Does God really act in our world today?  Here is a personal experience where God rescued Steve from a desperate situation.  Trapped down a mine, God gave him immediate peace and soon deliverance. 

Lots of strange things happen in graduate school.  Some result from poor judgement.  I can share an experience of mine that involved some of this. (pun intended)  It also proved to be an anchor point that I have looked back on for years in recognizing God’s hand and care for me. In fact, through a dangerous situation, I felt God’s presence in a very real way.

To understand the story, I need to explain why I was going in abandoned mines in Mexico. I was in El Paso, Texas, attending graduate school at the University of Texas at El Paso.  Karen and I were married, and we had one son and another on the way.  Financially, we were always broke.  As a geology student, I had to write a master’s thesis, and I wanted one that involved doing a significant amount of field geology rather than a more lab-based research project. When a professor offered to fund me to study a small mountain range in Chihuahua, Mexico,  I jumped at it.  Thus, I began to drive 250 miles down into Mexico, east of Ciudad Chihuahua.  I would camp there and study the geology of Sierra Gomez (Shown above).  Today the whole state of Chihuahua is considered dangerous with kidnapping and organized crime, often drug related.  Not so in the late 1970s. I was safe out in the mountains alone and when I came into the city, the people were great and very friendly to this young American college student who knew little Spanish.

Professor Goodell was able to fund this, not just because the limestones of the range had not been described except in very general terms, but because uranium deposits had been found there and Mexicans mined some ore there, leaving much of it in piles as they could not processes it then.  My time in graduate school was during the days of the “energy crisis” and funding for energy related studies was available and helped us keep eating while I got a degree.  My project involved measuring sections and mapping the limestones in the mountains.  I also mapped the location of the various mine workings in the area.

In the summer of 1979, I needed to drive down to Sierra Gomez to do the mapping project, but our youngest son was not eager to be born.  I made sure to be there for this happy occasion, but before long I was going on down to work in my field area. Karen went to stay with her parents in eastern New Mexico with our 18-month-old son, Brian and newborn son, Michael. My parents lived nearby and they were excited to have a new grandson to hold.  She needed their support and I was glad that they could help while I was away.

In the summer in northern Mexico, it is blazing hot. It was quite a field area. All of the vegetation had thorns and even many of the rocks would weather and give a pitted surface as if they had rock thorns.  I camped near a dry stream bed and tried to get up around sunrise to start out, carrying as much water as I could carry.  I had a simple campground, a two-man pup tent, a very small fire and a propane lamp.  I could read a bit in the Bible but sometimes God seemed distant. Being away from my family was hard. Faith means trusting even though sometimes we don’t feel a lot of the great feelings.

Steve pointing at a mineralized zone with uranium ore along a thrust fault plane.

Often I would walk up and down the mountains through the morning and then work in some of the old mines in the heat of the day.  Most of the mine workings were small and very straightforward.  A few were a bit more extensive.   On one trip, my plan was to go down and stay for two weeks, just me and the mountains.   I worked my campsite farther down the central valley, farther away from my car so that I would spend less time going to and from the car.

Early on the trip, I spied a working that I had not been to before.  It was getting hot, so I worked my way up to it to see what was there.  I took my backpack off and retrieved a flashlight out of it and set the pack down near the entrance.  The limestone walls were dark and coated with dirt. I had to look close for any signs of mineralization.  In most places, the miners removed all signs of what was there originally.  Working along the mine wall, I tried to decide if there was any evidence here that I would need to come back to this mine for more detailed work.

So, I went in, expecting to spend a little time checking out the mine and then maybe just wait for it to cool a bit.  As I stepped down the narrow passage, I focused carefully on the wall, searching for any evidence of clues that would tell me about the ore deposits. Focus can be a great thing, but even so, it is still important to be aware of your surroundings.  This is a wise saying that I verified with experience.   I was focusing on the wall one second and the next thing I knew, I was waking up in a very, very dark place.  I had managed to find a hole in the floor just my size.

I don’t know how long I was out for.  My flashlight didn’t make it down with me.  Logically, I was in a very bad situation.  No one would be expecting me back in El Paso for over a week.  In fact, my wife was the only one who really knew when I would return and no one knew what part of the area I would be in.  The reality was that it could easily have been a month or more before someone came to the right place where I was.

I was well aware of my predicament, but the strange thing was, I didn’t feel panicked. Somehow, I was aware of God’s presence in a different but very real way. I began to move around and all parts were functional… a real blessing.  I felt around for the flashlight… no luck.  I felt in my pockets.  Here I found a real treasure.  I found my tiny Bic cigarette lighter.  I used it each night to start my campfire. The night before I had slid it into my pocket. With a flick from my finger, I had a small light to check out my surroundings. God allowed me to have a small light to guide me. The psalmist wrote, “Thy Word is light unto my path and a lamp unto my feet”.  I was so happy that God had provided a light for my path. I knew that I was not alone.  I chose not to think about the danger and things that could go wrong.  God was there and He would be with me all the way.

I knew my small lighter would not last long, but at least for a little while, I had something to dispel the darkness. In the movies, there always seems to be a torch on the wall ready to light.  No such luck here.  On one side, it was just black, even with the lighter flame.  I eased my way along the floor, carefully this time, lest there be another hole.  Along the passage, I came to a wooden item, a ladder.  This had promise.  As I worked along the passage, I came to a place where looking up above there seemed to be a ledge.  I dragged this 6 or 7 foot tall ladder over to this area.  I climbed up the ladder to find another passage, but I could see a hint of light up above.  I saw another ledge that might lead towards that light.  I went back and painfully pulled the ladder up to me to use to try to reach the next ledge.  There appeared to be a shallow pool of water near the ledge.  I set the ladder there but it needed to go in that pool of water.  As I set the ladder down, it abruptly went down and out of sight.  That little pool of water was a lot deeper than I thought!   I explored the passage further.  It wound around a bit and I found an inclined portion that led upwards.  Taking it, I was able to crawl and climb my way up and back to the light of the outside world.  It was beautiful!

Coming to the original area of the mine shaft where I had fallen, I could see my flashlight near the hole that I fell down.  I shined the light down but could see little.  I was banged up and sore, but alive and knew that God had provided a means of escape in a very literal sense.  I worked my way down to my campsite and spent the night there.  The next day, I drove to El Paso.  That also involved God’s protection because in my fall, my glasses fell off and were gone.  Driving the 250 miles to El Paso safely without glasses was its own sort of miracle.

In El Paso, I called Karen.  She was surprised to hear from me this soon. I started by telling her not to worry.  I was okay.  She was instantly concerned.  She was also worried because my voice sounded really strange.  My professor insisted that I go see a doctor.  The doctor explained that in the fall, my head had hit hard enough that it had changed my voice, but it would be just temporary.  Scratches and bruises healed and my voice came back.  Dr. Goodell found a young man who could go down with me in Mexico.  For some reason, he didn’t think I should go down by myself again.  A few weeks later, this young man and I came back to the mine where I fell.  We used stronger lights, but could not retrace the path that I escaped with.  We saw where I had apparently landed.  It was a narrow ledge.  Had I not landed on it or if I had wondered around, I would have fallen much farther.

I learned valuable lessons here.  For one thing, I learned to be very careful in mine workings.  I appreciated my family and how my choices could impact them as well. It was a sharp reminder for both Karen and I of how much we loved each other. Most important though, I knew that God’s presence is real and He would be with me even in dark places.  For several years, I kept a Bic cigarette lighter in my pocket.  It was a tangible reminder that God is a light that shines and delivers in time of need.

You, LORD, brought me up from the realm of the dead;
you spared me from going down to the pit.
Sing the praises of the LORD, you his faithful people;
praise his holy name.

Psalms 30:3-4 NIV