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The Waves of Contention

Just recently I was on a small ship in Chesapeake bay on a cold, blustery, windy day. I looked out and saw the wind picking up the whitecaps and I was reminded of an experience I had some years before.  I was on a voyage to the Antarctic with my wife and others. We reached Cape Horn, the very southern tip of South America. The captain announced that he was going to hold up for a while before jumping off into the Drake passage, because there was a storm out at sea. 

We all went to bed that night and slept peacefully. Then sometime around 3 or 4 o’clock in the morning I was abruptly pitched out of bed. When I came to my senses, I realized that the ship was pitching and rolling in a manner that I had never ever experienced. I felt instantly sick. I pulled on my clothes and ran for the highest deck that I could find. As I passed one door to the outside I observed that it was chained shut with a warning not to go out on deck. I later learned that winds over the deck were above 80 MPH.  When I reached the enclosed top deck, I looked out over the bow. Waves above 30 feet high, were crashing over us.  The ship would rise on the crest, and then plow into the troughs. It was spectacular and sickening. 

We endured those stormy seas all through that day. A great number of the passengers, including myself, became ill. I watched people moving up and down the companionways bouncing off the bulkheads. No one could walk a straight line.  People were throwing up all over the ship. It was a terrible day at sea-the worst I had ever seen. 

All of this caused me to reflect on President Russell M. Nelson’s April 2023 talk about peacemakers. He said,

“Contention drives away the Spirit—every time. Contention reinforces the false notion that confrontation is the way to resolve differences; but it never is.” 

He went on to encourage the choice of charity. 

Anger, contention, and social bitterness, are like the stormy seas of mortal society. And so hot and powerful are the strong winds of hate and incivility today that the waves are running high and we as a global society are all made sick and sick of it nigh unto death. 

Have you ever marveled at the peace and calm of waters as still as glass? No wind—No waves—just stillness. 

Someday this earth will become as a sea of glass and only those who calm their soul and hold their tongue will find place in that heavenly world. 

Let it start with me.