Coming to Terms With a Shark

At some point, we'll all have a difficult experience, a time when we're hard-pressed to either quit or hang in there. The answer isn't always easy to come by: how do we really know when enough is enough? Well, a few years back I was put in just such a predicament: I was fishing in my kayak when I caught a large Thresher Shark. 

Fishing for sharks in a kayak may seem a bit over the top, and it is. I had seen pictures on the internet of guys who caught Thresher sharks in their kayaks, and thought to myself, That's just plain crazy. I would certainly never do such a thing. Yet that picture above is no fake: I ended up being one of those guys. How exactly did that happen?

Well, it wasn't exactly my choice. At the time, my wife and another couple from our church had been invited to travel to India for a Pastor’s Conference. We would be gone for two weeks, and I had one day off before we left, so I jumped at the chance to go fishing.

I launched out of Dana Point Harbor early that morning.  I was planning to fish for halibut up against the kelp near Salt Creek beach.  My fellow yaker wasn't able to join me, but I went out by myself anyway. Going out by yourself isn't necessarily a bad idea, unless you're about to catch a shark. Then it very much is a bad idea. 

It was a beautiful day out: sunny, clear, not too much wind. It was a good day for fishing. But the problem with fishing it's sometimes it's just that: fishing, with not a whole lot of catching going on. But I stayed out, paddling around, dropping my line in different spots, and by the early afternoon I was ready to head back, with at least a forty-five minute paddle back to the harbor.

I planned to troll as I made my way back.  (For those of you who are unfamiliar with fishing terminology, "trolling" is when you drop a "lure" (a fishing hook concealed by what looks to be a small fish or squid) behind your boat/kayak as it's moving. The lure is attached to your fishing pole, and while dragging behind you, the lure looks like live, swimming bait.) I have this lure that looks just like a squid and I thought, Hey, there could be a White Sea Bass lurking around here. I attached it up to my rod with 60 pound braid and a 30 pound leader and started paddling to shore. 

No sooner had I gone but a few yards off the kelp when something big hit the lure. It was so big, in fact, that it turned my kayak around. The fight was on. 

I smiled as I thought, That's a big enough White Sea Bass for dinner plus lots to give to others.  This fish was clearly big, as it began to drag the kayak away from the kelp and out to sea.  As I continued to try and reel it in, and it continued to pull me out, I soon realized that this was a little bit bigger than a White Sea Bass. Maybe it's a Black Sea Bass, I thought, which have been known to get up to several hundred pounds.

I tried my best to bring the fish up to the kayak, but as soon as I would make any headway, the fish would just peel off another couple of yards of line. There were even times when I couldn't even lift my pole from the edge of the kayak, and I was just being dragged around with no real control at all. 

After about an hour of fighting, I was done. I was completely exhausted. I felt like I wasn't getting anywhere, and was just about to cut the line and let it go. But I figured that I would give it one more push, so I tightened down the drag as much as I could and attempted to turn the reel. 

And as soon as I did that, the fish stopped fighting. All of a sudden I was reeling it in. The line hadn't snapped: I could feel the weight of the fish on the other end– it had just given up. In a few minutes it was just under my kayak, and I saw what had happened. The lure had hooked the tail of the fish, a very long, whipping tail, and I realized I had a Thresher shark.  

The shark was still very much alive and the thought of wrestling him up into the kayak or dragging him back to the harbor did not appeal to me at all.  I looked around. A few hundred yards away I saw a small private boat whose engine had just started. I yelled and the boat came over. After a few minutes, the two guys agreed to drag the shark back to the harbor and leave it at the dock where I had launched from.

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There are times in our lives when events seem to just take control and drag us around.  We can be positive at first, but as it continues on and we are get nowhere, we reach the point when we are ready to give up.  How do you know whether it is time to cut the line or keep fighting? 

The writer of the Book of Romans says that if we are believers in the Lord we should “be led by the Spirit.” He is making an appeal that we should consider what the Scriptures teach in light of what we are facing.  The Spirit of the Lord would never contradict the Scriptures, as He is the author of the same.  Too often our response when worn down is to just do what feels right, or lean on our own understanding. It is only later that we suffer the consequences of our actions. By doing the right thing we can often find ourselves surprised by the Lord, as He provides for us in the most unique way.  

The same author also wrote in another letter that “...the Lord provides a way of escape out of every trial or temptation.” There was no way I was going to get that fish back to the harbor and eventually onto the many tables of thankful folks at our Church. Rather than giving up, I chose to fight on, and then once I did, I found that the fight was over. I had won. 

Are you fighting what seems to be an endless battle?  Don’t give up, look to the Lord and the Scriptures, they will make a way for you. 

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