__________________________________________________

MISSIONARY SURGEON WHO ROAMED THE WORLD BROUGHT BACK LESSON ON 'GOD IN THE NATURAL'

Are we doing what we were sent here to do? What is the motive for how we conduct our lives? What have we done for the least among us (Matthew 25:40)?

We hear much criticism these days of doctors but there is one who it seems fulfilled what a doctor should be, along with the biblical admonition to help the poorest and the poor.

That is surgeon Dr. Walter C. Thompson, who has traveled the world in some of the most difficult circumstances and reports back on God's miracles as they occur in the natural: everyday life and medicine.

What does in the natural mean?

Let's define that expression as: God intervening in everyday successes and surprises that don't involve a loud spectacular event or paranormality.

God intervenes in the natural when a newborn in Guam is found safe on the shelf of a closet after a record typhoon has devastated the hospital. Dr. Thompson saw that.

God intervenes in the natural when a mortar shell lands a hundred feet from the table you are eating at and when other shells and dangers always "just miss." (Dr. Thompson saw that during the war in Cambodia, when he ran with the refugees, and elsewhere)/

God intervenes in the natural in Africa when "one of the pastors called is all together to pray," writes the surgeon (in Memories of a Missionary Doctor). "We knelt there, in the dirt, and sought the grace of God to protect us from the storm. As we got up from our knees, the wind and the rain stopped!"

Mostly, in Dr. Thompson's experiences, God intervened in how he allowed the surgeon to heal people in places like Haiti and Pakistan and Russia exercising the normal tools and practices of medicine.

God -- and His angels -- work through all of us in or everyday jobs when we are open to Him.

This causes real success -- and is as miraculous as the sudden disappearance of a cancer.

It may not be as obvious. It may be something pegged to simple physical  laws and effects.

But when it is orchestrated by the Lord through the talents He has bequeathed, it is an intervention.

It is God working in the normal. It is God acting the natural when we respond well to medicine, when our recovery is rapid, when avoid an accident (upon death, we'll realize how many "near misses" we never even knew about -- that could have occurred had we left our homes a minute earlier).

Every time there's a disaster, we hear in the news of wonders -- most recently a two-week-old baby rescued 48 hours after a quake in Turkey from a small slit in the rubble.

There are also miracles in how we act.

In Rwanda, Dr. Thompson recounts that astonishing act of forgiveness by a woman who had watched her husband slain during that genocide in the 1990s (in this nation where forgiveness is evidently a remarkable trait). This too is miraculous. This too is the Holy Spirit working in the natural.

Describing the attack of Hutus on Tutsis who had fled to a church, Thompson writes:

"As the angry mob entered the chapel, one of them approached a pastor and threatened to kill him unless he followed his orders. The pastor stood firm, and was chopped to death with ax and machete -- his wife standing by and watching as his life blood flowed away.

"And then it was her turn but she survived the attack. In time, this lady recovered and began visiting the prisoners, taking them food and other necessities and sharing the scriptures with them.

"One day, she recognized the young man who had chopped her husband to pieces and tried to kill her. Rather than retaliate -- as she well might have done -- this lady began to minister to him, bringing him food, clothing, and other necessities. She told him she forgave him for the atrocities that he committed. Eventually, he softened and was released from prison. She took him to live with her -- and made him her son. I cannot find any biblical precedent akin to what has happened here wherein fellow believers attacked one another -- and yet could forgive and forget."

  E-mail this link directly