Good morning,

A two-thousand-year-old boat at the Sea of Galilee reminded me that we’re called to a life of rigorous action.

But first, here is today's Texas Minute.

– Michael Quinn Sullivan 

Friday, March 13, 2020
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• Brandon Waltens examines what President Trump’s address on the coronavirus –the “most aggressive and comprehensive effort to confront a foreign virus in modern history” – means for the Lone Star State.
      
• It was announced yesterday that various school districts in the Houston area will keep their doors closed after spring break. For example, Fort Bend ISD is closing schools for two additional weeks. Other schools districts around the state are expected to make similar decisions in the coming days. 
   
• Liberal environmentalists are once again falsely attacking Texas’ oil and gas industry, despite evidence that the state has made wide improvements in recent years. Waltens reports that real-world facts undermine the story being pushed in the establishment media.
      
• Austin’s mayor is again frustrating citizens after his controversial decision to cancel the “South by Southwest” music and technology festival amid the coronavirus outbreak, but then encouraging city residents to hit the bars. As Jacob Asmussen reports, canceling “SXSW” is expected to have a $350 million impact on the area’s economy. The decision came after Facebook, Google, and other large tech companies announced they were backing out of the event to avoid exposing staff to the virus.
      
• Ironically, the city’s own public health department stated there is “no evidence that closing SXSW or any other gatherings will make the community safer.”
     
• So after canceling the event on the basis of health concerns about large groups of people gathering, Mayor Steve Adler, State Sen. Kirk Watson (D), and Travis County Judge Sarah Eckhardt (D) filmed a video encouraging Austinites to do all the things they would have done during SXSW. Adler said, “Now is the time that we should be going to restaurants, going to clubs, buying musicians’ merchandise, helping one another.”
      
• After all, someone has to support Austin’s community of leftwingers, progressives, and other socialists after Hollywood and Silicon Valley backed out...
      

• In a guest commentary, Dallas activist Troy Jackson writes that in the midst of the coronavirus scare we shouldn't panic but turn to Christ and His Word.
     

• “Fear hijacks our imaginations and discards facts, or at least focuses only on those facts that justify alarm. Getting stressed out about getting sick just puts you at more risk of getting sick.” – Troy Jackson

Friday Reflection

by Michael Quinn Sullivan

There’s a big difference between “ships” and “boats.” I learned that as a teenager, when a gentleman asked me why I wasn’t interested in joining the Navy. I told him I couldn’t imagine being stranded for six months on a boat.

He was a retired rear admiral, who – I later learned – didn’t take kindly to America’s mighty vessels being referred to as “boats” by a snotty kid from west Texas. He was right, of course.

But standing near the shore of the Sea of Galilee, I was pretty sure the admiral would agree we were looking at a boat. But not just any boat; this was the remains of an incredibly well-preserved 2,000-year-old fishing boat. It was the most common vessel one would have found sailing the waters just feet away.

The local tourist industry calls it the “Jesus Boat.”

To be clear, there is zero evidence the boat belonged to one of Jesus’ disciples. There is no evidence that Jesus ever set foot on the boat, or – for that matter – even laid earthly eyes on it.

Yet this boat gives us insight to the men who Jesus called into ministry. Renaissance paintings often depict the disciples as soft, slightly overweight men of advanced age. They appear almost grandfatherly. That’s not who would have been working these boats. They would have been tough, hard, strong men, accustomed to a rigorous – and often disappointing – work.

In other words: they were perfectly suited to Christ’s call even if a cadre of such men would have raised eyebrows among the more genteel people of the day (or in our day).

But that’s the thing: they were not called to genteel work. And neither are we. They were not called to a contemplative life, but one of rigorous action. They were not called to a life of earthly success, but eternal significance.

They had a choice to make: keep fishing, or become fishers of men. They abandoned what was known in exchange for the risky opportunity to be part of something bigger and more meaningful than themselves.

Just as they were asked and called, so are we. What will be our response?

It’s easy to prefer the safety of what we know, even if that’s a flimsy boat on a turbulent sea. Yet the greater risk is in ignoring the call of the Author of Creation in serving our fellow man.

We must answer Him, every day.