In 1997 a cargo ship was overwhelmed in a significant storm just off the Cornish coast near Marazion. On board was almost five million pieces of Lego and for almost 30 years an assortment of pieces have been washing ashore on or near Marazion beach.
Among the discarded cargo were 352,000 pairs of flippers, 97,500 scuba tanks, and 92,400 swords – but black octopuses are the most prized objects as only 4,200 were on board.
Interest in the Lego pieces see beach comers come from far and wide to scour for different pieces and gradually add to their collection – it also helps clean the beach!
News broke this week that a 13-year old boy, Litaurus, from Cornwall found the rare black octopus after two years of searching. It’s not the only piece he has – his collection of Lego pieces from the sunken ship has now reached over 800!
Liutauras said he was “happy” to have found the rare octopus after years of searching. “We’ve been looking for that octopus for two years, it’s not easy to find. We were not expecting to find it at all because it’s very rare,”
Liutauras says his next goal is to find one of the 33,941 dragons that also toppled into the water thirty years ago!
This theme of searching, looking and finding is something that we find all over the Bible. We think of the parables of Jesus and especially the Lost Coin, Lost Sheep and the Lost (Prodigal) Son as key examples.
But I wonder also if the journey of the disciples was a process of finding things that challenged and changed who they were.
In our reading from Acts 10 this week, we see that Peter makes a new and profound discovery about the power and reach of the love of God through the Holy Spirit being poured out upon all those who heard him speaking. He realises that what he had received was not to be contained and restricted to a select group, but was for all people. His eyes were opened to a bigger, more generous, more compassionate God than ever he thought possible.
Again, in our Gospel reading we perhaps see it through the words of Jesus when he says we are ‘ to love one another as I have loved you.’ I wonder whether at times we can lose the power of that statement and that in our interactions with one another it’s love, but not as Jesus loved.
Might we need to invite the Holy Spirit to fall upon us again so that we find what we might have lost? It’s not as rare as the black octopus, but it is so much more precious and needed.
May God help us in our searching not to give up and to be open to re-finding the precious gifts he gives to us and the command he places upon us to share freely and generously with others.
Revd Paul