Tag Archives: God-incidence

God Arranges a Life-Saving Coincidence

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“Hey, Chuck!” I yelled above the noise in the cockpit of a well-used, older Helio single-engine bush plane.
“Look! Up ahead, to the right, is that a road down there?”
The pilot banked the plane slightly to see where I was pointing. Sure enough, it was a road—at least the beginning of one—where no road had ever been since God created the Amazon rainforest.

After leaving the Wycliffe Bible Translation centre near Belem, we had flown for three hours on a straight course for the Canela village, 600 kilometres to the southeast. From a height of three kilometres, the trees, reaching up from five to ten stories high in the vast jungle, looked like broccoli.

A new road was being hacked through the thick jungle starting at the Belem-Brasilia highway and going east. Chuck reported it to the operator at the mission centre right away, and carefully drew the road on the map on his lap, happy to add another checkpoint. Good thing he did. Toward the east, the road quickly ended in a bulldozed trail, which petered out into a thin line cut by surveyors.

Four hours after taking off from Belem, the Helio STOL (Short Take-Off & Landing), bush plane skittered to a stop on the mini airstrip alongside the Canela circular village.  Jo and I unloaded quickly, as hundreds of our friends came running to see the plane take off. Chuck flew a half hour to Barra do Corda to refuel the plane, stay overnight, and fly back to Belem in the morning with a missionary family as passengers.

Two days later, the early morning short-wave radio contact told us that the Helio had crash-landed safely on a bulldozed trail on the way back to Belem. Jo and I looked at each other and exclaimed, “That new road! Another God-incidence!”

We both knew that a small plane crashing into that thick jungle is almost impossible to find. Those giant jungle trees close over the crash site. Another pilot later told us that when a small plane crashes in that jungle, the site is not found until days later when circling vultures indicate the presence of dead bodies far below.

A month or so later, we heard the full story. Chuck had taken off from Barra do Corda with his passengers, climbed on course and all was well for about an hour. Then, suddenly, a loud bang startled everyone, the engine shuddered, rattled and quit.

Chuck at once made a thrice-repeated MAY DAY emergency call reporting an imminent crash into the jungle. It was picked up by the centre operator and the international airport in Belem.

He was near the survey cutline for the new road. Turning west to follow the cutline both the pilot and the missionary family prayed that God would keep the powerless plane gliding long enough to reach the bulldozed trail. When it was in sight, he assured the radio operators that he planned to crash land safely at a slow speed. Losing altitude and slowing down constantly, he glided the Helio to land on the roughly bulldozed track. The trees damaged the wings and broke radio contact, but the cabin stopped safely, with no one hurt. Thank you, Jesus!

Chuck asked the road-building crew to give his passengers a ride on one of their trucks to the main road where they could flag down a bus to Belem. He stayed with the wrecked plane until the next day when a fellow pilot arrived with a salvage truck to haul it back to Belem.

For many years, a piston from that plane’s engine sat on my desk—pieces of the broken valve still jammed in the scarred top. It was a mute reminder that God still arranges His coincidences, especially in the spiritual battle for the souls of the Canela people. Yes, there could be serious damage and the possibility of casualties, but God always has the final word.

This is an excerpt from the memoir of the Canela decades Jo and I are currently writing. I will share more stories of God-incidences over the next few months.
This true story was created with 100% human content. (No Artificial Intelligence was used.)

From Ice Cream to Cash in Hand

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From Ice Cream to Cash in Hand

Cash is King
One of our concerns was having cash on hand when driving back from the village to Belem, usually a three-day trip. Credit cards were not common, so cash was king to buy fuel, food, lodging, repairs, etc. Because the inflation rate was so high, we could not take along enough cash from Belem for a two or three-month session in the village since we would lose  25% of the value in that time. So, we brought only enough to get us there. When we were ready to leave, we withdrew some money from our account in the bank in Barra do Corda. Money in the bank received inflation adjustments so was safe.

One day, about a week before leaving for Belem, I had to make a quick trip to Barra to buy medicines to treat a very sick Canela boy. I spent the last bit of cash on the meds and some food to take back to the village. I stopped by the bank to withdraw money from my account to cover our travel expenses back to Belem. I liked having travel cash in hand in case we needed to travel on the weekend when the bank would be closed.

Sorry! No Money!
When I walked up to the bank door, however, I was dismayed to find the bank closed, even though it was the middle of the week. A note on the door stated it would be closed for ten days or more since the bank was out of money.
I prayed, “Lord, you are our Provider, and you know Jo and I need cash to travel back. This is not a surprise to you. Please help us.”

In Trouble? Eat Ice Cream!
I stopped for some lunch at a small restaurant, and for dessert, I ordered some ice cream. Ice cream was a relatively new luxury since Barra had been on the electric power grid for only a few years. The owner, however, said, “We don’t have any ice cream left. We only buy small quantities since we never know when the electric power will go off, and our ice cream melts.

God’s Reminder
Then I remembered! Many years before, in our old village house, we had used a small gasoline-powered generator but now in our new wooden house, we were using battery-operated lights and had stored the generator. So, I said, “What you need is a small backup generator. I happen to have one which I no longer use. Would you want to buy it?”

Happiness All Around
“Yes, I do!” he said, and we agreed on a price. I picked up the generator where I had stored it at the nearby MICEB mission campus and delivered it that same hour. He paid me in Brazilian currency, which solved my cash problem.

Yet Another God-Incidence!
As I drove back to the village, I mentally went over the amazing set of coincidences. Within minutes of the distressing bank closure situation and my prayer for help, I happened to order ice cream. Seconds later the solution appeared, and within an hour, God supplied the cash I needed. “Thank you, Lord, for arranging this God-incidence.”

This is an excerpt from the memoir Jo and I are currently writing covering our decades-long translation ministry among the Canela people of Brazil.
Working Title: From Adventure to Spiritual Warfare

 

 

An Insightful Grandson and an Angry Chief

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The First Story
If you have done repairs to a loose kitchen sink you will know what suffering is. As you lie on your back, the edge of the under-sink-cabinet floor causes excruciating pain as it tries to pry apart your vertebrae. You are peering up into semi-darkness, holding a flashlight in one hand, the other feeling for the loose under-the-sink bolt, and needing a third hand to find the tools lying on the floor beside you. In the meantime, bits of grit and dust keep falling into your eyes.

I had been in that position for much longer than I wanted to be, and still, the job was not done. Just then, Ryan, our oldest grandson who had observed my torment for some time, made an insightful comment for a young teenager.
“You are not very good at fixing this kind of thing, are you, Grandpa?”
“No, I’m not, Ryan. My back hurts, and I hate working way up above my head, with dirt falling into my eyes.”

He then made another perceptive comment.
“But later on, Grandpa, you’ll be able to write a great story about this. It’ll be a really funny one.”

Yes! That I could do. Ryan and the other grandkids had heard me tell hundreds of true stories about all kinds of adventures and hard times—many with funny and always encouraging endings.
I remembered that sink fixing episode today as I researched my 1987 diary for stories to include in my memoir of our translation work among the Canela people of Brazil.

The Second Story
Here’s the story that stood out. In 1967, twenty years earlier, Pedro, the Canela village chief, had invited Josephine and me to come to his village to live and work. He wanted us to do medical work and teach his people to read and write. We had done this and much more, including saving the life of his son by driving him four hours to town to a doctor who confirmed my diagnosis of appendicitis and sent him to a hospital where he had surgery just in time.

We had always had a good relationship with Pedro, and when he asked if I could drive him, his wife and two or three men down the jeep trail a few hours to meet some people, I agreed. A continued good relationship with him was worth four hours of driving over rough terrain.

At noon, I drove our little quarter-ton pickup truck to his house. Pedro and his wife

Baskets & 3 daughters Okay, 10 Adult men, No Way.

climbed on, and so did ten other people.
“That’s too heavy, Pedro,” I said. “Look at the springs; they are all bending the wrong way and will break. I can take the five people you asked for but not all twelve of you. I broke all four of these springs this year and replaced them. But now they’ll all break too. I’m sorry, but I can’t take all of you.”

Pedro exploded in anger. He stalked off directly to the local government agency. He complained to the manager, telling him, “Get on your shortwave radio and tell your bosses in the city that we no longer want these teachers in our village.”
He stayed right there until the manager had sent that radiogram. Happily, several other Canela leaders overheard this order. They told others in the village who sent a large delegation to the government manager saying, “Everyone in the village wants the teachers to stay.”

These events were the beginning of an enormous confusion that eventually involved directors of the government indigenous agencies in three cities. These authorities repeatedly ordered us to leave the village, and each time the Canelas made the local manager send radiograms objecting to the order.

Even our own Wycliffe director got involved. He was called to the agency office in Belem, where the agency director told him, “The Canela chief, Pedro, and Blackpalm, a sub-chief, both want your people out of their village.” Just then, Blackpalm, who happened to be in Belem for medical reasons, walked into the office and heard this statement; he objected.

“The only one who wants the teachers out is Pedro. He’s a hothead and gets violently angry when he can’t get his way. I love working with the teachers. I taught them much of our language starting twenty years ago. They have been a huge benefit to health and education in our village.”

The Last Story
What a coincidence! No, it wasn’t. It was a God-incidence. God is in control and kept us productively working for three more years until the Canela Bible was published.

At the public Bible distribution ceremony, I gave Pedro the first Bible I took out of the box since he was the chief who had invited us to come. He made an impassioned speech. “Treat this book respectfully. It is more valuable than a cow or a new shotgun. It is God’s letter to us. Don’t tear pages out of it to make your cigarettes. Don’t leave it out in the rain. Our friends have worked for more than twenty years to make this book. Respect their work.”

What a change in Pedro from just a few years ago! I couldn’t help chuckling, and covered my grin with my hand.