April 28
‘Lord, listen! Lord, forgive! Lord, hear and act! For your sake, my God, do not delay,’ Daniel 9:19a
Bible reading: Numbers 14:11-20 (Go to the Bible passage)
We still believe in miracles.
If not in the miracles of our day, then at least we believe in the miracles that are described in the Bible. And nowadays too, we gratefully thank God when the preacher on the pulpit gives thanks for the recovery of a brother or sister. If someone asks us if we truly believe that God has healed this person, we nod affirmatively, because obviously God has blessed the means!
When someone among us falls seriously ill, we call the doctor. He will write a prescription and if he reassures us, then our confidence in medical science is so strong that we are convinced of a successful recovery. But if things do not work out that way and the doctor shakes his head in concern - as do all the specialists who have been consulted - then we desperately search for a God Who should be somewhere. And without asking Him why the sick person fell ill, we beg for recovery.
Where do we find the nerve to do so, whereas we seldom or never approached Him for Himself when we thought we did not need Him? Will God not treat us as he treated His stubborn people in the desert? Then God said, ‘I will strike them down with a plague and destroy them!’ (:12).
But the people of Israel exist to this day. Why did God not do as He said He would, and destroy His people? Indeed, why does still a Christian church exist whose members rather put their trust in their self-obtained wisdom than in God? Is it not because there are still believers, even now, who - like Moses, like Daniel - beg God for mercy for the people surrounding them, with a truly priestly heart?

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