My wife and I sometimes
watch the television show, The
UnBelievable with Dan Aykroyd.
It features fascinating stories
from the past. I love history and
am always looking for interesting
stories to feature in a future
column. In a recent episode, we
learned about a strange spy venture
the show identified as among
the most successful informationgathering
operations of the Cold
War.
Since toilet tissue was not
issued to Soviet troops in the field, soldiers used any available
paper, including official documents. The repurposed paper
was not water-soluble, so it was deposited in trash bins. Upon
learning of this, spies from the US, England, and France began
collecting and reading the Soviet Army’s “repurposed official
documents”. Unsurprisingly, spies given this disgusting task
often grumbled about the nasty work, but no one complained
about the intelligence bonanza of Soviet secrets discovered.
According to Wikipedia, the project, called Operation
Tamarisk, eventually expanded to include agents who
searched Soviet dumps for discarded intelligence.
I do not believe the idea of searching for secrets among
enemy soldiers’ used toilet paper would have ever occurred to
me, but this did not keep the program from becoming extremely
productive. Operation Tamarisk seems unbelievable, but just
because something is strange does not mean it is untrue.
The Bible is filled with numerous remarkable stories that
seem impossible but are true. Allow me to share several
examples:
Exodus 14:21-22 tells of the Israelites walking through the
Red Sea on dry ground.
Joshua 6:1-20 describes how God’s people marched
around Jericho once a day for six days, and seven times on the
seventh day, then saw the city’s walls fall.
1 Samuel 17:1-51 narrates the story of young David, who
defeated the giant Goliath using only a slingshot and a stone.
According to Daniel 6:1-23, after he refused to stop praying
to God, Daniel was thrown into a pit of lions. Amazingly, God
protected him from the hungry beasts.
John 11:1-44 records the story of how Jesus raised Lazarus,
after he had been dead for four days.
Matthew 14:13-21 tells how Jesus fed a crowd of 5,000
men plus women and children with a little boy’s lunch of five
small loaves of bread and two fish.
And finally, Jesus’ resurrection, the greatest miracle ever,
is recorded in the final chapters of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and
John.
Does God always surprise us? No, many times, things
happen the way we expect; however, each of these stories
demonstrates how God sometimes does amazing things in
extraordinary ways. Operation Tamarisk reveals that just
because something seems unbelievable does not mean it is.
Many have had moments when God worked in ways that
defied human logic. In those moments, our faith can become
stronger if we pay attention to how God sometimes does the
unbelievable in the difficult situations we all face at some
point in our lives.
