This is one of the months with five Fridays. For today and months like this, we will focus on something a little different in our weekly email. In this email, the focus will be on Christian Missionary organisations and Military Christian organisations that God links AFCU to.
Today, we share a story from one of our members, Clive Langmead. Clive was the first Navigating Officer of Operation Mobilisation’s mission ship DOULOS from 1978 to 1982.
“I was running out of charts, my signal flags, hoisted, looked like wash day in downtown Naples, and my compass azimuth rings were bent. None of this was good.
I was the young navigator of the mission ship DOULOS, and we had just anchored off Santander in Northern Spain. With my wife and toddler son, we were on a ‘shake down’ cruise for Operation Mobilisation’s new eight thousand tonne ship, a seventy-year-old Italian liner just converted – yes, that was the word – into a ‘Christian mission ship’ intending to carry young people, books and conference facilities for churches around the world.
In a shipping company or the MoD, if you need equipment replaced, you put in a note, and it tends to turn up. Not so in OM. There, you have to pray for it.
“Nothing spare in the pot at the moment Clive”, said the dry-humoured German ex-banker who was the finance officer on board. “Perhaps you should call upon the heavenly ship chandler.” He smiled a half smile.
So I said prayers for flags, charts and new azimuth rings. Daft really. But all is not what it seems in the Kingdom of Heaven.
Santander is set in a beautiful bay, and we ran boats across it to get people on board for conferences and to take teams to churches to speak, visit local gaols, mend school roofs, etc. We also used our lifeboats to put 3,000 book titles ashore into a marquee, as we could not go alongside. We carried Christian, scientific, mathematical and children’s books. Indeed, the ship’s official charity was Good Books for All, with GBA written boldly in blue on our large white funnel.
The next day, the Chief Officer grabbed me and said we too were going ashore, not for books but to the ship breakers, which advertised its gloomy presence by a pall of black smoke drifting across the bay. I launched the No. 2 boat reluctantly.
As we approached, we could see the bright acetylene torches attacking the tall hulks lined up for slaughter. Cranes whined as they lifted great chunks of steel skyward. Blue water turned black and oily. I gingerly put the lifeboat alongside a filthy wharf.
The Chief pointed. “That tanker!” I turned to see her bow section hoisted up into the murk. “You take the bridge!”
I clambered hopefully up the ladder into the wheelhouse. The last ever to do so. But all useful fittings were gone. Sadly, I looked into the chart room. Lovely mahogany drawers, all to be smashed and burned. Sentimentally, I slid one open. It was full of charts! I pulled another. That was full too!
All the charts for the Atlantic and South America I needed. I bundled up fifty. How to carry? A bag. There must be a bag. I raced outside and tore open a cupboard. It was full of flags! Neat, clean, new. Quickly, I grabbed a large Dutch ensign, bundled it up and raced down the ladder. My bag of swag.
The Chief and I leapt for the greasy gang plank. Seconds later, the whole front of the ship was hoisted away. We wandered across the dock. I sat down on a gate valve, and he started poking around under a tarpaulin.
“Here!” He held up an azimuth ring. Then two. I stood up, stunned.
“Ah! But no way they’ll fit! So many…!”
He laughed. “Sperry Mk14!” Our compass.
“But this is all going to cost us hundreds…”
“No. They weigh it, like scrap.”
And they did. £10 the lot! (in Pesetas – that’s how long ago it was).
Well, I sometimes called her God’s warship because so often things were a spiritual or physical battle. Never a pleasure cruise! We worked hard. But God provided. If we did our bit. Usually, at the last minute, after a test of faith. Lessons for eternity.
We had many adventures – sailing up the Amazon, training my wife to launch a lifeboat, bringing up a young family on a floating home. An unforgettable time. Most of the crew were gap year students from over 35 countries. All volunteers with faith and vision to share for one or two years on board. Professionals like myself and unpaid volunteers saw ourselves as missionaries supporting them.
We returned to the UK after a number of years. I came ashore to answer a calling as a Christian writer and journalist, joining the RNR, as I still loved the sea. The Naval Christian Fellowship became a wonderful support to my family and me. And even at a desk back in the UK, I held onto the experience I had gained from those early DOULOS days.
That life, real life, should be a daring, though often risky, adventure with Christ!”
In 1984, Clive wrote a book, ‘Worse Things Happen at Sea’, which shares further stories from his time aboard DOULOS.
In addition, this summer, Operation Mobilisation’s ship LOGOS Hope is visiting the UK. The vision for Logos Hope’s UK tour is to create a sense of encouragement and renewal of the UK Church’s response to God’s call to make Him known here and around the world. For more information on where to visit LOGOS Hope this summer, go to their website.