Leviathan

Job 41:1-10

1 Can you drag out Leviathan with a fishhook,

And press down his tongue with a rope?

2 Can you put a rope in his nose,

And pierce his jaw with a hook?

3 Will he make many pleas to you,

Or will he speak to you gentle words?

4 Will he make a covenant with you?

Will you take him as a servant forever?

5 Will you play with him as with a bird,

And tie him down for your young girls?

6 Will the traders bargain for him?

Will they divide him among the merchants?

7 Can you fill his skin with harpoons,

Or his head with fishing spears?

8 Lay your hand on him.

Remember the battle; you will not do it again!

9 Behold, your expectation is false;

Will you be hurled down even at the sight of him?

10 No one is so reckless that he dares to stir him;

Who then is he who opposes Me?

Circumstances have not met my expectations and I feel deeply frustrated and wounded at the fact that events have not occurred the way I thought they would. (Job 3:26) I have been blindsided by tragic events, am off center and reeling back from a sucker punch that came out of nowhere. I expected life would work out one way and it has taken an irrevocable change in direction that will lead to a destination that is nowhere I expected to go. I will make that change faster and more uncomfortably than I like, nor do I even want to go where it is leading. It is the White Whale, the Leviathan. (Job 41:1) Something with intent on my life’s destruction looms over me and has altered my path with no regard for my plans or expectations.

Captain Ahab is a man obsessed with the thing, the White Whale, that changed his life. The White Whale is his nemesis, an uncontrollable element of life that has left him lame and threatened his reality. Now Ahab is intent on destroying the thing that has broken him. Ahab's life was that of a whaler, sea captain and successful merchant. Now he is uprooted, physically changed, and the dominance he felt over his life’s direction is torn and changed by the will and force of an outside entity with a mind of its own. The White Whale intends to destroy Ahab and has the power to do so. (Job 41:10)

In the novel, Ahab’s obsession becomes the self-fulfilling prophecy that will result in his own death. The control he needs and wants over his own destiny and path is blocked by an ominous White Whale that he cannot control. A danger when facing tragedy is following Ahab’s path and obsessing over circumstances we have no control over and expectations that no longer fit with the station and trajectory of our lives. To follow Ahab’s path means we attempt to control the uncontrollable leviathan. We demand restitution for injustices that cannot be solved this side of eternity. We focus on our own White Whale and the obsession will lead us nowhere but the end of our days and/or sanity.

Is Ahab forced to obey this fate given by the White Whale? Are the control and answers he seeks from the leviathan even possible? Like a hand of cards that cannot be won, is Ahab forced to accept God's sovereignty and walk the path ahead despite his objections? Is the imperative to obey or die? When the New Testament gives us Christ's imperatives, is it demanding something we cannot do, or forcing us to a place we desperately do not want to go? Are God's commands a recipe for discouragement? Do this, don't do that. Go here but do not go there. Or is Jesus telling us to submit; to trust God, to let go of the White Whale.

Jesus is telling us that the White Whale of this fallen life and reality cannot be controlled by us and to pursue it with pride and indignance results in death. Jesus is telling us that like ink from a pen, obedience flows from our submission of expectations, failures, successes, tragedies and leviathans to His sovereign control. And in that act, we will be given rest, sabbath, a renewed Eden; tomorrow. Like Adam we are told to fast from ourselves today, so we can feast from His provision tomorrow. So when tragedy strikes like violent spurs, we are given the opportunity, the gift, the free gift, to relent our obsessions with the leviathan and lean into grace. And if we fail to do so, the brutality of tragedy, the ominous leviathan we cannot hope to control, conquer, or understand is the brick wall we dive headlong into when we do not submit; and Christ's imperatives are telling us there is an alternative to self-destructive obsession. Christ's imperatives tell us more than do this and don't do that. The underlying foundation of Christ's imperatives are to tell us to submit.

So yes, the pain and injustice of this life and reality are intent on our demise. It is the prescription we have been given because of our fallen illness. To obsess about it, to demand our will and wants is to argue with the very fabric of reality. It won't work. It cannot work. There is no personal mechanism to procure success. Only submission. Only the relaxation of will leads to rest. A rest that is real, provisioned and awaiting our arrival. And until we get there, we do not go on fruitless journeys to harpoon death, we submit to the one that gave us freedom from it.