Recently, I have become totally enamored with anchors. I kept seeing them everywhere. I know there has been a recent fashion resurgence of a nautical style, but this has never interested me. But recently,like I said before anchors have become my thing! I mean I bought a phone case, a ring, earrings a notebook ( basically anything with an anchor on it) I couldn’t tell you why. I’m not a sailor, not interested in anything nautical. So what’s drawing me to the anchor?

Let’s first examine what anchor is. According to Wikipedia,

An anchor is a device, normally made of metal, used to connect a vessel to the bed of a body of water to prevent the craft from drifting due to wind or current.  So basically an anchor is something designed to hold something in place, to keep something grounded.

Hmm…This year I vowed to not only look at things through my physical eyes, but spiritual eyes as well. So during my devotion,I asked God to show me what He kept bringing the anchor around me as a symbol and why all of a sudden it meant something to me.

The only “answer” I got for a while came in the answer of a song.An old hymn that I’ve that I used to hear all the time at church, but probably haven’t heard in about 10 years. The lyrics that kept repeating over and over in my head read as such:

Will your anchor hold in the storms of life,
When the clouds unfold their wings of strife?
When the strong tides lift and the cables strain,
Will your anchor drift, or firm remain?

We have an anchor that keeps the soul
Steadfast and sure while the billows roll,
Fastened to the Rock which cannot move,
Grounded firm and deep in the Savior’s love

Okay… I still didn’t get how this applied to me. I mean I understood the meaning of the lyrics, but why was God trying to remind me of this right now?

It wasn’t until my dad had his health issues and my family began going through some  tough emotional times and a loss of a friend exactly one week later did I truly understand what the purpose was. He was preparing me to handle the stress that was coming my way. Throughout these past two weeks, I have been so calm, and anybody who knows me knows that calm is usually not in my vocabulary!

The anchor serves as a reminder that If you are not grounded and held firmly to something, you’re liable to sink or drift away aimlessly. Physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually, you have to be grounded to something.

Hebrews 6:19 reads,¹⁹ This hope is a strong and trustworthy anchor for our souls. It leads us through the curtain into God’s inner sanctuary. I look at the world as a big ocean, the people as a ship and God as an anchor. The anchor keeps the ship from being washed away in the ocean if a storm rages ie: God keeps us grounded when life seems to get us down, Now, just because we have an anchor keeping us grounded, doesn’t mean that the storm won’t rage and that we will come out of a storm completely untouched or unscathed. It simply means that despite the fact that we may be battered and bruised and sometimes damaged, we will not sink. There will always be something there preventing that. Even though we have an anchor, we have to be responsible and ensure that we are setting that anchor in place. We can’t just expect the boat to know that If we want it to stay in place, it has to drop the anchor in the water can we? No, of course not! That’s the sailors job. So in light, that’s our job. The only way you can ensure the anchor is prepared to do its job, is check on it daily. Is it in good repair? Do I need to make any changes to it? Basically , this is all just a metaphor for this: Check in with God. Are you doing everything you can to maintain your relationship with him? Are you communicating with him? Is your anchor ready for what this world may throw at it?

I know I’m doing everything I can to ensure that my anchor holds up through whatever storms come my way. It’s been working for me so far!! Get anchored to something!

xoxo