Rescue the Beaconsfield Miners

RESCUE
By Bob Mendelsohn

All Australia ached and prayed and longed for the release of Tassie miners Todd Russell and Brant Webb during the last fortnight. It all began on Anzac Day as we ate and drank and were unaware of those boys in Beaconsfield.

There in the gold mine, one kilometre underground, the kennel-sized cage used only for transport, became the temporary cage/shelter for the thirty-something pair.

Finally on the morning of 9 May, amidst hundreds of onlookers and awakening the nation which prayed, the two punched the air and raised their heads in glee, hugging family and friends who worked tirelessly to get them out.

No cost was left unspent. Tens of thousands of dollars were spent to fly four explosive experts interstate. Knocking through the ultimate barrier, to within 300 millimetres of the floor of the captives, the explosive experts did what they were asked, to rescue our boys.

The bell at Beaconsfield's Uniting Church pealed in celebration just after 5am. It was the first time the bell had been rung since the end of World War II, 61 years ago.

The value of a human life, no-- 2 human lives, is without limit. We will stay up to the wee hours of the morning to watch and hope along with others. We will cash our savings and super to spare the life of a friend. There is no cost we won’t pay.

Imagine having to save a nation, not only a pair of miners. Imagine having to save a pair of nations, or imagine, if you can trying to rescue the world of nations, not only alive then, but for all people of all times.

This would make church bells toll for decades, even centuries.

That’s what God did. He looked down at the trap of our inhumanity, the way we misbehaved and the sin which so characterized us. He didn’t turn away in disgust, and say something about ‘good luck’ or decrying us as ne’er-do-wells.

He actually looked on us with pity and spent everything he had, the life of His only begotten Son, Y’shua, to get us back and rescue us.
Thanks be to God who sent Jesus to die for us, to raise Him from the dead on the 3rd day, and to ever live to give us hope and reason for living.