Miracles

by Eric Metaxas

  Larry Crabb is quick to point out that this sort of experience was very far from typical for him. He joked that he “was raised on the Holy Duet. The Father, the Son, and watch out for those crazy charismatics.” But after this dramatic experience he realized he had been stiffing a third of the Trinity, and thereafter resolved to recommit himself to worshiping not just the Father and the Son, but the Holy Spirit as well.

  As they sat there and took in what had happened, this father and son were simply blown away. The idea that God would do something this outrageous specifically to let them both know how much he loved them and how intimately he was involved in their lives and difficulties was obviously very moving. It was of course an answer to both their prayers. Before they parted, they wept and hugged. Ken finally knew deeply exactly what his father had prayed he might come to know, that God was there and is there, and he would not waste all of the trials Ken had been through. He would use them for his purposes, because Ken was willing to let him do that. It seems that already in telling this story to me so that I could put it in this book to encourage others, God is fulfilling that promise.

  Today Ken is happily remarried with two beautiful children.

  ONE PHONE CALL

  The first word that comes to mind when I think of my friend Larry Poland is “integrity.” He’s about as solid a citizen as you’re likely to come across. Larry is the head of MasterMedia, a ministry that reaches out to Hollywood executives on behalf of the Christian community. We met him in 2000, when I began attending a Bible study they had started in Manhattan. I was at the time a writer for VeggieTales. Larry is tremendously gifted and was once the youngest college president in America, at age twenty-seven. Not long ago he wrote a book, titled Miracle Walk, about the many miracles he’s experienced, and he has graciously let me include a couple of those stories in this book.

  This first story is about a breakfast appointment with a director of photography (DP) in Hollywood. The man was going through a time of serious depression. In fact, it was so serious that Bryan, a friend of Larry’s who was a film and TV producer, had called Larry about it, asking for help. Bryan had been working with the DP and said he feared the man might take his own life. He asked Larry if he could meet with the man, or at least try to meet with him. Bryan and his wife had tried to help him, but it was clear that whatever he was dealing with needed heavy artillery.

  Larry’s schedule was already packed with important meetings, so he hadn’t been able to reach out to the man. Then one morning Larry’s executive assistant, Ruthann, came out of her office to express her frustration with their appointment schedule. Larry regularly met with entertainment executives to encourage them in their faith in what is certainly a very secular business. He also met with executives who were not Christians to help explain to them what typical evangelical Christians are looking for in entertainment and why trying to create wholesome entertainment can help their bottom line, not to mention the broader culture.

  But this morning, Ruthann said all the appointments were being scrambled. Several people had called to cancel at the last minute. It was all so out of the ordinary, that Ruthann had to tell Larry about it. It was unprecedented. “I don’t even have an appointment for breakfast tomorrow morning!” she said.

  Suddenly Larry thought of something. “Did you ever contact that depressed DP Bryan told us about?” he asked.

  Ruthann said she hadn’t. “Call him right now,” Larry said, “and put me on the phone.”

  Ruthann dialed the number and, when it was ringing, Larry picked up. In Larry’s description, the voice that answered was “rather subdued.” Larry, whom I’ve never seen subdued in my life, has a booming, hearty, confident, and positive demeanor at all times, as far as I know. “Hi!” he said, “I’m Larry Poland. Our mutual friend Bryan said you were working together on a picture and that you seemed down. He thought I might be able to encourage you. I’m going to be in Hollywood tomorrow morning and wonder if I could treat you to breakfast.”

  There was a fairly long pause, and then Mark gave his halfhearted answer: “I guess so.” It was clear to Larry that having breakfast with a cheerful stranger the next morning was not something the man had been planning to do. This is putting it mildly, as we shall see.

  “Well, then,” Larry continued, “where would you like to meet?” They settled on a Denny’s on Sepulveda Boulevard, not far from where Mark lived.

  When they met the next morning, Larry immediately saw that Mark was not doing well. He had a haggard, miserable look about him. Larry knew Mark’s story from Bryan. He had been married but had left his wife for another woman, whom he described as the “love of his life.” But Mark’s wife wasn’t impressed with this description of the woman with whom her husband was committing adultery, so she hit him with everything she had. The ugly divorce dragged on and on, costing Mark $100,000 in attorney’s fees. After five years with the “love of his life,” she decided to leave him. That had happened recently. When Larry met Mark at Denny’s that morning, the divorce was still far from settled. The recent departure of the “love of his life,” after five years together, had broken Mark. He was clearly at his wit’s end.

  Mark was so distraught he could hardly eat. He said the only thing he thought his stomach might be able to handle was some hash browns. As they sat there, Mark told Larry his whole story, with a mixture of bitterness and pain, and when he was done, Larry said, “Sounds like you need God’s help to deal with this.”

  Mark answered in the affirmative. “[Expletive deleted] right I do.”

  “Do you know how to get God’s help?” Larry asked.

  His negative response was similarly colorful.

  “Let me tell you how,” Larry said, and in the way that very few people can do as well as he, Larry took Mark through a step-by-step presentation of the basics. He explained that all we need to do is turn to God and ask his forgiveness, knowing that Jesus paid the price for all our sins and mistakes. Because he died for us and for our sins, we can turn our life—meaning our problems and everything—over to him and he can make us new again.

  Mark had been raised a Catholic, so all that Larry said was not entirely foreign to him. Larry then asked if there were any good reason why he would not like to pray with Larry to invite Christ into his life—to forgive him and give him new life. Mark said there wasn’t. And there at the table at Denny’s, Larry led Mark through a simple prayer surrendering his life to Jesus.

  But when Larry spoke the “amen,” Mark fell apart. Larry was taken aback to see it. He said that Mark began laughing and crying simultaneously, and it went on and on and on. Larry estimated that the emotional roller coaster went on for perhaps three full minutes, which is an eternity on an otherwise quiet morning at Denny’s. It was so boisterous and strange that other diners looked up from their Grand Slams, wondering if perhaps they should call an ambulance. Was the man having some kind of seizure?

  Finally, Mark calmed down. Fifty years of his life’s burdens and guilt seemed to have been lifted from him. It was dramatic. Then he told Larry something he hadn’t said before that helped to explain his emotions.

  “Funny,” he said, “yesterday when you called I was lying in bed with a razor in one hand and a bag of ice in the other, prepared to slash my wrists. I shouted, “God, if you’re there, help me!” and the phone rang, and it was you . . . scheduling this breakfast.”

  Several weeks later, Mark showed up at a meeting. Larry was there, as was Bryan, the producer who had connected them. Bryan did the proverbial double take, because Mark looked so different that he almost didn’t recognize him. The anguish and guilt that had distorted his life and features were gone. He looked peaceful. Mark went on to grow in his faith and he often tells people about the day he had a “really close call,” when a phone call saved his life. He doesn’t believe it was a coincidence.

  CALI TO BOGOTÁ

  There have been seasons in Larry Poland’s
life when he was traveling almost nonstop. That was the case in 1977, when he was the head of the Agape Movement of Campus Crusade for Christ, a ministry begun by the great Bill Bright. Today it’s called Cru. Agape was something like a Christian Peace Corps that would put young volunteers into developing nations. During this time, Larry spent several weeks traveling all over South America to work with nationals in various countries, in order to place volunteers in those nations.

  He first flew from his home, California, to Miami, and from there caught a flight to Bogotá, Colombia, where he met a team of Cru staff. He then flew to Cali, Colombia, which was where the heart of the ministry was located. It was on the 250-mile flight from Cali back to Bogotá that this story began.

  In the seat next to Larry on the plane was a Hispanic man—of medium height and somewhat stocky, with typically dark hair and eyes. But Larry soon learned he was actually an American who had grown up in New Mexico. He was obviously educated and seemed to be enjoying the opportunity to converse with a fellow American. Larry chatted with him for the whole flight, but despite what Larry calls a “prompting” to say something to this man about God, he didn’t. He wasn’t sure why, but for some reason, he simply didn’t. When they landed in Bogotá, they said their good-byes and headed for the luggage carousel. The man—let’s call him Ramon—got his bag first and left. That’s when Larry heard God speak to him. It wasn’t an audible voice, but the message was clear: “You didn’t share your faith with him.” Larry wasn’t unused to hearing from God, but he was certainly unused to disregarding a prompting to share his faith. So he told God he was sorry and asked for God’s forgiveness. Then he prayed: “If I ever get another chance to speak with him, I will obey your voice. If not, please get the message to him from someone else.”

  Life is full of regrets and for Larry, missing an opportunity to share his faith—especially when he clearly felt a prompting from God to do so—was the sort of thing he would certainly regret. But he knew God forgives us if we really know we are wrong and are genuinely sorry about it. Of course, he was.

  That week Larry flew from Bogotá to Lima, Peru, and then to La Paz, Bolivia—and then finally to Santa Cruz. There he met a team of Agape teachers whom he had placed a few years earlier. The lead couple was Dan and Nancy Pryor. They worked with disabled children and had actually started Bolivia’s first school for special needs children. It’s still in operation today.

  About a week after that he was scheduled to leave Santa Cruz for São Paulo, Brazil. But when he arrived at the Santa Cruz airport, he learned that his flight had been canceled. This was Thursday, and the next flight was on Saturday! Larry knew this was not entirely atypical in a developing nation, so he did what he could to rearrange his plans for a departure in two days. What else could he do? Traveling 1,100 miles via ground transportation through dense rain forest was not an option. So he stayed with the Pryors for two more days. Happily, the flight to São Paulo on Saturday was not canceled, and Larry was glad to know that it was a nonstop. But when he got to the airport and went out to board the plane, he saw that the plane was rather old and not well maintained. The pilot himself was very scruffy-looking and disheveled, with a few days’ beard growth and a necktie that was half-undone.

  After they took off, Larry noticed that they were flying at a rather low altitude, so he found himself enjoying the view, which after some time included the lush grasslands of Brazil. They had traveled about five hundred miles when the pilot announced that they would be landing at Campo Grande. This was a very odd thing to hear, considering the flight had been advertised as a nonstop to São Paulo. But Larry took comfort in knowing that at least this wasn’t an emergency landing. Besides, what options did he have? So he relaxed and watched as they slowly descended toward Campo Grande International Airport.

  But as they descended, Larry didn’t see any town or city that would have an airport nearby. There was nothing but farmland in every direction. Where was the airport? The plane had descended to about five hundred feet when Larry spotted a thin strip of grass amid the farmland. Evidently this was the landing strip, and the plane soon landed without incident.

  Larry saw a building the size of a two-car garage with a tin roof—topped by a windsock. So he knew this was indeed some kind of airport and not just a place where planes could land if they needed to. The plane taxied to a stop. The door was opened and the stairway lowered. By now Larry saw two or three people, who seemed to be his future fellow passengers. They were standing together with some baggage handlers and began moving toward the plane. As they drew near, Larry saw that one of them looked familiar. Larry almost thought his eyes were playing tricks on him, but as the passenger drew nearer, he knew they were not. It was Ramon. To say that Larry was surprised can hardly do justice to what he felt.

  The seat next to Larry’s was free, so the moment Ramon entered the cabin, Larry leapt up and waved him over. He wasn’t about to miss this second opportunity to do what he should have done the first time, over two weeks ago. His head was swimming that this was now happening, that he really would have this chance. Ramon put his luggage on the overhead rack, took his seat, and then gave Larry the strangest look. Larry wondered what he was thinking, and then Ramon told him. “This is weird,” he said. “When I left you at the Bogotá airport, a voice said to me, ‘You will see this man again. He has a message to which you must listen.’”

  As much as Larry had been amazed to see Ramon approaching the plane, he was now even more amazed to hear what Ramon was saying. Larry had seen God do amazing things before, but it seems one never really gets used to it, nor should he. Larry saw that Ramon was seriously spooked by the whole thing, and he gave Larry his rapt attention, waiting for the message he was obviously supposed to hear. “I have only one message that is important to share,” Larry said, and with that he told Ramon about the forgiveness and love of Jesus, and how God wanted each of us to turn our lives over to him. Larry had done this so many times in his life, but the way God had arranged this made it feel especially important. Larry then asked Ramon if he would like to pray to accept Jesus, but it seemed that the whole experience was so new and overwhelming to him that he couldn’t quite take it in. But he didn’t seem resistant to the idea either. So Larry suggested that he pray on his own, in private. From all that transpired to get them to that point, Larry had little doubt that he would. When they landed in São Paulo, they said their good-byes, and Larry entrusted his passenger into God’s hands.

  One often hears that God is a God of second chances, that he is rooting for us and wants us to succeed. Perhaps especially if we have screwed up, he is eager to give us another chance, if we are open to that. For my friend Larry, this was a rather dramatic illustration of that simple idea.

  A GIRL AND A SQUIRREL

  My close friends Rick and Barbara Vlaha live in an area called the Woodlands, near Houston, Texas. Of course, there are a lot of trees in the Woodlands, so when in September 2008 Hurricane Ike swept up from the Gulf of Mexico and slammed into Galveston and up through Houston and the Woodlands, a large number of trees came down. Rick and Barbara were therefore especially glad that none came down in their yard. They were also surprised to see what did come down: It was an intact gray squirrel’s nest, containing three baby squirrels. Their children, Grace and Christopher (at the time, ten and seven), were excited at the literal windfall, but saddened to discover that only two of the squirrels survived the drop. They tried to get the mother to take her children back, but for a reason unknown to them, she took only one back. So the Vlahas decided to care for the remaining squirrel themselves. They named him Isaac, after the storm that had delivered him into their life.

  So many trees had fallen down during the storm that in the days following there were massive power outages in the area. It was so disruptive that they thought it would be smart to drive up to Tulsa to stay with some friends. Tulsa was eight hours north, but they had no choice but to take Isaac with them. Grace was th
rilled and cared for him in the car all the way there. But when they arrived in Tulsa, it became clear to Rick and Barbara that Isaac wasn’t doing too well. Was that why his mother had rejected him? Could she sense he wasn’t going to make it, as animals sometimes can? Isaac was refusing to eat, so Rick and Barbara decided to try to find someone who would better know how to take care of him.

  But by now Grace had grown so attached to Isaac that she wouldn’t hear of it. Rick and Barbara knew it would break her heart, but what could they do? How do you explain to a child with an overwhelming emotional attachment to an incredibly precious furry creature—one that seemed to have fallen out of Heaven itself and into her life—that she needs to give it up for its own good? That they didn’t know how to get him to eat and that he would soon die? They tried hard to explain that to Grace, but she remained unmoved. The plan was to take Isaac to a vet in Tulsa and leave him there. They continued to try to convince Grace that this was the only right thing to do for him, but she could not believe it. So Rick and Barbara prayed. They knew that the God of the Bible loves each of us as a father loves a child, so if their parental love made them want to assuage Grace’s feelings over the squirrel, wouldn’t her heavenly father want to do the same? So they weren’t shy in asking God to help Grace want to do the right thing and “have peace” about that decision.