You don’t have to be a nautical expert to know that boats must be as solid below the water line as they are above it. A boat that looks good above the water line but is rotten below it will eventually sink. Well, the same kind of thing holds true for Christians. Those who have a fellowship with Christ that looks good on a surface level, but who are rotting away spiritually on the inside, are in trouble. Eventually, they will sink into the murky depths of life.

And so how can you, as a Christian, ensure that such a thing doesn’t happen to you? The answer is simple: You must do that which is necessary to keep your fellowship with Christ strong. How do you accomplish this? You do it through such things as: daily prayer, daily Bible study, weekly church attendance, cheerful giving, frequent witnessing, and regular confession and repentance. I know, I know, these things have been promoted so much they’ve become virtual cliches of Christianity. But they’ve been promoted so much because they work!

In Jeremiah 6:16, the prophet Jeremiah says to the people of Judah:

Thus says the Lord: “Stand in the ways and see, and ask for the old paths, where the good way is, and walk in it. Then you will find rest for your souls…” (N.K.J.V.)

By encouraging the people to ask for the old paths God was telling them, “The things I’ve had you do before will still work and keep you in right fellowship with Me.” To those Jews, that meant keeping the moral specifics of the Mosaic law, bringing their sacrifices to the temple as acts of worship, offering up their prayers to God, confessing their sins and repenting of them, and looking to God for their guidance and protection. Sadly, though, those people would have none of it. Jeremiah 6:16 ends with the mournful words:

…But they said, ‘We will not walk in it.” (N.K.J.V.)

Now, I do realize that the “old paths” for the Christian today aren’t the same as the ones the Old Testament Jews were to walk. However, the basic template is still the same: adherence to God’s word, worship, prayer, confession, repentance, and seeking God’s guidance and protection. The Christian whose life evidences these things need never worry about rotting or sinking because his spiritual boat will be solid and worthy of sailing the seas of life. As we all know, those seas can sometimes be stormy, choppy, and downright dangerous, but the Christian who is walking in God’s old paths won’t sink. How can he when he has the Lord Himself as his captain?