1999 Thomas Kinkade, Media Arts Group Inc., San Jose, CA

have always lived within sight of the Lighthouse.

My parents chose to dwell there, as had their

parents before them, and growing up I cannot

remember a time when my searching look was

not met by the Lighthouse's searching beam.

o I began crafting a boat. I kept my plans secret, though I occasionally noticed concerned glances from my parents when I would steal away to sand the sides of the craft, shape the curve of the stern, craft the secret compartments that would store my personal treasures. Nothing pleased me more than feeling the grains of the coarse wood in my hands, knowing that my boat would carry me away to whatever destiny I chose.

I was a young man when I finished the boat. I saw the way it gleamed with its fresh paint, not a stray mark or a single blemish. Perfect.

The evening finally came when my increasingly strong will was matched and beckoned by an increasingly strong wind, blowing out to sea. Wasting no more time, I loaded all my earthly possessions into my boat. I beamed with pride as I revealed the magnificent craft to my family.

"Isn't she lovely?" I asked, only to see them look upon it with heaviness in their eyes.

"She's capable of handling any storm that old sea can throw at her. I know. I built her myself."

Still, they said nothing. Instead they looked up to the Lighthouse, then to me, then back to the Lighthouse.

I pushed off into the surf. Soon the horizon swallowed my family and the Lighthouse from my view.

I steered around the jagged rocks and reefs as the storm gathered, darkness fell and ominous thunder began to rumble. I remember thinking how fortunate it was that I didn't have to return that way again. It was a difficult navigation at dusk. It would be deadly in the dark.

By the time I cleared the rocks and set my sail, the storm had reached frightening proportions. The waves smashing against the boat soon showered me with dark, dank water. Frantically I bailed the unwelcome waves. I could taste the despair of being lost at sea as plainly as I could taste the salt water battering my face. Impending death had become my shipmate, and he waited for the storm to overwhelm me. My possessions, once so dear to me, soon lost their value, and I traded them to the sea for greater buoyancy. The trading ended when my boat capsized, and I lost everything.

I can't explain what happened next without using the word miracle. It was as if the eye of the storm passed over me just long enough to let me right the boat, revealing its broken mast and single, dangling oar.

As the storm intensified again, I determined to use the lone oar as a paddle and looked around to get my bearings. There was only darkness--and a dim light in the distance. The Lighthouse.

Despite my unwavering drive to leave it behind, it still shone for me, its Light offering me a clear path to safety. For the first time in a very long time, I thanked God for the Lighthouse.

With renewed hope, I paddled feverishly toward the only Light in my life. Instead of resenting it, I now celebrated its omnipresence and power, its penetrating, revealing nature, its demand of my focused attention. The qualities that in the past had made the Lighthouse repulsive to me were now praiseworthy.

Just when it seemed I might make it back to shore on my own strength, my boat hit the rocks. As the work of my hands splintered into a thousand pieces, my drenched body sailed into the air, and I experienced one of those rare moments where time seems more like eternity. There, at the end of my strength, at the end of my ingenuity, at the end of my self, I called out to God to rescue me. Then I was immersed in the cold, dark, deadly water. The taste of salt and the pounding of the waves slipped away as I lost consciousness.

When I awoke, I was inside--I want you to understand--I was inside the Lighthouse.

canning the room, I noticed familiar faces.I saw

my parents, who apparently had never left the

shore but patrolled it faithfully there at the base of the

Lighthouse, praying I would return. I saw friends and

acquaintances whose devotion to the Light of this place

had drawn my disdain and cynicism in the past.

Now I understood, and was both sorry and thankful

for their unwavering commitment.

But not all the faces were familiar. Some had not been there when I began my journey and had not known my parents or friends until they had aided in my rescue. Yet their willingness to weather the storm, searching for those in need, now bonded them together.

In the days and weeks following my rescue, I became intrigued with the rescue patrol that combed the waterfront looking for miracles of grace, seeking others like me. With regularity they would drag sputtering sailors and swimmers and surfers from the waters and nurse them back to life, a new life given to them by the Lighthouse.

So impressed was I by the courage and purpose of the rescue patrol that I gave regularly of my time and treasure to help them continue. I cleaned the brine from their boots, mended their tattered clothes and prepared hot soup for their exhausted return. And over time I became one of the ones who cared lovingly for the Lighthouse, keeping its glass panes clean, its structure reinforced, its doorways and sidewalks well groomed and inviting.

One day I questioned Steve, who had assisted in my rescue.

"How much did you train to join the rescue patrol?" I asked. "It must be nice to be part of such a small, elite team."

He stopped, and looked at me intently. "It's not supposed to be elite," he said. "Or small." His eyes seemed to penetrate deep into my spirit.

"All who have been rescued are needed along the shore. There's a place there for all of us." He glanced down, away. "But most choose to stay inside the Lighthouse."

I was aghast. I found it hard to imagine that everyone could do the special work to which these heroes had been called. I looked out the open door through which Steve was about to walk and saw the raging wind and rain. Just as lightning flashed across his tear-streaked face, Steve invited me to come with him. He said he'd show me how I could help.

I broke free from his convicting gaze and stumbled back away from the door. Flashing across my mind were images of stormy terror, my splintering boat and endless dark water. I pictured desperate, clutching hands dragging me back into the water and down to the depths with them. I shuddered, my soul literally cowering inside me. It was the most fearful sense of oppression I had experienced since awakening in the Lighthouse.

Steve looked at me with understanding and compassion, but sadness. Then quickly, with urgency, he stepped out the door and raised his collar against the howling wind. Turning back to me one more time he said, "Maybe tomorrow then." He turned on his small light and strode boldly into the stormy darkness. In that moment I loved and admired him. I just didn't think I could be like him.

I turned to find the others who stayed in the Lighthouse gazing thoughtfully at me. They appeared sympathetic, like they wanted to help, but both they and I knew they couldn't. I hurried off to be alone and found myself at the base of the long spiral staircase that led to the beacon tower. The rescue patrol spent a lot of time up there, and since they were now combing the shores, I knew I could climb and be alone.

I passed the equipment and storage rooms and reached the beacon platform a little winded.

I had never been this close to the Light that had saved my life before, and it was not what I expected. Instead of being hot and harsh and unapproachable, I found the Light soft and warm and inviting. I paused with reverence as I remembered this Light was my personal Savior.

I noticed a pair of binoculars hanging on a bent nail. I took them and raised them to my eyes, adjusting their powerful focus to my own imperfect vision, which is peculiarly shortsighted in one eye and farsighted in the other. From the Lighthouse's vast illumination and towering perspective I could now see miles and miles, from the rocky coastline out to the storm-tossed sea. Down on the beach I saw a handful of smaller, swarming lights. I wondered which one was Steve.

0What I saw then shocked my eyes, broke my heart and awakened my spirit. As I looked out to the vast sea illuminated by the Lighthouse, I saw hundreds, no, thousands of floundering souls gasping for air and going under for the second and third times. There were shattered boats and grounded shipwrecks, people hanging on to slippery buoys and swimming in the wrong direction. Some, like me, had seen the Lighthouse and seemed to be swimming in the right direction. But it was clear they wouldn't make it on their own.

In that moment, my vision of the world, myself, my purpose in life, the Lighthouse--all changed. It didn't matter if I died. In a sense I had died already that first stormy night, and since then I had found my only real purpose in the Lighthouse.

But now I was discovering the purpose of the Lighthouse! It was salvation for the floundering, lost humanity that was me before I was saved!

And there was work to be done.

darted into the equipment room. I knew I

wouldn't be much help to the drowning people

unless I made some outward adjustments in equipment

to match the inward adjustment that had just taken

place in my heart. Intuitively I grabbed a rope, a life

preserver, a raincoat, a whistle. I threw open the lid of

an old chest simply marked "lights," and was again

taken back by what I saw. It was full of engraved,

personalized lights! Though each type of light was

different, I recognized every name. They were the

names of my friends downstairs--the people

who stayed inside the Lighthouse.

Frantically, I fumbled through the chest looking for my name. There were flashlights, lanterns, torches and floodlights. At last I caught the glimmer of my name engraved in brass, and my heart leapt at the sight, then was puzzled. It was a boat's headlight--for someone who no longer had a boat.

Feeling in my own heart the urgency I had sensed in Steve, I grabbed my light and rushed down the stairs, out the door and into the night. I reached the shore and hurried toward the first little light I saw. It was Steve. He looked exhausted, but somehow strengthened by the sight of me.

"We're glad you're here," he shouted with joy over the noise of the storm. "We've been praying for laborers. There are so many of them who are lost and so few of us ..."

I had numerous questions to ask Steve and felt so inadequate, but all of that paled in comparison to the need that was before us.

"I found my light!" I shouted back. "But I don't understand ..."

Steve looked at my headlight, then at me. His eyes were wide with awe and excitement.

"Come on, follow me!" he shouted. We ran up the beach a few hundred feet, then Steve led me to a small sheltered spot protected by a large rock.

"We just found this tonight," he shouted. "We have no idea how it got here."

There, nestled and preserved by the rock, was my boat, or at least one just like it. Without taking time to analyze, we mounted the headlight and threw the rest of my equipment in the boat. Then Steve pushed me out to sea.

My life preserver, my rope and my boat helped me pull one, then two, then four people out of the sea.

Back on shore, Steve and others helped them back to the Lighthouse that had been their true salvation, and I returned for another load.

That night we helped rescue 12 people. I had never felt more afraid, more alive, more significant and more purposefully active--until that night, and the next one, and the next, as I took my permanent place on mission with the rescue patrol.

ne night on our way back to the Lighthouse,

Steve and I marveled at the discovery of my

boat and the way I had been uniquely prepared and

equipped to actively join in the mission. I asked him if

he had ever seen the trunk full of engraved lights. He

said he had, but only on that first night of awakening

when he discovered his own personal light. Each time

he had returned, he found only his light in the trunk.

Yet one by one, he had watched others find their way

up the staircase, into the equipment room and onto

the shore.

"But we need more help now!" I exclaimed. "Can't we go back and persuade the others to come up the staircase and look inside the equipment room? Can't we tell them they have unique lights that can help in the rescue?"

Steve smiled. "There are lots of ways people are drawn to the mission of the rescue patrol. Some start in the equipment room, some come down to the shore right away. Others see the misery of those lost at sea, like you did, from the perspective of the Light. Right now there are more people who stay in the Lighthouse than join in the rescue. But that seems to be changing. Sure, let's go back and invite the whole Lighthouse crew to pick up their lights and join us. But do you know what I've always found most effective?"

"What?" I asked, curious and a bit impatient to empty the Lighthouse onto the shore.

"The same three things that we did before you joined us tonight. We stay close to the Lighthouse. We let our lights shine everywhere we go. And we pray passionately for more lights to come down from the Lighthouse and join us at the seashore."

Nate Adams is vice president of the Mobilization and Mission Education Group of the North American Mission Board, SBC.