When I was around 10 years old I loved History (I still do!) and proudly showed my Grandad my Gold star for my project “Five Famous Battles”. He read it, commending me for my efforts, then proceeded to tell me about a “more amazing” battle, The Battle of Jericho.
He told me that God had sent an Angel to command the Israelite army in its first real battle. I knew this was something amazing because my Grandad had been a soldier in The War and knew about battles! (yet he never talked about those battles very much!) To me this was a massive thing, I knew “all” about Adam and Eve, Noah’s Ark, crossing the Red Sea and all those Bible stories I’d learned at Sunday School and Junior School but here was a story that was right up my street.
As my Grandad told me the story about the battle I compared it with battles I had “researched” for my project, and I couldn’t fathom it. No cavalry charge, no archers raining down deadly arrows, no cannons blasting the enemy ships; just following God’s instruction, marching around the walls of the city once a day for seven days then a blast of trumpets and a shout and the walls fell! The 10-year-old me was blown away, God must be powerful!! I wanted God on my side in all my battles.
As I grew older, more inquisitive and read the full story, amazement only grew. Among the survivors from the conquest of Jericho, was Rahab, who appears in a Family tree in the First Chapter of The New Testament, the family line of Jesus. That makes an even more amazing impression NOW! about God’s promises and faithfulness, on a much, much older me!
Trevor Crawford, Cockermouth Christian Centre
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