Art to Heart Prayer of Petition

J.M.W. Turner: Snowstorm: Steamboat off a Harbor's Mouth

©2002 by Jeff Dugan

This may look a bit like the kind of modern art that so many of us find so incomprehensible.  In actuality, though, it was painted in 1842, by an artist who was obviously well ahead of his time. 

Although Turner did not embrace pure abstraction like artists of the 20^th century did, he was among the first to so boldly turn away from a photorealistic vision in the pursuit of enhanced expressiveness.  And who can deny that this painting is powerfully expressive of the turmoil to which this steamboat is subjected in the midst of a violent, tumultuous storm at sea?  It’s not pretty, but it’s not intended to be.  It’s meant to communicate in a very visceral way the torment suffered by the steamboat at the whim of the world around it.

And yet, the steamboat is not overcome by the storm.  It need not rely on the world for wind; it has its own internal power source.  As the winds howl and the waves crash, the steam engine simply churns the harder.  In Turner’s day, at the dawn of the industrial revolution, viewers might have seen in the bright light surrounding the boat a testimony to the hope that technology would give mankind the final victory over nature.

Today we’re more likely to understand that such a final victory is impossible.  But in the context of the New Testament, that light around the boat is not an inappropriate indication of the hope that Paul had in the faithfulness of God as he obediently endured a seemingly constant storm of dangers, toils, and snares.

That storm still rages today, and we too often seem to live in the midst of it.  We’re doomed for shipwreck if we trust in the world, but praise God that we can instead rely on the amazing grace that has brought us safe thus far.

Let us pray:

Lord, we’re so afraid of all the things that seem poised to smash our fragile lives into pieces.  We cry to you as if you don’t know of our plight or as if you can’t understand it.  But we take heart in remembering that you do know, and you can understand, because you came here to live in the storm with us.  We rise now from our despair in hope that you will still the seas as you have so many times before.

(At this point, the worship leader may choose to lead the congregation in a prayer or litany of petitions of importance to the specific congregation and service.)

Amen.