Dan Sandberg drew back his throwing arm, holding a stick of driftwood. He let it fly, throwing it as far as he could out over the bay. It hit with a splash more than a hundred feet from shore. His wife and three children, wearing winter coats, watched as Dutchess, their Labrador retriever, ran across the beach, leaped into the chilly water and with powerful strokes swam towards the stick. This was her favorite game.
Dutchess was getting close to the stick when she swam through a bed of bull kelp. Bull kelp are strong, tubular, water plants that sometimes grow as much as fifty feet long and look similar to the bull whips that wagon drivers used in years past. These kelp plants tend to grow together, making underwater forests. They attach to rocks at the bottom of the ocean that anchor them in place, and at the top they have air sacs that act like balloons to hold them at the surface of the water.
Dan and his family watched as Dutchess suddenly stopped swimming. It seemed as if something had reached out and grabbed her, holding her in the same spot. They quickly realized the kelp had trapped her.
At first the family coaxed her to swim harder and break free of the seaweed. “Come on, Dutchess ... you can do it!” they called from the shoreline. But no matter how hard she tried, Dutchess couldn’t break free.
This is a lot like the problem of sin. All of us, whether old or young, have been trapped in sin. This certainly is serious. God is holy, which means He loves goodness, but He hates sin. He cannot let sin go unpunished; He would not be just if He did. People who die in their sins will pay the penalty for their sins for all eternity. “It is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment” (Hebrews 9:2727And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment: (Hebrews 9:27)). But God loves you so much that He has made a way for you to be washed clean from every sin. The very next verse says, “So Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many” (Hebrews 9:2828So Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many; and unto them that look for him shall he appear the second time without sin unto salvation. (Hebrews 9:28)). He will set you free from your sins.
But could Dutchess be set free from the kelp? Dan knew they had to do something before the cold water sapped the dog’s strength, causing her to drown. He pulled his cell phone from his pocket and dialed 911. Dan didn’t know if the police would come to the aid of a dog in danger, so he was relieved when the dispatcher told him help was on the way.
In a few minutes, a police car pulled right up on the beach and two officers got out. One of the officers, Andrew Huett, loved dogs. When he heard Dutchess had been in the water for nearly fifteen minutes, he knew he had to act fast to save her.
Officer Andrew decided to swim out to save the dog. He opened the trunk of the police car, grabbed the spare tire and then waded out into the bay carrying the tire. The shock of the cold water almost took his breath away. When the water was too deep to wade, he pushed the tire in front of him and, kicking his legs behind him, swam the long distance out to the dog.
When he got near to Dutchess, he saw the problem. She had grabbed onto a long piece of kelp with her mouth and for some reason would not let go of it. Officer Andrew spoke softly to the dog so she would know he was her friend. Then he slowly reached over and pulled the kelp out of her mouth.
Freed from the kelp, Dutchess was able to swim on her own strength back to shore. When Officer Andrew, blue in the lips, straggled out of the bay, his partner gave him an emergency blanket to warm him up.
There is a way to be saved from your sins. God could not watch people perish without doing something about it. In love He sent His Son into this world to be the Saviour of sinners. The Lord Jesus went all the way to Calvary’s cross where He took the punishment for the sins of all those who would believe on Him. “Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God” (1 Peter 3:1818For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit: (1 Peter 3:18)).
Faith in the One who gave His life at Calvary is the only way to be saved. “By grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: not of works, lest any man should boast” (Ephesians 2:8-98For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: 9Not of works, lest any man should boast. (Ephesians 2:8‑9)). It is God’s love that opened the way for sinners to be saved.
And it was Officer Andrew’s love of his own dog that made him willing to swim out in the icy, cold water to save Dutchess. When they thanked him over and over, he told the family, “I have a dog myself, and I couldn’t imagine standing there and watching my dog drown.”
ML-11/22/2009