The Time I Almost Died – A Sailing Story

By Elizabeth Prata

This is about the times I almost died. It’s also about being immortal until God sovereignly saves us and finishes His work through us. We all have a number of days.

Since his days are determined, The number of his months is with You; And his limits You have set so that he cannot pass. (Job 14:5).

God determines who is born, where we are born, IF we are born, and how long we may live after we are born. He decides when we die and how we die. We are totally in God’s hands from eternity past to eternity future.

He chose to tell Peter by what manner he was to die. (John 21:19) In John 21:22 He told Peter about John, “Jesus said to him, “If I want him to remain until I come, what is that to you? You follow Me!“

I have lived a careful life. Nothing reckless. I don’t bungee jump or skydive or even drive on Los Angeles freeways. I lived on a sailboat for two years, sailing up and down the Atlantic seaboard and across the Gulf Stream to the Bahamas. It’s not especially dangerous to live on a sailboat, no more than driving around or slipping in the bathtub. Accidents make only the 4th leading cause of death. Heart attacks is number 1.

I wasn’t saved when I lived on the sailboat. I never thought about death for long. Or Jesus or God or eternity. I didn’t know at all about the Bible or salvation.

We used the Intracoastal Waterway (ICW) for part of our journey up and down the coast. This is an “inside” waterway of connected lakes, seas, canals, and rivers that allow for barge traffic up and down the coast. It also allows for mariners on motor or sail vessels to go up and down the eastern seaboard without having to make a foray into the Atlantic Ocean.

It’s actually a roadway similar to the Interstate. On any given day, especially in populated areas, all sorts of marine traffic will be plying the Intracoastal waters. In some ways, it’s more difficult to navigate the ICW when it’s crowded because there are so many boats. You have to time it for the tide AND the bridges. (Bridges will lift to allow sailboat masts to go under). There are a thousand ‘rules of the road,’ protocols for travel, right of way, passing, bridge tenders, speed limits, navigation markers, horn or sound signals, ranges…

There are parts of the ICW that are shallower than others. We were on a sailboat and had to be aware of the ‘draft’ under us and be precise about whether there was enough water under our keep for us not to touch bottom and get stuck. Because of the shifting nature of sand, the Army Corps of Engineers are constantly dredging to ensure safe passage for vessels of reasonable draft.

As we motored up the river in northern Florida, a tug pushing a barge came up behind us. (Or a tug pulling one, I forget which). I do remember the tug was Tug Green Cove and he was going to take a left at the St. Johns River while we were going to proceed north past Amelia Island up to Georgia.

We knew this because we were in a constricted area, and he contacted us on VHF radio. He needed to pass us since he was motoring at a faster speed than us at our 5mph. We communicated about the complexities of us moving a bit to the side so he had enough room to pass us safely, what speed to do it, and when.

When we saw no southbound traffic coming at us, we started the passing maneuver. We did the maneuver carefully. Steering a boat is not like a car, it is susceptible to currents, waves, and sudden wind gusts to push your vessel where you don’t want it to go. We didn’t want to run into the barge/tug and he didn’t want to run into us.

I stayed above on deck to watch and help if needed. When we finished and the barge was ahead of us and not behind us, I went below to finish making the sandwiches. That’s when I heard a BANG. I though we had run into something. But no, we had run aground. A shoal got us before we could move to the center of the narrow ICW waterway again.

It took a bit of backing and filling and use of an anchor to pull us off but we got off the sandbar.

I thought about this incident long and hard. It happened sometime in 1992 or 1993. So, thirty years ago. I was not saved by the grace of God then. But even before I was saved, it does a soul good to ponder the near death experience one has just undergone. And especially now that I’m saved, I think about death, life, afterlife.

You see, if the timing had been just 15 seconds prior when we went aground, the barge would have run us over. We’d be dead. Just like that. The tug operator certainly wouldn’t have had time to stop. And our grounding was so quick that we wouldn’t have had time even to jump off the boat and swim away.

So now that I’m saved and understand the sovereignty of God, His sovereign election of His sheep, I think about the fact that I am immortal till I am saved and immortal after that till His work through me is done.

I wasn’t saved until age 43. I am sure that incident on the Florida Intracoastal Waterway was not the first or only time I was nudged from a track of death to near-death. I often chuckle at the angels God must have sent to push me or pull me from this or that oncoming disaster so that I would remain alive until the appointed time of my salvation- and after.

Do you ever think about that? How God in His sovereignty keeps us alive until the appointed day of salvation and then afterward? And he does so for each and every of the 8 billion people on earth, saved or unsaved, future sheep or present goat. He orchestrates the moves of each person so He will receive maximum glory.

I’m sure if we ponder this for a while we will fall down in unabashed humility for God’s greatness.