Never lost in the fog
One of my great recreational joys is swimming the line of ocean buoys near the coast at my local beach. Four laps along the buoys is one mile. I swim regularly throughout the year for the peace and beauty it brings to each day.
Last October I was swimming one early morning before work when a dense fog descended. This particular fog was like pea soup—so thick I could hardly see my hand in front of my face.
The safety line of small orange floaters between the large buoys had been removed for repairs and no large buoy was visible after I continued to swim for 20 or 30 minutes. I became lost and disoriented.
I had been swimming comfortably without a wetsuit, but after almost an hour in the water I started to feel cold, dehydrated, and fatigued. I had to get to shore, but there was no sound of a shore break, which helps to indicate direction. The sea that morning was calm, like glass. I was concerned I could be swimming out to open ocean. I could be swimming toward the sharp rocks off the beautiful protected marine area farther south along the coast. I could be swimming in circles.
As I swam several more minutes without a result, I felt a powerful panic set in. There was no point in shouting. No fishermen were on the jetty that morning. There were no walkers on the beach. The only sound was an incessant foghorn in the distance.
I started to breathe abnormally and I grew dizzy, disoriented, exhausted. Even so, angel thoughts, or spiritual inspirations that I had cherished, came to my rescue.
I remembered a Christian Science lecture I had attended the previous weekend. The lecturer spoke of God’s law, that it is eternal and ever present and never suspended. He shared a recent encounter on a freeway in which another driver flashed him a sign of anger and contempt after feeling he had been cut off. Was the law of Love absent, he had asked himself? At what point did he or this other driver leave the kingdom of God? The answers, of course, were that Love could not be absent and that neither man could leave the kingdom of God, in which all of God’s ideas, His children, dwell eternally.
I also remembered an article I’d first read in a Christian Science Reading Room years before when I was a new student of this healing Science. It’s called “God’s Law of Adjustment,” by Adam H. Dickey. He writes: “If a man were drowning in mid-ocean with apparently no help at hand, there is a law of God which, when rightly appealed to, would bring about his rescue” (The Christian Science Journal, January 1916).
I asked myself, “How could that law be in operation to save me now?”
It was clear my first step out of trouble was to pray.
Mary Baker Eddy explains that God can be appealed to for help at any time, with healing results. She says in her poem, “ ‘Feed my sheep, ’” “Shepherd, show me how to go” (Poems, p. 14). I placed special emphasis on “how” as I remembered this line, knowing that God could give me sure and specific guidance. I became calm and receptive to divine direction. I was prepared to, as the poem says, “listen for Thy voice, / Lest my footsteps stray” (p. 14). My receptivity helped me recall a DVD lesson in distance swimming in which the teacher shows students how to completely relax in the water, face down, for several minutes before swimming. This total “letting go” allows the body to become completely comfortable and balanced in the water and makes swimming more efficient.
As I relaxed into my float, and my breathing returned to normal, the fear left me completely and my thought was flooded with healing messages. I remembered a line from Isaiah 30: “And thine ears shall hear a word behind thee, saying, This is the way, walk ye in it, when ye turn to the right hand, and when ye turn to the left” (verse 21).
In the process of praying this way, I became rested and almost warm in the water. I was ready to keep moving. As I swam, I silently sang to myself a hymn written by Minny Ayers: “I walk with Love along the way” (Christian Science Hymnal, No. 139). I always sing this hymn when preparing for long-distance races because of how it elevates my thought.
I started swimming in the direction I thought might bring me to a massive jetty—an important landmark, as I knew that from there land had to be about 100 yards to my right. In the process I literally swam into the first buoy. I grew even more hopeful and confident. After another five-minute swim I was at the jetty, and ten minutes later I was safe on the sandy shore.
As I showered and changed clothes, I was singing: “I love Thy way of freedom, Lord” (Violet Hay, Christian Science Hymnal, No. 136, © CSBD). I have rarely felt so completely elated! I was not even tired after the ordeal.
This story is not only about how Christian Science saved me from drowning. The real lesson here is the transformation that happens by understanding that God’s law is in action. The good news is that all of us can understand God’s law and trust it, even when we are not in immediate danger.
Reflecting on that morning in October, I see that through her discovery Mary Baker Eddy has given the world a life preserver—sure rescue from danger, doubt, and fear.
Richard Tradewell
Laguna Hills, California, US