Spiders
web
During World War II, a US marine was separated from his unit on a
Pacific island. The fighting had been intense, and in the smoke and the
crossfire he had lost touch with his comrades. Alone in the
jungle, he could hear enemy soldiers coming in his direction.
Scrambling for cover, he found his way up a high ridge to several small
caves in the rock.
Quickly he crawled inside one of the caves. Although safe for the
moment, he realized that once the enemy soldiers looking for him swept
up the ridge, they would quickly search all the caves and he would be
killed.
As he waited, he prayed, "Lord, if it be your will, please protect me.
Whatever your will though, I love you and trust you. Amen."
After praying, he lay quietly listening to the enemy begin to draw
close. He thought, "Well, I guess the Lord isn't going to help me out
of this one."
Then he saw a spider begin to build a web over the front of his cave.
As he watched, listening to the enemy searching for him all the while,
the spider layered strand after strand of web across the opening of the
cave.
"Hah, he thought. "What I need is a brick wall and what the Lord has
sent me is a spider web. God does have a sense of humor."
As the enemy drew closer he watched from the darkness of his hideout
and could see them searching one cave after another. As they came to
his, he got ready to make his last stand. To his amazement, however,
after glancing in the direction of his cave, they moved on.
Suddenly, he realized that with the spider web over the entrance, his
cave looked as if no one had entered for quite a while. "Lord, forgive
me," prayed the young man. "I had forgotten that in you a spider's web
is stronger than a brick wall."
We all face times of great trouble. When we do, it is so easy to forget
the victories that God would work in our lives, sometimes in the most
surprising ways. As the great leader, Nehemiah, reminded the
people of Israel when they faced the task of rebuilding Jerusalem, "In
God we will have success!" [Nehemiah 2:20]
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