“Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.” (Matthew 7:13-14)
Michael Palin, in his book Erebus: The Story of a Ship (2018 Arrow Books), tells the story of the Erebus and the Terror on their first journey into Polar regions in the mid-nineteenth century. At one point, as winter approached, they were caught behind two massive, moving icebergs looming out of thick fog. In their efforts to avoid the icebergs they collided with one another, seriously damaging both ships. A small gap opened between the two icebergs and Captain Ross commanding judged that to heave too and attempt repairs and look for a way out later would leave them trapped. He took the desperate decision to attempt passage through the gap, despite damaged rudders and rigging. The two ships limped through to clear water with only a few feet to spare on each side and minutes to spare before the gap closed.
Once through they realised that these were not two isolated icebergs “but part of a long and continuous chain, with no way through other than the narrow slit that had saved them from destruction.” (Palin 2018:143) If they had not made it through, they would have been trapped and crushed behind a wall of ice. “[Cornelius] Sullivan [Blacksmith on Erebus] had no doubt who was responsible for their survival: ‘God Almighty, My friends, alone that Saved us from a miserable death 3000 miles from any land.’ [William] Cunningham [Marine Sergeant on Terror] concurred: ‘I must here say that it was a most wonderful interposition of Divine providence that we were not all Sent into the presence of our Maker.’ And [John] Davis too [Assistant Surgeon and Botanist on Terror]: ‘After daylight and we had signalled the Erebus, I went to my cabin; and never did a sinner offer up to the throne of the Almighty more sincere thanks.’” (Palin 2018:143) To do nothing, to delay, to try to fix the situation themselves, to choose any other moment than ‘Now!’, would have brought certain death. They had to risk that narrow passage and it only opened once.
A decade later, under the command of Sir John Franklin, while searching for the North West Passage through Arctic waters, a series of less-blessed choices ended in both Erebus and Terror becoming ice-bound and sinking. Franklin died. The doomed and gruesome attempts of the crews to survive were later pieced together by John Rae, commanding a rescue mission. The accounts he gleaned from Inuit hunters and the evidence he uncovered told of a savage and brutal end to the adventure. None survived.
Reading Palin’s excellent account, I wondered if we have become accustomed these days to presenting a rose-tinted gospel, an appealing and entertaining package offered like an option on some kind of eternal Caribbean cruise? I’m not suggesting a return to the style of past preachers and evangelists who scared sinners into the kingdom with fire-and-brimstone sermons. But perhaps we need a more urgent focus on pointing to the narrow road and telling of the dangers of a delayed decision about where our lives are headed. Life is more like those old Arctic explorations than we’d like to think and less like luxury cruises. May we seize every opportunity to warn this generation and the next that delay in choosing life’s course is deadly.