And it immediately arrived at the shore
Space and time are the two fundamental dimensions to which our life and everything in it are inextricably tied. Space and time determine the pace and the way we live much more than what we normally think. Space is the dimension that facilitates or forces us to nearness or distance, to separation or encounters. Time is the dimension providing the daily pace of the distance and separation between desire and realization, intentions and choices, projects and execution.
When Jesus gets on the disciples' boat, the dimensions of time and space are united, or better still, time and space collapse together changing their density and significance: but the boat immediately arrived at the shore to which they were heading. The text says Eutheòs, "immediately, instantly.” Immediately tells us about the dimension of time, time that in the presence of Jesus becomes the entire present, the only one that exists. There is no longer life in the past or in the future. Loving and believing in the power of the present removes the strength of the time dimension that separates desire from realization, intention from choice, the desire to escape from the rough sea and to arrive safe and sound at the shore. With Jesus in the boat, the time dimension yields immediately to desire, instantly, without waiting, without delay. With Jesus in the boat and in our hearts, we do not have to wait, time has finally become timely. The boat arrived at the shore tells us about space, the dimension of things, people, ideas, and situations. The boat, the living space, the relational space, the emotional space, the working space with which we cross the world and life, is what it is; it is what we have found and which we have been forced to accept or to adapt. The boat represents the mental space, the organizational, cultural, physical, economic space we are moving in. Letting Jesus and His procedure on the boat of life and the heart transforms every boat, even the one we are using to cross the stormy sea of life and its events, into a useful space that is extraordinarily effective and powerful to fulfill our desires and God's desires for us. The disciples' boat is not a an extraordinary boat, but preciesly because they loved it and used it, understood and lived it in the present, with Jesus on board, it becomes the most functional means to achieve their desire to reach the shore, to overcome their fear and to be safe.
The shore to which they were heading tells us about the direction established by desire, in this case the desire to reach safety away from the stormy sea. It is always desire that creates direction, creates the journey, the itinerary, not the opposite. It is the discovery of the treasure in the field that overturns life as nothing else can, changing the balance, suggesting objectives, organizing the mind and feet, creating and motivating projects, routes, perspectives, choices, dedication. It is the desire to get to shore and to be safe that bends the rudder, creates the ship's wake in the sea and establishes the intensity and density of time. Fear dilates seconds to thousands of years, love transforms years into minutes.
When we live with Jesus, time, space and desire collapse in a present almost unknown to us, a present full of love and tenderness, light and help. It is the present of God’s providence, of divine presence. It is in God’s present that space and time no longer have the strength to squeeze our minds and our emotions towards competition, to fear of losing, to holding on, and the poison of attachments.