Rabbi, we know you are a teacher who has come from God. For no one could perform the miraculous signs You are doing if God were not with him. John 3:2.

Give all your worries and cares to God, for He cares about you. 1 Peter 5:7.

And continuing our 351 Old Testament prophecies, promises of God, fulfilled in Jesus Christ, we come to number 122: Zealous for the LORD’S House. Psalm 69:9: For zeal for Your house has consumed me, and the reproaches of those who reproach You have fallen on me. And, John 2:17: His disciples remembered that it was written, “Zeal for Your house will consume Me.”

This morning I read from Lift Up Your Eyes, Collected Columns of Clyde E. Nichols, about Moving Nearer to God. He wrote about the SS Titanic. Speeding on in the frigid North Atlantic despite five warnings of icebergs and field ice, she hit an iceberg and from the time of impact until she was sunk was 3 hours. What struck me was this: “Among those who lost their lives was Robert J. Bateman. You never heard of Robert J. Bateman? I dare say few people have. He was an evangelist, a diamond-in-the-rough winner of souls. When it was learned that there were not enough lifeboats for all those on the ill-fated ship, the men stepped back and let the women and children have them. Among those who gave their lives that night in the North Atlantic was Robert J. Bateman. As the great ship went down, the voice of Robert J. Bateman struck up a hymn, “Nearer, My God, To Thee,” and the band that had been playing ragtime joined in.” He helped them sing what had never been more true, Nearer my God to Thee, because they had the certainty of only one thing they could not escape, they were waiting for the ocean to claim them.

The first Scripture verse cited above in Hearing God by Dallas Willard, talked about Nicodemus, a teacher of teachers of Israel who thought He knew who Jesus was and Jesus undid that limited knowing. Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit…Truly, truly, I say to you, we speak of what we know and testify of what we have seen, and you do not accept our testimony.” John 3:5-6, 11. What about us? In My Utmost for His Highest by Oswald Chambers this morning, this: “I am a child of God only by being born again, and as His child I am good only as I “walk in the light” (1 John 1:7).”

Even in the blackness of the sky above and the deepest depths below of the frigid North Atlantic Ocean, Robert J. Bateman led those people who were near him on that sinking deck to the light of the truth of the light that lights the way for all of us we will one day face, Nearer my God to Thee am I. And I can’t help but think about all the certainties of their individual lives reduced down to that one inescapable truth they all imminently faced. Today it feels as though we are all of us on a Titanic and it’s taking much longer than 3 hours for everything we are so very certain of to be reduced down to our one true need. Nicodemus didn’t understand. Do we? “Truly, truly, I say to you, we speak of what we know and testify of what we have seen, and you do not accept our testimony. If I told you earthly things and you do not believe, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly things? No one has ascended into heaven, but He who descended from heaven: the Son of Man. As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up; so that whoever believes will in Him have eternal life. For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life. For God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through Him. He who believes in Him is not judged; he who does not believe has been judged already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.” John 3:11-18. It is by God’s very own love for us that He truly helps us see and walk in the light of His love, even in the dark night of the soul. Nearer my God to Thee – let me always be.

***DARK NIGHT OF THE SOUL – LORD, You are the God who saves me; day and night I cry out to You. May my prayer come before You; turn Your ear to my cry. I am overwhelmed with troubles, and my life draws near to death. I am like one without strength. I am set apart with the dead, like the slain who lie in the grave, whom You remember no more and are cut off from Your care. You have put me in the lowest pit, in the darkest depths. Your wrath lies heavily on me; You have overwhelmed me with all Your waves. You have taken from me my closest friends and have made me repulsive to them. I am confined and cannot escape; my eyes are dim with grief. I call to You, LORD, every day; I spread out my hands to You. I cry to You for help, LORD; in the morning my prayer comes before You. Why, LORD, do You reject me and hide Your face from me? I have borne Your terrors and am in despair. Your wrath has swept over me; Your terrors have destroyed me. All day long they surround me like a flood; they have completely engulfed me. You have taken from me friend and neighbor. Darkness is my closest friend. Psalm 88:1-18. Adapted.***