lord wants us to be His hands and feet in a hurting world.  And that's both an unspeakable responsibility and privilege.  We don’t just work for anybody.  No, we serve the King of Kings!   That should put a spring in our step and give us energizing purpose every morning when we wake up.  And who knows how God can  use even some of our smallest acts of service to have a far-reaching impact for good and for His glory.  Because the Lord’s in the business of using the seemingly hidden, hard, ordinary, and insignificant things in our lives in remarkable and even eternal ways.
For instance, how on earth do you suppose the Lord could use the service of a dilapidated, old fourteen foot fishing boat during a cataclysmic world war?  Well, the humble owner of that little fishing boat would tell you, “An awful lot!”
You see it was in the beginning stages of World War II in May of 1940.  The overwhelming might of the German fighting machine had inflicted heavy casualties on the Allied Forces of Britain and France who were opposing the Nazis in a desperate struggle for survival.  As the powerful Nazi troops swept across Europe, the over 450,000 soldiers of the Allied Army were forced to retreat, and the British commanders soon realized that unless they were somehow able to evacuate their forces, they’d be trapped and completely annihilated in France.  That would’ve been catastrophic, for it would’ve meant the destruction of the great bulk of Britain’s forces, leaving England largely defenseless.
The troops eventually ran out of space to retreat and were trapped on a beach at a place called Dunkirk.  The Allied’s position looked hopeless with their backs to the sea and the German juggernaut relentlessly attacking them from the front as well as bombing and strafing them from the air.  The German Air Force even dropped leaflets urging the British and French to surrender for there was no chance of escape.
All of England knew of the desperate plight of their soldiers and were awaiting the dreaded news of the annihilation of their brave forces.  Late on the night of May 25, a simple three word message was transmitted across the airwaves of England from the commander of the British Army at Dunkirk. The cryptic message simply said: “But-If-Not.”  
        Remarkably, these words were a direct quote from the Old Testament book of Daniel.  It’s from the story of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednago in which three young Hebrew exiles are about to thrown into a fiery furnace for refusing to bow down to a golden statue of the mighty Babylonian King Nebuchadnezzar.  These young men defiantly tell the King, “Our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and He will deliver us out of your hand, O king!  BUT IF NOT, let it be known to you, O king, that we will NOT serve your gods or worship the golden image you’ve set up.” (Dan.3:17-18).
“But if not,” the British forces were telegraphing their people, “We will not quit; we will not give up; and we will not surrender.”  
In a matter of hours, thousands of regular old English citizens began getting into their boats and heading across the perilous waters of the English Channel towards their trapped soldiers. The boats they owned were of every conceivable shape and size—from small fishing boats, to trawlers, to lifeboats, to motor boats, to even an Olympic racing yacht.
Guided by the smoke and flames filling the sky above Dunkirk and at great personal peril, these civilians and their ragtag rescue fleet made their way through German attack and treacherous waters to the stranded troops.  Under withering enemy fire, these ordinary British citizens began evacuating the exhausted soldiers.
The operation—code-named Dynamo—continued for several days.  At the beginning, the British figured they’d be lucky to save even a tiny fraction of the troops.  Yet, miraculously, this motley crew of all kinds of average citizens and their boats ended up rescuing the vast majority of the trapped forces—nearly 400,000 men!  No wonder historians now refer to it as “The Miracle at Dunkirk!”
But think about it—what if all those ordinary British civilians had responded to this desperate call with: “I’m too busy,” or “My boat’s not much good,” or “I’m too tired,” or “Somebody else is far better equipped to handle this than me,” or “The situation’s hopeless so what’s the point of risking my life?”
I can tell you what would’ve happened—innumerable fighting men would have lost their lives, and in all likelihood, Great Britain wouldn’t have recovered after losing the bulk of her fighting force.  And had England fallen to the Nazis, there’s no telling what might have been the outcome of WW II.   Yet because a bunch of ordinary people—folks much like you and me—answered the call and decided to offer up themselves and their boats to serve their nation and save her soldiers, Great Britain survived to fight another day.
So let me ask you: What’s your boat and how are you using it?  We all have boats, you know.  Not literal ones of course, but our boats consist of our time, our talents, our treasure.  We all have different abilities, different circumstances, different interests, different giftedness, different resources, but we have one thing in common.  We are ALL called to serve.  We’re all called to use what God’s given us to serve where God’s placed us.
You could say that we’re saved to serve, and we’re blessed to be a blessing.  God doesn’t bless us, teach us, redeem us, love us so that we can just hoard His goodness and grace in our lives and then huddle by ourselves in the dark.  I couldn’t help but think of Gollum.  Remember Gollum from J.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings  series.  He’s warped and twisted beyond recognition, because he selfishly clutches, hides, and refuses to share the golden ring, which he names his “Precious.”  No!  Over and over again God’s Word makes it clear that we’re healed to help; we’re blessed to be a blessing; and we’re saved to serve.
        If you’re still breathing today…then God still has great plans for you, and He still has work for you to do that you—and only you—can do.  Let’s stop worrying about what other people are doing…or not doing!  Let’s stop comparing our path of service with someone else’s.  Let’s stop looking at the world and culture around us and throwing up our hands in despair, thinking “what difference can I possibly make?”
No, I’m certain that if we could go back to May of 1940 and ask that question of every British owner of every boat who chose to get off their duffs, overcome their fear, and refuse to give in to their despair over the plight of their trapped soldiers, they would all respond: “One person can make all the difference in the world!”  Look at how each person who was willing to use whatever boat God had given them and to serve where God had placed them, helped save countless lives and even ultimately affected the outcome of a World War.  Don’t you bet each of those boat owners—as well as each of those rescued soldiers—never ever ceased being overwhelmed with thankfulness and joy at the way God used the service of some boats and their willing owners to save lives?
God used David’s sling to bring down Goliath.  He used Moses’ walking stick to confront Pharaoh and rescue his people from slavery.  He used Rahab’s red chord to save her entire family from destruction.  He used Mary’s perfume to pour out extravagant love upon Jesus right before He would give His life for the sins of the world.
We’ve who’ve been saved, rescued, and blessed by the Savior have the priceless opportunity to express and pour out our thankfulness and love by being a blessing to others.  We’ve been saved to serve and healed to help.  And we’ve been given our boat by Almighty God—whatever our boat might be—so that we might be a blessing.
The time is NOW to stop making excuses, stop giving in to fear, stop wallowing in discouragement, and start using our little boat to serve God and others.  There are all kinds and ways of serving: serving in your home, in your church, in your community.  Serving through prayer. Serving with financial generosity.  Serving by encouraging others.  Serving thru hospitality.  Serving by sharing our faith.  Serving in whatever way and in whatever place God has chosen to put you.
And if you’re perhaps questioning whether it’s worth it…or maybe wondering if you have the desire or the energy or the ability or the time to serve, can I encourage you to recall another rescue mission?  Only this was a divine rescue mission that occurred a little over two thousand years ago.
For you see, every single one of us was even more hopelessly trapped than those doomed soldiers at Dunkirk.  We were entrapped by our sin and selfishness, and there was no possible escape for any of us, because the wages of sin is always death and despair.
But at the most desperate, most eternally dangerous of moments, Almighty God didn’t just send a boat—of even an enormous fleet of boats—to rescue us.  He didn’t send a supremely powerful military.  Nor did He send advice or a self-help guru or even a brilliant strategist to help us try to figure out how to deal with our hopeless condition.  
No, He came Himself.  The Lord Jesus willingly relinquished the perfection, comfort, security, and beauty of heaven in order to come Himself and rescue us.  Jesus left the infinite joys and wonders of heaven to come and rescue us, even though He completely knew and understood the pain, humiliation, betrayal, and rejection that would confront Him on earth’s war-ravaged shores.
And at the cross of Calvary, Jesus conquered sin and death and rose to new resurrection life so that any and every person on this planet could be rescued and saved.  The only requirement?  Like those soldiers at Dunkirk who had to choose to step off the burning shores of France and onto those rescue boats, we, too, have the choice.  If we want to be rescued, we must choose to accept Jesus’ offer of deliverance by making Him our Lord and Savior.
If you're reading this and have never made that decision, I pray that this would be the day that you would say “yes” to Jesus and accept His rescue so that you might enjoy abundant, glorious, eternal Life—with a capital “L!”  
And if you have been rescued by Jesus, I sure hope I’m not alone in admitting that there are plenty of times when I don’t feel like serving others.  Sometimes weariness or discouragement or just plain old selfishness gets the better of me…and I don’t really want to serve my family…or my friends…or those I come into contact with…or those in need.
But here’s what I’ve learned—in those moments of exhaustion or frustration or discouragement or selfishness, if I’ll simply shift my gaze off of myself and instead, as Hebrews 12 says, “Fix my eyes on Jesus,” it changes everything!  Because when we see the Almighty Creator and Sustainer of the universe washing His disciples' dirty feet…or lovingly embracing a leper…or offering the gift of forgiveness and salvation to the outcasts of their society—like the adulterous woman, the prostitute, and the tax collector--or stretching out His hands wide on a cross and saying “Father forgive them” as they hammered the nails into His flesh…or dying on that cross for the likes of you and me out of His immeasurable love and grace, how can it not compel us to cry out, “Thank You, thank You, thank You, my King, for rescuing and saving me!  I’ll happily serve anywhere, anytime, in anyway that You direct so that I might pour out my grateful love and worship to You!”
Oh my, how this dark world needs the hands and feet of Jesus right now to serve as He served and love as He loved.  Out of overflowing thankfulness for His extravagant goodness and grace, might we be ready and willing to offer ourselves to love and serve wherever and however our Savior leads us. We’ve been blessed to be a blessing, healed to help, and—praise God!—saved to serve.  By the power of His Holy Spirit and to the praise of His glorious grace, let’s get out there and do it.
        To God be the glory.