"It's a miracle!"

The news was dominated at the end of last week by the amazing story of the US Airlines jet that crash landed into the Hudson river, right on the doorstep of densely populated Manhattan, with not one fatality. BBC reported: Captain Chesley Sullenberger was praised by New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg for his "masterful" landing. The state governor spoke of a "miracle on the Hudson".
The same day I read a news article about a couple who, with medical help, had been able to conceive after the husband had undergone cancer treatment that would normally prevent the couple from conceiving. Again, It’s a miracle! was their response.
Now without wanting to read too much into those spur of the moment exclamations, it does make me think that in those extreme moments of personal vulnerability, when there is an unlikely turnaround, there seems to be an inbuilt response of gratitude that sees something more significant than ‘good luck’. Fatalism (or more precisely determinism) even in good situations, won’t quite do. There’s a sense that something or someone is acting kindly towards them.

As economies wobble and people face uncertainties of all kinds, I do believe that it causes us all to dig a little deeper into the meaning of it all – and the significance of our lives. It’s not that religion is a crutch or the opiate of the people that dulls the senses, quite the opposite! In the words of C S Lewis, God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world. With so much spurious noise going on all around, I am convinced that it is God’s desired intention to break through, to still our storms, and thus gain the attention of a generation that badly needs to be awakened to His presence and purpose without which, there is no meaning.

Goff

By the way – I do apologise for getting out of routine with my Blog. I do intend to get back to writing it weekly, Sunday afternoon! Having said that, this weekend I shall be in Germany taking a weekend for Newfrontiers’ leaders, so I shall try to Blog a few words from Germany!