by John Emery
John Emery was a colleague of Mike Andrews at John Fluke Mfg. Co. in Everett, Washington. Both men posted frequently to net.religion.christian in November 1985, sharing their faith with a fledgling digital community. Where Andrews wrote personal testimony and practical theology, Emery occasionally turned to allegory — the older mode of Christian teaching.
This parable, posted November 26, 1985, is a complete and careful allegorical retelling of the Christian account of creation, providence, free will, and salvation. The great ship is the created world; the captain who built it with his father and guides it from a hidden cabin is Christ; the speaker in each passenger's cabin is the Holy Spirit; the guardrails are divine moral law; the final destination is the heavenly kingdom. Those who jump into the waters have chosen the world over the captain's voice. The allegory is not original to Emery — the ship metaphor has deep roots in Christian tradition, from Origen's ark to Ignatius of Antioch's image of the church as a vessel — but this version is his own, composed and posted to strangers on the early internet as an act of quiet faith.
This is the story of a captain of a very large ship. This ship sails through many rough waters and endures countless stormy nights. The passengers are many and the room aboard is plenty. The people aboard are from every walk of life. Everyone on board has a one way ticket. The ship sails on day and night and the passengers have only heard of the destination.
Yes, once long ago, the captain showed himself to the fathers of the passengers and told them face to face about the beautiful, wonderful place that the ship was heading towards. Since then the captain has not been seen because he is busy keeping the ship on course. Yet each passenger has his very own cabin with a speaker in it. That captain talks to each passenger over the speaker even though not all of the passengers listen. He speaks to the passengers to comfort them, especially during the storms and to give them hope and encouragement about the ship's destination.
The captain's father designed the ship and the captain himself helped his father build it. There is much room aboard the ship for the passengers to move about freely. Aboard the ship the passengers can do anything they please and go anywhere they wish. The captain's father built guard rails around the ship to prevent any passenger from falling into the waters below in case one of them went too far towards the edge of the ship.
There is a sad part to this story. Many of the people aboard do not trust the captain. They ignore his voice over their cabin's speaker. Some feel the captain is lying to them about the destination, believing he is guiding them in the wrong direction. Others do not have faith that the captain is able to keep the ship on course. Still others believe that their fathers made up the story about the captain and that the ship is just sailing by itself. They believe this even though the ship survives countless stormy nights. "It is only by chance we survive," they claim.
Some of these passengers change. They start listening to the captain's voice and to the people aboard who trust the captain. Others eventually climb over the guard rail and jump into the waters thinking they can make it on their own, never to be seen or heard from again.
One day the ship will reach its destination. By the time it gets there, only those who listened to and trusted the captain will be left. All the others will have jumped off the ship, lost forever. The captain will then show himself to the remaining passengers and take them by the hand off the ship into their new home. They will never have to worry about stormy waters again. They will finally meet the architect of the ship, the captain's father.
John Emery
Colophon
Written by John Emery, John Fluke Mfg. Co., Inc., Everett, WA. Posted to net.religion.christian, November 26, 1985. Message-ID: [email protected].
A complete original allegory composed and shared on the early internet. The ship metaphor for the created order has roots in Patristic Christianity (Origen, Ignatius of Antioch, Tertullian), but this version is Emery's own — written as an act of lay evangelism in the first months of Usenet's Christian community. The allegory's identification of the captain's hidden voice with the Holy Spirit speaking through an internal speaker (the conscience or indwelling Spirit), and the guardrails with divine moral law, reflects mainstream evangelical Trinitarian theology rendered in contemporary terms for a technical audience.
Preserved from the Usenet archive for the Good Work Library by the New Tianmu Anglican Church, 2026.
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