Ice Cream, Austin and Costly Love

Yesterday included…

…popping into the Seagull Theatre, talking about ongoing projects, upcoming shows, a grant that will ease our cashflow. Most exciting – there’s to be a new ice cream supplier with a new freezer display cabinet!

…twelve-year-old grandson-Luca coming for tea… instructing me on some of the music he listens to… discussing the difference between those questions that have a right answer, and those that have many answers.

…praying with church friends for those going through tough times… discussing the meaning of ‘love’… reflecting on Jesus’ words: ‘Greater love has no one that this; to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.’

…watching the particularly depressing 10-o’clock news – Russian bombing, Columbian drug gangs, more Epstein files, the Suffolk serial killer…

But then there was thirteen-year-old Austin Appelbee…

Austin was with his mum, Joanne, brother Beau (12), and Grace (8), holidaying in Geographe Bay, Western Australia. Last Friday, before heading home to Perth, they were playing with two paddleboards and a kayak in shallow water. The children went out a bit too far, the wind picked up, they drifted out further, the waves got bigger…

Joanne couldn’t leave the younger children, so Austin took the kayak to get help. The kayak was damaged and capsized, Austin started swimming for the shore which was now 4km away.

Throughout the next two hours Austin says that it was prayer, Christian songs and ‘happy thoughts’ which kept him going. ‘I was thinking about mum, Beau and Grace…’

Eventually, after being in the water for four hours, an exhausted Austin made it to the shore. At 6.00 pm he phoned for help; rescue teams started searching.

At 8:30 pm, a search helicopter found the mum and two children wearing life jackets, clinging to a paddleboard 14 kilometres from shore.

Musing on my day and Austin Apelbee… holidays and ice cream… youth-full boys’ possible unforeseen dangers, yet potential of great things… the power of prayer in tough times… family love… what it is to ‘lay down one’s life’.