By Ye Lin
Ye Lin often went to have meetings with the brothers and sisters in the mountain. She usually needed to pass along a mountain road to go back home as the sun was going down. Once, she encountered an unexpected accident, which allowed her to gain some true knowledge of God’s almightiness and sovereignty. The accident happened on March 20, 2012 …
That evening, Ye Lin finished the meeting and walked the bike toward home as usual. After climbing over a mountain slope, she felt a little tired and rode the bike trying to slide down the slope. When she was on the bike, she found the bike was speeding up. She tried to brake but the brakes were broken. This unexpected situation frightened her out of her senses. Suddenly, she felt as if riding on clouds and mist and her mind went blank. And then she lost consciousness …
When she woke up, she doubted: “Oh, where am I? How come I see the night sky, not ceiling? Am I not sleeping in my bedroom?” She tried to turn over to sit up, but suddenly felt a piercing pain in her left hip. By then she remembered that when she was riding down the mountain slope, she lost control of her bike because of the brake failure and thus fell off the precipice. She held the bushes beside her, and turned over and sat up with all her strength. She found that she was surrounded by mountains and was lying at their foot. She looked around and saw that there was darkness everywhere except for some dim lights in the distance. Apart from the sounds of insects, only barking not far away could be heard. The mountain was frighteningly quiet. Ye Lin hurried to feel her pocket, and found her MP4 player was still there. Then she opened it to take a look at the time, finding that it was past two in the morning. She recalled that it was only six in the afternoon when she was going home. Then she realized that she had actually been unconscious for eight hours.
In that solitary road, there were usually few passers-by or vehicles in the daytime, let alone at night. Staying alone in this wild place, Ye Lin remembered that some people of her village had ever said that the dead people were all buried in this mountain, and that ghosts sometimes might be seen. She also heard that there were some gangsters and robbers who often harmed people. At the thought of this, a wave of inexpressible fear swept over her. She worried that gangsters would come to murder her, or robbers might come to rob her of the things on her, or even kill her for the chance of material gain. She couldn’t stop asking herself what to do. At that moment, God’s words suddenly came to her: “God Is the Source of Man’s Life,” “Man’s life originates from God, the existence of heaven is because of God, and the existence of earth stems from the power of God’s life. No object possessed of vitality can transcend the sovereignty of God, and no thing with vigor can elude the domain of God’s authority. In this way, regardless of who they are, everyone must submit under the dominion of God, everyone must live under God’s command, and no one can escape from His hands.” Ye Lin came to realize: I believe in the true God who created the heavens and the earth and all things. All things are under the control of God’s hands. Man’s life and death and fate are all in God’s hands. Isn’t my life controlled by God? Although I’m here in the middle of nowhere, without God’s permission, even if I encounter gangsters or robbers, they can’t do anything to me, let alone take my life. Thinking of this, Ye Lin calmed down, and prayed to God silently, “God, I’ll entrust myself to You. May You be with me, and care for and protect me.” After the prayer, she didn’t feel fear and horror anymore, but felt particularly peaceful. Because of the great pain in her hip, she couldn’t walk at all, and had to lie down for a rest. She took her MP4 player, and played a hymn of God’s words “God Is the Sole Foundation of Man’s Existence,” which sang: “When the waters swallow humans whole, God saves them from those stagnant waters and gives them a chance to live anew. When people lose their confidence to live, God pulls them up from the brink of death, granting them the courage to go on so that they can use Him as a foundation for their existence. …” Hearing the elegant melodies and feeling God’s love, Ye Lin fell asleep …
The next morning when she woke up, she looked up and found that the precipice where she had fallen off was at least as high as a three or four story building. Under it there were rock piles and bushes almost everywhere, and only the part on which she had landed was thick dried weeds and relatively soft sandy soil. Except that her hip got injured and her trousers were torn at the knee, there were no other injuries on her. She knew very well that this was God’s great protection for her.
Due to her injury in the left hip, she wasn’t able to walk. In addition, there were no passers-by for her to ask for help. So, she could only stay there until her pain was relieved, and then found some ways to get down the mountain.
Soon, night fell again. In the mountain, night was still silent. When Ye Lin felt fear, she turned on her MP4 player to listen to the hymns of God’s word and of life experience, and prayed in her heart to draw near to God. Immersed in the hymns, she completely forgot that she was in the mountain and felt no fear. Although she was there with nothing to eat or drink, she felt neither hungry nor thirsty. She was very clear that this was God’s wonderful deeds, which was unachievable by man. Only God has such power. At that point, she recalled that when some brothers and sisters experienced various disasters such as flood, they got through without anything to eat or drink by relying on God. Just as the Bible says, “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God” (Matthew 4:4). She truly appreciated the practical side of this sentence of God’s words, and felt that God’s words are what is needed in man’s life. She thanked God from the bottom of her heart.
On the third afternoon, Ye Lin prepared to go down the mountain. When she saw her bike, she was stunned: The bike looked like an old heap of iron, and its front part had been broken. She thought: “That was close!” The bike was only two meters away from where she had fallen. If it had fallen down on her, she wouldn’t have been so fortunate. What’s more, her bike had been broken like this, yet she herself didn’t suffer severe injuries. This made her see God’s almightiness and sovereignty, and His marvelous protection for her.
She began to walk lamely down the mountain. Because her hip was injured, every step caused her a heart-piercing pain. She incessantly prayed to God within, asking God to help her get home smoothly. Under God’s guidance, she walked to the road. After a while, she saw an oncoming motorbike. After she stopped it and told the driver what had happened to her, the driver offered to take her home. At that moment, Ye Lin was extraordinarily excited and grateful to God from her heart. Because she knew that God had heard her prayer and arranged a stranger to help her.
When they arrived at the town, Ye Lin first went to a clinic for an examination. The doctor said, “It’s nothing serious. The meridian is blocked. You just need an injection and apply some ointment.” Hearing these words, she felt very excited and thanked God deep inside for His care and protection. After taking a rest at home for one week or so, she got much better. Seeing all of this, she felt deeply moved and truly thanked God for His love.
One morning, she came to a pond to wash clothes. She heard some villagers discussing together, “The God Ye Lin believes in is really powerful. She fell off the high precipice but unexpectedly was all right. How quickly she can wash clothes and work again!” “Yeah, that’s a place where people blast rocks. There are many rocks. In the past, two people fell down onto heaps of rocks. One was sent to the hospital with severe injuries, and the other became disabled.” “You don’t say. It had been rainy some days ago. But only in the two days when she fell down, it didn’t rain. If it had rained, she would have been frozen to death, even though she hadn’t fallen to death. …”
Hearing those people’s words, Ye Lin was full of gratitude to God. Just because it had been rainy some days ago, the soil where she landed was soft, which made her escape severe injury. If she had fallen onto those pine trees, or fir trees, or stones, then she would have been either disabled or dead. Moreover, it was the second month of the Chinese calendar when the weather was still cold. However, even though she stayed outside for one day and two nights, she didn’t feel cold or hungry or thirsty, and instead her mental condition was very good. This really was God’s care and protection. It exactly fulfills God’s words: “God is never absent from the heart of man, and He lives among man at all times. He has been the driving force of man’s living, the root of man’s existence, and a rich deposit for man’s existence after birth.”
Now, when Ye Lin recalled the matter of her falling off the precipice, there is still some lingering fear in her heart. Without God’s salvation, when she fell off that high and steep slope, even though she had not died, she would have been surely disabled. She saw that when she was in grave peril it was God who reached out His hands to save her, and helped her get out of the jaws of danger. Through this experience, she had some practical knowledge of God’s almightiness and sovereignty, and also truly saw that man’s life is indeed in God’s hands.
At this time, Ye Lin was deeply moved by God’s love. Tears welled up in her eyes. She was resolved to follow God to the very end.
