Shipwreck - The DUNBAR!

So many of us in today's world never even think about Jesus and what he did for us on the cross all those years ago. None of us ever knows when our lives will be cut short, and none of us ever knows what lies ahead of us.

WOW! Just reading about what happened on the night of Thursday, 20th August 1857.

After spending 81 days at sea, the beautiful ship THE DUNBAR arrived off Sydney Heads. I live in Newcastle, NSW, and we are just 168 kilometres, or around 103 miles, from Sydney Heads.

The DUNBAR, named after its owner, the wealthy Duncan Dunbar, was the largest ship ever built at that time at the Sunderland Shipyard in England. It was completed in 1854 and started off on its voyage to Sydney, Australia in 1856.

After 81 days at sea, she arrived off Sydney Heads, captained by James Green. It was a horrendous night, blowing a gale, and the waves and sea were treacherous. It was pitch black, with heavy rain squalls making all vision pretty impossible.

The cliffs around Sydney were obscure, and Captain Green believed he was approaching North Head; instead, he was kilometres/miles off and ordered the crew to straighten the ship and run for Sydney. He mistakenly drove the ship into what is known today as THE GAP, thinking it was the port's entrance.

There were 63 passengers on board as well as 59 crew members, including himself. The night was ghastly and cruel, with a wild storm in the pitch black. The ship crashed into the cliff face and the many rocks forming a reef around its base, known today as South Head. The ship immediately started to break up. The passengers and crew were all thrown into the water, the huge waves, and the rugged and jagged rocks surrounding the base of the mighty cliff face.

The gale was gigantic, and all but one on board were tragically and horribly killed on the fateful and disastrous night.

Those on board certainly wouldn't have been expecting that! Their whole lives would have been totally consumed by the huge effort of leaving their homes and starting a new life in the Australian colony.

Every bit of their lives was consumed with hope, love, and desire for their new start, which was to commence so soon in the vast colony, so far away from their homeland. Their hearts would be totally in awe of Australia and what it could offer them; they really had no idea, none of them at all, of what was about to happen.

Our lives can be so consumed by everyday living, making do with what we have, and just getting on with life in general. None of us, other than anything planned, will ever know the time or date when our life here on earth will be over, finished and done with. It's quite a remarkable eye-opener when you think about it. Life can be so so busy and full, and then suddenly it can be cut so short.

Jesus tells us that we should make sure that we give God first place in our lives and be prepared for whatever happens in our lives, and also to be prepared for Christ's eventual return as well. In the Bible, in John chapter three and verse sixteen, it says, "For God so loved the World (that's you and me) that he gave his only son, that whoever (that's you and me) believes in him shall not perish but have everlasting life."

That certainly means that God is offering eternal life to anyone at all who trusts in him! Pretty straightforward. In the Bible, in John 5:24, Jesus said, and I quote: "Truly, truly, I say to you, He that hears my word, and believes on him that sent me, has everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death to life." Couldn't be any plainer than that.

Are you ready to ask Christ into your life? Maybe there would have been some board that had actually asked Christ to lead their lives, but I think many of them would have had no idea about what Jesus could be offering them. Unfortunately, just like so many today.

In the horrible accident of THE DUNBAR, the bodies and the wreckage actually filled the harbour - how horrible would that have been - and a huge funeral would have been held in Sydney. There were seven hearses and four other coaches and a long procession of carriages. The whole city closed down.

The only person surviving was found clinging to rocks as huge waves swept over him. How he did that is amazing and incredible. He managed to cling to a rock at the bottom of the huge cliff, being constantly pummelled and crashing into the cliff face by huge waves for 48 hours before he was finally rescued.

How James Johnson survived and ended up being a lighthouse keeper here in Newcastle many years later is beyond our minds.  He was an amazing man. He passed away in 1915. The whole episode is hard to imagine today.

James Johnson helped rescue Frederick Hedges, the only one to survive when the paddle steamer he was on foundered near Newcastle harbour in 1866.

Reading all of this and trying to take it in has been a real eye-opener for me. I knew about it, but I didn't realise just how it had such an impact on Newcastle and Sydney. All those people died so tragically.

We never know when our time comes to die - it is always there, no matter how we live, who we work for, how many in our family, and what we do with our lives. There it always is. Sooner or later we are all going to have to face the certainty of giving up our lives.

We certainly have to make sure about how we live and what is going to happen to us after death. Jesus Christ knew what was going to happen. He knew there was a heaven and there was a hell. Any of us coming to Christ and asking him to take over our lives, and making sure we put him first in everything, we can guarantee that when the time comes, we will live eternally with the one who guides our lives, Jesus, while we are here on earth.

Where are you with Jesus? That's a great question. Are you anywhere at all with Jesus? Do you even know him or even think about him?

You can give your life to him just by asking him to lead you in every situation in which you find yourself. Putting him first makes everything else fall into place. Of course, life will still throw you lots of curveballs, and yet knowing that Jesus is leading you in all situations certainly steers you in all the right places and definitely helps you cope with whatever comes your way.

Ask Him to come into your life to lead you in everything you do and everywhere you go.

God bless you this week - hoping to see you soon