Intervention – Sunday, March 28, 1943
We have had some sobering accounts within recent times of men cast upon the far and desolate places of sea and land, with the near-presence of death, who perhaps for the first time in their lives, have poured out their hearts in prayer for sustenance and deliverance, and their needs have been provided and their lives have been spared, and they have returned to testify, reverently, unashamedly, that out there in the broad spaces of the earth and over the deep places of the sea, they have been delivered by an unseen hand, and their mouths have been fed and their lives have been preserved.
This profound discovery, new and startling to some, is a matter of life-long conviction to others, and the testimony of men who return from far places and harrowing experiences to bear witness that God lives, and that He hears and answers prayer, is likely to become news that is less startling as time goes on. The pendulum swings that way, as now with the hazards of war, and journeys to far places, man often finds himself alone, beyond the help of any human power, and, having cried to his Maker, and found answer, learns to know that prayer is something more than a psychological effect. And as the stresses of life increase to push us further and further beyond our own resources, and into the hands of Providence, at home and on the high seas, and on distant battle fronts, out of it all of it may come a generation acquainted with God and grateful for the privilege of approaching Him in prayer—a kind of prayer the efficacy of which lies beyond the ready rationalizing of those who would explain it away.
Somehow there comes to mind these words from Hamlet: “There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.” And so we observe with thoughtful interest, the return of those who come to bear witness of the intervention of Providence in their behalf, when none but Providence could save them—that Providence who is God, in whose image men were created, who lives and moves and brings about His purposes, and who is mindful of all men.
By Richard L. Evans, spoken from the Tabernacle, Temple Square, Salt Lake City, Sunday, Mar. 28, 1943, over Radio Station KSL and the nationwide Columbia Broadcasting System. Copyright-1943.
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March 28, 1943
Broadcast Number 0,710