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Miracles within miracles!
First things first. Why are so many miracles recorded in the Scriptures? For us to be awed by the
all-powerful ways of Almighty God and spontaneously praise Him in the spirit of adoration! The very
purpose of our Creation is to worship Him (the very first declaration in Westminster Catechism,
which encapsulates Christian faith best, testifies to this fact). Oh yes, reading about miracles
also reinforces our
faith in Him, to deliver us from our difficulties. Now permit me to sidetrack
just a bit and visit the Cricket field!
One of the fascinating aspects of Cricket-essentially a team game- is that
it packages and presents contests within contests. Confused? Let me explain.
Let’s take the recent Indo-Australia series for example. Even while the crowds
were having their fill on watching the two mighty teams matching their sublime
skills on the field, discerning Cricket aficionados wouldn’t miss within the game,
development of an enthralling duel. A young tyro Ishant Sharma versus a seasoned campaigner
R. Ponting! The young pace bowling sensation in contemporary cricket pitting his skills
versus the best batsman in business and rattling him up provided for some lip-smacking
stuff for many a Cricket buff. Likewise old-timers would recall similar hi-voltage
contests within contests in Cricket history involving “Gary Sobers and D.Lillee”
(Rest of the World vs Australia in 1971), “Sunil Gavaskar and Malcolm Marshall”
(India vs West Indies in 1983) etc. All these bring me to the like sounding spiritual
theme …“MIRACLES WITHIN MIRACLES” (high time some readers might say).
A bit dazed once again? Permit me to clarify at the outset before expounding this subject,
further. We always praise God for many an awe-inspiring miracle in the Bible but have we
praised Him for some “silent” miracles within “thundering” miracles. Not so much for felling a
Goliath, as for silently “directing” the stone slung by the shepherd boy to its target!
In this essay, I want bring to the fore three such extra-ordinary Biblical
accounts under the following subheadings
- Gosh (en)! What a protected land without walls!
- Standing tall on a crumbling Wall!
- Precision bombing!
1. Gosh (en)! What a protected land without walls!
Goshen was the name of the district in which the Jews were penned (like sheep in a pen)
in Egypt during the times of Moses. Gosh! What a land within Egypt! Is how any first
time Bible reader would react on repeatedly coming across God’s special
protection of his special people living there, awaiting deliverance from slavery.
Now once again, permit me to visit the World of sports (boxing ring to be precise, this time)
to drive home a point (I never tire of reiterating the fact that God’s Word by creative study
needs to be enjoyed thoroughly).
Normally, in a boxing bout, before the killer blow arrives there are a few “softening blows”
which are anything but soft, setting up the stage for the final coup de grace. After that
the scene of the victor standing triumphantly beside the vanquished lying limp in the
canvas would invariably emerge. The fact of the matter is that the softening blows are
just as important as the knockout punch. Ditto treatment of cancer; the preceding cycles
of chemotherapy to root out the dreaded disease are just as vital as the final long session.
The Book of Exodus (Chapters 7-10)
records a series of “Divine softening punches” unleashed
on the hard-hearted Pharoah, before the knock-out punch in the form of killing of the eldest
offspring (Chapters 11-12) arrived. God “who donned the gloves” and fought on the “corner”
of His unarmed chosen ones’ (they obtained their independence without as much as raising
their little finger against their oppressors) in the Egyptian soil unleashed one softening
blow after another on the stubborn tyrant, who was hell bent on not releasing Jacob’s
descendents from the clutches of slavery. One such softening blow that preceded the
knockout punch was the biggest hailstorm in Egyptian history that hit the Nation of
Pyramids
(Exodus 10:23-26).
I am picking out and laying special emphasis on this
miracle in the series of miracles that occurred before and after it only to bring home
the fact that “silent miracles” do occur alongside “blaring” ones! While doubtless,
we are awed by God’s power in this miracle of whipping up a devastating hailstorm
that leveled all of Egypt, what about a silent miracle, which accompanied this boisterous
thunder, and lighting miracle? Verse 26 records pointedly “The only spot in all
Egypt without hail that day was the land of Goshen where the people of Israel lived”.
Talk of an invisible wall of protection around the land of Goshen, which had no physical
walls rising to the skies…
While, we may have praised God for the awe-inspiring miracle of unleashing
rip-roaring storm upon the cruel despot have we ever praised Him for this “silent”
miracle within the “thunderous” one?
Speaking of storms, there is that story of a storm of great intensity hitting the
high seas. It was so severe that the giant waves tossed the big ships about
like paper cups in a big bowl of water. A few days after surviving the tumultuous ordeal,
a captain of a ship was in a sailors’ party. When he related this frightening,
‘brush-with-death experience’ with one of his friends, who had been in a submarine
at almost the same place during the storm, the latter is said to have calmly quipped,
"What storm"? Several hundred feet below the raging waves, he and his crew in a
submarine had been in a serene world of their own.
A Jew of Moses’ times in the City of Goshen in Egypt waiting for “Divine liberation”
from the tyrannical Pharoah’s yoke might well have asked the question “What storm”
to his Egyptian acquaintance, when informed about the biggest hailstorm to have come
upon the Egyptian soil!
As stated before in this essay, we see repeatedly the pattern of God’s people being
insulated in the land of Goshen amidst God-ordained calamities in the Book of Exodus.
Before the hailstorm arrived, do we not see a similar pattern in the miracle of
“swarm of flies” infesting the land or the plague on livestock
(Exo 8,9). Later on,
was there not normal light in Goshen even as night like pitch darkness pervaded
rest of Egypt, - Exo10:21-23- and eventually even the case of death angel visiting
only the Egyptian homes on the Passover night was an example of preservation of
His chosen ones’ in the midst of devastation.
2. Standing tall on a crumbling Wall!
If Goshen without a wall was safe in God’s hands, then the city of Jericho
despite a robust wall around it was hapless before the marauding Joshua’s army
(Numbers 14:9),
which brings us to the Rahab story …to ponder awhile on yet another
miracle, not often talked about. Frankly, the Rahab’s daring faith and her subsequent
rescue and rehabilitation story (Joshua 2 and 6)
never ceases to surprise the Biblical
scholars. The more one digs into that, more are the insights representing a rare
treasure, waiting to be revealed.
So as the Jericho wall miraculously fell
(Joshua 6:20), where was Rahab? Since she knew
going outside her house at the time of conquest would be a breach of the covenant,
she had entered into with the spies (Joshua 2:17-21), she with her relatives shepherded into
the safety of the house were ensconced therein. Oh yes, there was a scarlet robe tied to the window,
hanging outside. At this moment, we can well imagine she with all her relatives waiting with bated
breath for the Jericho wall to collapse or be breached with battering rams and the city to be conquered.
In case, we have forgotten, where was her house? ON THE WALL!!! Look once again, at her amazing faith.
Stretching our imagination a bit, we can well visualize her relatives whispering into her ears, the
danger of remaining inside a house with a shaky foundation, but Praise God for her unshakable faith
at that time, even as she held fast to her oath of staying put inside her house. By faith she
knew that while the entire wall or a section of it surrounding the Jericho city would collapse,
that portion of it on which her house rested wouldn’t. That’s exactly what happened. Even as that
of others like Jericho wall itself collapsed like a pack of cards, her house as though in the
safety of His palm, remained untouched by the rumble all around! Hallelujah!
If felling of Jericho wall-again not a finger of his people of His people needed to be
raised- was a mighty miracle, then that of Rahab’s house standing tall amidst ruins was the
very definition of a miracle within a miracle. There it stood symbolic, as it were, of her
unshakeable faith, even as that of her city dwellers very much like their relationship with
the Lord lay in ruins.
Even as we praise God on reading the account of a crumbled Jericho wall, let’s not forget to
praise Him for Rahab’s house, which stood tall amidst ruins!
3. Precision bombing!
Joshua Chapter 10 records one of the most amazing Divine interventions ever during
a battle in human history. NO, NO, here at this stage, I neither intend to focus upon the
event of sun and moon stopping in their tracks, consequent to Joshua’s prayers (verses 12-15)
nor do I desire to focus exclusively here about the enemies dying on account of the hailstorm
(verse 11) which God unleashed upon the fleeing army. In the midst of these greater miracles’,
I want to focus upon a “silent miracle” that happened alongside them.
Also lets get straight some of the geo-historical aspects of this miracle, which happened when
Joshua and his men were engaged in a battle with five Canaanite kings
(Joshua 10:3-11).
Close to the scene of the battle at Gibeon was, Upper Beth-horon—about ten miles distant,
and approached by a gradual ascent through a long and precipitous ravine. This was the first stage
of the flight of the enemy forces, who realized as the battle progressed that they were no match to
Divinely strengthened Joshua’s army. The fugitives had crossed the high ridge of Upper Beth-horon,
and were in full flight down the descent to Beth-horon the Nether. The road between the two places
is so rocky and rugged that there is a path made by means of steps cut in the rock. Down this pass
Joshua continued his victorious rout. Here it was that the Lord interposed, assisting His people by
means of a storm, which, having been probably gathering all day, burst with such irresistible fury,
that "they were more which died with hailstones than they whom the children of Israel slew with the
sword." Just as it is recorded in Job 38:22-23,
sometimes God uses hailstorm to deadly effect in wars.
The Oriental hailstorm is a terrific agent; the hailstones are masses of ice, large as walnuts,
and sometimes as two fists; their prodigious size, and the violence with which they fall, make them
always very injurious to property, and often fatal to life.
So even as these “ natural bombs” from the skies were raining upon the fleeing army, has it
ever occurred to us, where were Joshua and his men? Chasing their enemies, they were certainly
not faraway! Now did these “Heavenly bombs” fall upon them? NO! Welcome to the age of precision
bombing! And those of us who think that precision bombing with guided missiles is a modern-day
invention would do well to revise our opinions. Doesn’t this miracle of hailstorm “not falling”
upon the chasing Joshua’s army awe us, as much as the miracle of it precisely hitting the
scampering foes does? A case of yet another miracle within a miracle! Hallelujah!
By now the readers would have gauged the underlying principle behind all of these miracles.
The one of God’s faithful preservation of the faithful ones’ amidst full-scale destruction!
Psalmist also shares this sentiment in Psalm 91:7-8.
What is the lesson these miracles’
(more than one, as though to underscore a point) hold for modern-day Christians living oh-so-close to
II Coming and subsequent tribulation? Having come under His saving grace, our present difficulties
(varying in degree from person to person) on Earth aside, we as a Church are guaranteed to be raptured,
as such taken away from a much more severe tribulation time ahead
(Rev 3:10)! As a Bible teacher
taking special classes’ on the Book of Revelation, I shudder sometimes, at the very thought of
terrible woes awaiting the disobedient world. A detailed study of tribulation woes
(Rev 6-19)
would also reveal their similarity to the Egyptian woes. For one thing in both the cases it was
just not one woe but a series of them. Also do not we see both of them gradually growing up in intensity?
That is the second similarity. Then what about their impact on the wicked? Again we notice a similarity.
Pharoah did not repent till the end and likewise nor would the wicked during the Tribulation time
(Rev 9:20-21,
16:11). No wonder our God is said to be an unchanging God
(Heb 13:8). Not only are His
ways of dealing with the wicked still the same (intensity of punishment always increases gradually)
but more importantly He is just as unchanging when it comes to preserving His faithful ones’
in the midst of calamities. If He has insulated His chosen ones from troubles in the past,
will He not keep up His promise of keeping us insulated from the fiery times ahead? Is this
not one more reason to praise our glorious Savior God?
HALLELUJAH…more loudly please. What price any theology, which doesn’t end with doxology!
(Suresh Manoharan)
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