Flotsam: Webster's Dictionary defines this word as the "floating wreckage of a ship or its cargo; miscellaneous or unimportant material."
Jetsam is likewise described as "The part of a ship, its equipment or its cargo that is cast overboard to lighten the load in times of distress and that sinks or is washed ashore."
Why the interest in these two words? What is even the difference? While flotsam is by definition broken or useless junk, jetsam is the stuff that we not only do not need but also weighs us down. We all have flotsam floating around in our lives, bumping up against the shore of our hearts, lingering and left over from heartbreak, broken families, lost friendship and others. Who among us can claim freedom from wreckage? We are all damaged in some way. Flotsam is the result of the shipwreck that sin made of life. We can and do claim healing from that through our Savior Jesus Christ, and He can a does build us a new boat, a new body, and a new mind.
Jetsam, on the other hand, is of our own doing. Our ship, the body that we willingly gave over to Christ as His temple, is used often as a storage unit for those things that are not pure. We take in information, sights, smells, physical or mental pleasures that do not please God. We absorb so much of what the world has to offer and we put it in our minds, which feeds the sin that we hate. We take on cargo that weighs us down and attracts all of the nasty little creepy-crawlies, all the disease-ridden rats, and all the stowaways, all of which consumes our resources and defiles our wares. With every stumbling block that we do not avoid, with every look at that porn site, with every fit of selfish rage, with every idol that we place before God, we take on weight that will distress us and will slow our passage to the Lord. Because that is what we strive for, audience with the Lord.
He calls us to take up our crosses and follow Him. He does not call us to load it with jetsam and carry it, heavier, to Him. That's no sacrifice, that's fruitless and unfulfilling work. Jesus, in His death, killed and made void every bit of sin that every one of us has and ever will commit. Why then do we willingly step into bondage with those sins that by Jesus' blood have no power over us? Those chains that you carry are not meant to be carried anymore by you. You have been claimed in victory by God and are no longer bound to the sins of your flesh.
What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? Certainly not! How shall we who died in sin live any longer n it? Or do you not know that as many of us as were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death? Therefore we were buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in the newness of life. - Romans 6:1-4
Do you not know that to whom you present yourselves slaves to obey, whether of sin leading to death, or obedience leading to righteousness? Romans 6:16
For when you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness. What fruit did you have then in the things of which you are now ashamed? For the end of those things is death. But now having been set free from sin, and having become slaves of God, you have your fruit to holiness, and the end, everlasting life. For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. - Romans 6:20-23
Be free. Throw your jetsam out of your life and be free in God's peace.
God bless.
