Resources

NOW AVAILABLE!

On the Face of the Deep: The Sea in Scripture

Pre-release discount from Publisher:  Baker Academic

After May 27 also on Amazon and other online sources: Amazon

During the twenty years of sailing the Mediterranean, I began to read again the sea stories in the Bible, noticing in new ways how the Hebrew and Greek writers of scripture viewed the seas, and the people who, unlike the Israelites, were at home on the sea. The depictions, the assumptions, the perils and the promises of the seas are fascinating, for they tell us about the writers’ land-shaped, identity, faith, and their view of their sea-faring neighbors, and the profound changes that occurred as the land-lubbers and sea-people interacted. Western culture has been shaped by this interaction. The stories of Jesus, his disciples in the Gospels, and the fearless sea-farers of the early Christians beginning in Acts is the model for those of us living in the sea-like conditions of globalization.

On the Face of the Deep is the story from Creation to Revelation of the sea and its people. It is being published by Baker Academic Books, and is scheduled for release in May, 2026. It is available for pre-order now. For further description pre-order information, please see Amazon website. The book includes a number of my own personal encounters with the Mediterranean Sea and the people who live on and beside it that relate to the biblical sea-stories.  

Contents

NEW: BIBLICAL SEA SHANTIES ON THE FACE OF THE DEE: SEA SHANTIES ON THE BIBLICAL STORIES  – ALBUM AND STUDY GUIDE

The idea to compose biblical sea shanties was born aboard SailingActs in the Mediterranean to help understand and appreciate the sea people in the Bible  who do not get a chance to tell their side of the stories. The shanties I wrote, and which the singing group Cantore composed the music and recorded, are the stories told by the often misunderstood and unappreciated sea workers – sailors, pagans, villians, losers at the bottom of society.

For more information and purchase of the album and study guide, please see Bandcamp website.

SailingActs: Following an Ancient Voyage

The Apostle Paul was one of the first century’s great travelers, covering at least 12,000 miles by land and sea. On these journeys he was shipwrecked, imprisoned, and attacked as a Jewish believer in Jesus in the pagan Roman Empire. This dramatic story was recorded in Acts by Luke, who traveled with Paul almost 2,000 years ago. SailingActs is likely the first book – since the book of Acts – written by someone who actually sailed the routes of St. Paul.

In 2004, Linford and Janet Stutzman undertook a 14-month voyage aboard their sailboat, which they christened “SailingActs,” spending time in all 54 cities, 37 harbors, 9 islands that Paul visited mentioned in Acts.

Buying a grimy, junk-filled, aging 33-foot sailboat in Greece off the Internet, Linford and Janet moved aboard, and for six weeks cleaned and repaired the boat while delicately negotiating through the maze of Greek and US bureaucracy in order to complete the paperwork. Then they set off, logging more than 4,000 miles over two sailing seasons.

Stutzman’s detailed knowledge of the sociopolitical setting in the first-century Roman empire, combined with his own sometimes alarming, often hilarious and occasionally profound experiences, brings St. Paul’s journeys vividly to life.Amazon  

With Paul at Sea: Learning from the Apostle Who Took the Gospel from Land to Sea

Since the sabbatical voyages of 2004-05, Linford and Janet Stutzman have returned every summer to continue exploring the world of the Apostle Paul aboard SailingActs. Incorporating experiences, encounters, and insights that began during the sabbatical have continued in subsequent voyages, research and seminars, With Paul at Sea takes the reader into the first century world of the Mediterranean-centered Roman Empire, the precursor of twenty-first century of globalization. Like Acts, this is a first person account of exploration – the ruins, history, culture, myths, drama, violence, hopes and fears – of first century Romanization. Insights for navigating with confidence the storm-tossed and rising seas of today’s changing world are included throughout.

Suitable for both admirers and scorners of Paul and anyone else interested the achievements and relevance of the Apostle to the Gentiles including undergraduate and graduate students, Bible study groups, arm-chair adventurers, pastors, and theologians.