Haven

A haven is a harbor or sheltered anchorage for ships, mentioned in both the Psalms and the New Testament. Psalm 107:30 uses the image of God bringing sailors "unto their desired haven" after a storm as a picture of divine deliverance, and the whole Psalm celebrates God's rescue of various travelers from danger — the desert wanderer, the prisoner, the sick, and the sailor — all brought to their destination by God's mercy. The haven is thus a figure for God's saving purpose reaching its completion.

In the New Testament, the account of Paul's voyage to Rome includes specific harbor references: the harbor of Fair Havens (Acts 27:8) on the south coast of Crete, where the ship Paul sailed on paused before the disastrous attempt to reach Phoenix for the winter. Paul warned against continuing the voyage (Acts 27:10), but the centurion followed the pilot's advice and they sailed into the storm that ultimately wrecked the ship on Malta. Ezekiel 27:3 describes Tyre as situated "at the entry of the sea, a merchant of the people for many isles" — a key haven in ancient Mediterranean trade.