A Concern about the Doldrums

In the days when ocean vessels were driven by wind and sail, nothing was so feared by seamen as the doldrums.

The “doldrums” is a popular nautical term that refers to the belt around the Earth near the equator where sailing ships sometimes get stuck on windless waters.

Known to sailors around the world as the doldrums, the Inter-Tropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ, pronounced and sometimes referred to as the “itch”), is a belt around the Earth extending approximately five degrees north and south of the equator. Here, the prevailing trade winds of the northern hemisphere blow to the southwest and collide with the southern hemisphere’s driving northwest trade winds.

Due to intense solar heating near the equator, the warm, moist air is forced up into the atmosphere like a hot air balloon. As the air rises, it cools, causing persistent bands of showers and storms around the Earth’s midsection. The rising air mass finally subsides in what is known as the horse latitudes, where the air moves downward toward Earth’s surface.

Because the air circulates in an upward direction, there is often little surface wind in the ITCZ. That is why sailors well know that the area can be calm for sailing ships for weeks. And that’s why they call it the doldrums.¹

The American Heritage Dictionary gives three definitions of this word:

• A period of stagnation or slump;
• A period of depression or unhappy listlessness;
• A region of the ocean near the equator, characterized by calms, light winds, or squalls.

The word has its etymological roots in Middle English, originally having the idea of being dull.²

Interestingly, the Bible portrays the wind as a symbol of the Holy Spirit, and our Lord employed the illustration of the blowing of the wind as representative of the Spirit’s ministry in John 3. Thus, it is both biblically and geographically correct to say that when the wind does not blow, we are in the doldrums.

In my itinerant ministry, I have observed and am concerned that there are American believers and churches that are seeing little of the moving of the Spirit of God in their midst. While there may be a dispensational element involved relating to the prophesied apostasy of the last days, God’s people in all ages should be known as being Spirit-filled and thus Spirit-empowered servants of Christ. So why are some experiencing spiritual doldrums? Here are possible reasons why:

• When we do not habitually experience the Holy Spirit’s filling, we end up walking after the flesh.
• When we do not have a sensitivity to the Spirit’s conviction because of a hardness of heart, we stay too long in the deadness of sin and worldliness.
• When we hinder the working of the Spirit in our evangelism by grieving Him and depending upon our own abilities, conversions will be absent.
• When we do not seek the illumination of the Spirit in our minds and hearts, we become shallow in our understanding and presentation of the Scriptures.
• When believers individually and churches corporately are not listening to the voice of the Spirit of God, missionaries will not be called and, thus, will not be sent with the Gospel.

How important it is that those of us who know Jesus Christ, and have the Holy Spirit living in our lives, allow Him to use His Word to breathe fresh power into our lives and ministries. Perhaps you are going through a time of spiritual “stagnation or slump,” a time of “depression or unhappy listlessness.” If so, the need is to make sure you are dealing with sin in your life, to ask Him to renew you in the Word of God and to empower you for life and service. The need is not a second work of grace or an intensification of human effort, but rather, a return of our hearts to faith and submission to the Word and Spirit of God. Lord, deliver us from the doldrums!

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Dr. Bud Steadman is the Executive Director of Baptist World Mission.

1. What are the doldrums? (noaa.gov).  See also: The Intertropical Convergence Zone (nasa.gov). [↩]
2. American Heritage Dictionary Entry: doldrums (ahdictionary.com). [↩]