just a small ship in a big pond

One thing that I have come to realise this past week is that we are just a small ship in God's big ocean. Time and again we have found ourselves in situations where we just have no control over our circumstances or the decisions that other people are making.

Here in Barbados, the Cruise Ships are king and they rule the waves and the port. After them come the container ships, the grain ships and other cargo ships. Then somewhere, a long way down the list, comes Logos Hope.

We may be God's navy but here in Barbados this week, it has been hard to understand why some things have been happening the way they have.

So we spent 8 days at anchor and then the past 2 days moving around different berths, trying to juggle loading water, fuel, book containers, technical container, off load sewage etc.

We still can't get into the berth where the public will be able to come onboard the ship. We have even tried to take books off the ship to sell onshore, but have not been able to do that either.

We are all having to learn lessons about trusting God and what we can and can't do in our own strength.

One good piece of news was that yesterday we were able to come into a berth and get off the ship. This meant many of us were able to take a day off and go to the beach.

We went with our friends, the Muller family, to a bay where we hoped to be able to see turtles.

I was told to look for the tourist boats, who feed the turtles. Sure enough 3 of the came into the bay and there were around 100 people in the water looking for turtles.

We swam out to the boats and soon actually got to see and swim with 3 turtles. It was an amazing experience, despite all the other people around. Sadly Heather and Kara weren't there but for Liam and I it was a great experience.

So now we hope and pray that tomorrow we can load our books, vans and everything else and at some point in the next couple of days be able to go back to the flour mill berth and open to the public. On Monday we sail for St Lucia for a week.

bobbing around off Barbados

This entry is written somewhere off the coast of Barbados. The ship is currently sailing 12 miles out from shore in order to dump all our waste water, sewage and food waste. We will then pick up about 50 tons of salt water to convert into fresh water.
I know you are probably wondering, why on earth are we doing this. So I will tell you.

After arriving in Barbados on Wednesday 28th October, we first went to a commercial berth, where we loaded 3 containers of books and off loaded our ship vans. This berth is in the main cruise terminal port and there is very tight security due to all the cruise ships arriving daily.
We then sailed around to another berth at a flour mill where the public are allowed onboard. However, this is a very small berth where we can only put out a couple of our gangways and are unable to unload vehicles or load the books.
We opened to the public before the weekend and had a great response with a good number of visitors and encouraging book sales.

The flour mill berth is not very well protected from the sea, and on Saturday, a storm somewhere out in the Atlantic started to send larger waves to Barbados and the ship started to really move around in the berth. As the weekend went by, the situation got worse, to the point where the cables attached at the bow and stern became so tight, they damaged the ship with their movement.

Early Monday morning, the captain took the decision that it was not safe to remain at the berth and the ship was taken out to anchor. On Monday, the ship was rolling up to 11 degrees each way while at anchor.

Gradually the weather improved and by Wednesday the seas were calmer, however, a grain ship had arrived and they then proceded into our berth at the flour mill.
This was a situation we had expected, but we didn't think it would happen after we had already spent 3 days at anchor.

The grain ship needs 6 days to unload it's cargo so we are not able to get back into our berth until Wednesday morning. We had hoped to be able to go into one of the other berths in the commercial port over the weekend, but were told there was no space.

So the ship has now been sat at anchor off the coast of this beautiful island for 6 days. We now have to go out to sea to get rid of some stuff that has built up and get more water because we are about to run out.

It is obviously very frustrating when you come to an island for 18 days, hoping to be able to minister to the people and have the bookfair open each day, and then end up at anchor for 9 days.
We just hope and pray there are no further delays in getting in to port.
Thankfully, because the seas are now calmer, we were able to launch a lifeboat today to shuttle people to and from shore, so teams were able to go out and do ministry ashore, as well as some people having their day off.
Sunday we will send teams out to churches on the boats.

On Tuesday, we plan to go back to the commercial berth to load more book containers, water and fuel. Then we expect a very busy last 5 days when we reopen on Wednesday.
Meanwhile, we are trying to make the best of our time out at anchor. Tonight we are having a movie night up on deck - Titanic would you believe?!

Of course being at sea means only the satellite internet connection so no pictures today I'm afraid.