The other day, I was in a conversation with a friend, and I used a word to describe the condition of somebody else’s life. When I was asked how that person was, I simply said, “Untethered.”
When I said the word, I was picturing the Tom Hanks character in the uber-popular movie, Castaway, when he realized that his volleyball-turned-friend, Wilson, had fallen off the raft in the middle of the ocean.
Chuck (Hanks’ character), dives into the water and swims after Wilson until he feels the rope that he was holding on to pull tight. At that point, he chooses to let go of what is keeping him tethered to the raft, so he can swim further to get Wilson.
If you’ve seen the movie, you’ll remember the cinematic swell of the music, and quicker scene cuts from Chuck to Wilson, then back to Chuck, then back to Wilson even farther away. It’s done in such a way as to really make the viewer feel the danger that Chuck faces by letting go.
At the most intense musical moment, he turns back, grabs the rope, and says goodbye to Wilson. He swims back to the safety of the raft, climbs on it, and lays back as the camera rises above him, allowing the viewer to really grasp how small he is in the vast ocean.
But here’s the deal. Who – or what – is untethered at that point?
Wilson, of sure. If you screen grabbed the scene as the camera reached its highest point, you’d have to get a magnifying glass to find it, but there’s an untethered volleyball floating in the water somewhere.
But so is Chuck. Sure, he’s still holding a rope that keeps him attached to the raft, but (and please don’t miss the power of this next statement) the raft isn’t attached to anything.
The raft is untethered, and so anything attached to it is untethered by association.
(I feel like I’ve written the word “untethered” so much that my writing software is going to suggest plenty of alternatives, but I think we must read it enough to really get it.)
The thing that I want us to understand is that there would be a false sense of security on that raft because Chuck would still be at the mercy of the wind, the waves, and the currents. He’s still drifting aimlessly.
In 1 Corinthians 15:58, God calls us to live lives that are “steadfast” and “immovable” (don’t read that as “stubborn and unwilling”). To rephrase it, He calls us to live lives that are tethered, but not tethered to just anything.
We need to be tethered to something that is anchored.
With all the syncretism that is happening in the church right now, we are witnessing a drift unlike anything we’ve seen in recent history because we’re attaching ourselves to beliefs and practices that aren’t anchored in truth.
Until we are tethered to the kingdom that cannot be shaken (see Hebrews 12:28), and the King who is unchanging (see James 1:17), we will find ourselves with a false sense of security as we’re being led wherever the current winds of culture want to blow us.
As Paul wrote in Ephesians 4, it’s time for the Church to mature to a place where we are grounded, anchored – tethered – in Christ.
“Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of people in their deceitful scheming.” (Ephesians 4:14)
