A Thai cave rescue plan & a Whole World eternal sin rescue plan

photo credit: screenshot Evening Standard

The world is watching and waiting with baited breath along with the parents and families of 12 boys of a Thai soccer team and their coach, who went on a hike down some caves in a remote area of northern Thailand on the 23rd June, unaware that heavy rain was going to suddenly cause flash flooding and trap them inside the cave. 

For 10 days they were missing. Experts rallied from around the world to try to search for the boys. Two highly experienced volunteer British cave divers were the first to reach the boys and discover they were all still alive and in relatively good shape. 

A British television presenter made the following comment:

The world at the moment seems dominated at the moment by cruel and confusing and loud cycles of news. These stories speak to a hope that out of gloom, a quiet unassuming stranger will emerge, someone who actually knows what they are doing, someone who will rescue us from the darkness.

Now there is the issue of getting these young boys out. But those boys were so thankful for those two divers who made the first contact and brought them news, food and encouragement and hope.

We don't know what the end of this story for all the boys will be (although just as I am about to post this, it has been confirmed that four of the boys are now out!), but we do know that on a far greater level, another unassuming stranger emerged from the gloom of our world over 2000 years ago, who knew what he was doing, in order to rescue us from a much greater spiritual darkness.  

Just like these boys, humanity is in a hopeless and helpless situation unable to save ourselves. We need to totally rely on the direction and ability of another. These boys not only have no diving experience, some of them can't even swim. They have to totally put themselves in the hands of another if there is any chance of them getting out and being rescued.

As the rescue process began cave diving expert Dr Rogers spoke to ABC News 24 and gave some thoughts on the rescue process:

He said he doesn't think the boys will be expected to do anything during the operation — the expert divers will take care of everything.

"I don't believe the kids will be doing anything. They won't be swimming. They may not even have fins on. The expert diver [will] have a minimum of two independent air supplies on them, I suspect they will be carrying another bottle as well, but they will know the distances of all the sumps [underwater flooded sections] and there's spare bottles they can pick up."

Dr Rogers said the boys will hold on to the back of the expert diver and will be wearing masks. 

People in our world are looking for who can rescue them from the mess they can see, but the mess is far greater than that. They need Jesus Christ who can rescue them from the mess of our hearts not just the mess of our circumstances, and not just on a temporary scale, but on an eternal scale! We can do nothing to save ourselves, We need Jesus. Once we understand our dire predicament and have had the only answer explained to us,... we have to be willing, and trust his ability and plan, and give ourselves to him, by faith, despite our uncertainties and inability to comprehend it all,... but he does it all.

When the boys were initially found it was thought they might be able to wait out the wet season and walk out on their own. But while their own walking steps got them trapped, their own walking steps were not going to get them out. Time was limited. Waiting in hope was a false hope. An urgent rescue plan had to be completed.

Just like those boys, the rescuer has come, but if we want to be rescued we have to entrust and enjoin ourselves to the rescuer to bring us fully to the completion of the rescue. While the successful rescue of each boy is not something this human rescue operation can guarantee, our eternal rescue is guaranteed if we are willing to entrust ourselves to the eternal rescuer.

Maybe you can use this situation that has the eyes of the world, as an opportunity to draw a parallel and lift the eyes of friends and neighbours to their need for a much greater rescue!

Pray that hearts will come to see their true need and that Jesus is their true rescuer not just from the darkness of a cave, or the darkness of our world's news, but the darkness of our own hearts and the deepest darkness and horror of an eternity without the 'light of the world'...

….and then pray and go into this dark world, bringing light to people's darkness.

note added 20 July 2018 - all the boys and coach were safely rescued from the cave - you might like to watch this Australian Four Corners program about it broadcast last Monday the 16th, including interviews with some of the rescue divers and this YouTube video of the press conference with the boys the day they left hospital, and an extra interview with the boy who served as the translater for the group in the cave when the British Divers arrived - because he had been taught English by the Pastor of the church that has been his home for the past 10 years as a Myanmar refugee!