Author Archives for Rockie Sue

Diggin’ Up the Bible – 6 – Is there Evidence of the Red Sea Crossing?

One of the greatest miracles recorded in the Old Testament is the children of Israel’s crossing of the Red Sea. It is also one that people often consider just a fanciful story inserted to entertain ignorant religious adults and children.

When my husband was attending Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary (SWBTS) and me Dallas Baptist University, the pastor’s wife of our church shared their experience concerning this miracle. They had attended a much more liberal seminary than SWBTS, and because they believed the Bible was the infallible and inerrant Word of God, they were a joke among their peers. Their acceptance of Bible stories such as the Red Sea crossing, the divine destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, and the fall of Jericho as actual history caused much amusement. When introduced by their friends to other seminary students, they were noted as “the couple who believes God actually parted the Red Sea.” An amused laugh concerning their naiveté would often follow.

So, is there evidence of the Red Sea crossing? If you follow the path shown on most Bible maps, the Israelites would have traveled far to the north of the mountains and barely caught the Red Sea. This trail, the one dubbed the crossing site by Emperor Constantine’s mother (Helena) due to a vision does not fit the biblical description? It does not enable the Israelites to be trapped as the Bible records. In Exodus 13-14, we read that the children of Israel were angry at Moses for leading them into this trap. There were mountains on both sides, the sea was before them, and the Egyptian army approached from behind them. Since the Bible is the inerrant word of God, then Helena was wrong, and so are all maps that indicate her chosen trail—regardless of where they are found. Remember, the Bible is the inerrant word of God, not the maps and indexes man inserts into them. 

When you study the landscape leading out of Egypt, there is one trail that leads to the Promised Land that does fit the biblical description. It leads to the Nuweiba Beach—a beach that can hold between 2 to 3 million people, and this trail matches the biblical description perfectly.

At the Nuweiba Beach crossing, there is a natural land bridge that is merely fifty feet below sea level. It is the only raised ground in the Red Sea, is a half-mile wide, and is smooth enough for people and wagons to travel upon. Every other part of the Red Sea would have been too steep or rough—due to coral—for wagons, horses, and people to have navigated. We don’t know if God formed this natural land bridge on the day of the crossing or during Noah’s flood, but it really doesn’t matter. It was there precisely when the Israelites needed it.

At this crossing site, archeologists have found chariot parts and chariot wheels (mostly covered with coral) that fit the description of the chariots of Moses’s day. They have also found human and horse bones. At both the entrance to the water at Nuweiba Beach and the exit on the other side, two massive pillars appearing to be built by King Solomon in honor of God’s protection of the Israelites were discovered. Meaning, in Solomon’s day, this was the accepted site of the Red Sea crossing.

For pictures and additional information, please go to www.arkdiscovery.com/red_sea_crossing.htm. On the left side of the page, double click on the words Red Sea Crossing. You can either watch the video over the Red Sea crossing or read the information accompanying the website. There are several other online sites where you can find even more pictures and information about this extraordinary, Bible-validating discovery. 

The Red Sea Crossing | A Rood Awakening! International

Do You Believe in Angels?

Do you believe in angels? I do. I’ve heard many stories through the years about unexplainable events, otherwise known as miracles. Several of these miraculous events happened in my own family. This morning, I’d like to share one of these stories with you. The year (as best as I can remember) was 1983. At about four p.m. one afternoon, my mom received a phone call from my sister, Patty. Patty was spending several days at a friend’s house because her parents were out of town. This girl, May, was afraid to stay alone. At mom’s suggestion, Patty invited May to stay at my family’s house because she wasn’t too thrilled with having two sixteen-year-olds staying alone in a trailer located thirty minutes from town, but May would have nothing of it. She didn’t want to impose on my family, and her refusal nearly cost my sister her life.

The first day, everything went as expected, but the second afternoon when Patty arrived at May’s house, she felt a bit uneasy. She had personally run back inside earlier that morning to turn off the lights, yet several of them were on, ones she specifically remembered switching off. As she stood in the living room, trying to figure out what was going on, she heard her friend’s poodle scratch on the front door. That’s what their dog did to let the family know she wanted inside.

My sister walked over and put her hand on the doorknob with every intention of opening it, but right when she was about to turn the knob, the dog jumped up on her leg—from inside the trailer. It was all too weird since she had personally put the poodle out before they left that morning. She immediately locked the door and stepped back.

At the very moment Patty turned the lock, someone tried opening the front door. When the person couldn’t get the knob to turn, he started kicking his foot against the door. He demanded that Patty open it. When she refused, he began throwing his body against it in an effort to knock it open.

About a minute later, everything suddenly became silent. That’s when Patty remembered the kitchen door. She turned and ran through the trailer, reaching it just before the man did. When he tried the door and discovered it was locked too, he was furious. He immediately began banging and kicking against it. He continued going back and forth between the two doors for at least twenty minutes.

My sister was a very confident, level-headed girl. She didn’t panic at the blink of an eye. Yet that day, when she called mom, she was hysterical. It took over a minute to calm her enough to figure out what was wrong, and then, mom wasn’t sure what to do. If she hung up and called the police, she lost connection with Patty. Also, she knew the police would never make it to May’s house in time. She told Patty to get a knife or anything she could find to protect herself. She hoped that if the man knew she would fight, he might decide it was too dangerous and just leave.

As soon as Patty found a knife, my brother ran inside our house. Mom sent him to the neighbor’s house to call the police so she could stay on the phone. She hoped the man would be less likely to do anything if he knew Patty had connections to the outside world.

Mom could hear the man banging and kicking against the doors as he went from one to the other, and his fury continued to grow. He knew it was possible to break into the trailer because he had already broken in once that day, yet nothing he tried worked.

Mom said she could hear his blood-curdling screams and filthy words, words expressing his intents, coming through the phone. She said the horror of his voice and threats put Hollywood actors to shame. He was a wretched man. Each time he kicked the door, mom said her heart jumped into her throat. She could hear everything but was physically helpless. There was nothing she could do but pray. She prayed that God would send his angels to hold the doors fast so the man could not get inside the trailer.

After about twenty minutes, everything fell silent. Patty looked out the window and saw dust rising from the dirt road in the distance. All we can guess is that the man saw the dust rising and thought it was someone coming to help. It wasn’t, it was May, but he didn’t know that. After all, he knew that Patty had been on the phone with someone, and he probably assumed that someone to be the sheriff’s department. To this day, we don’t know who he was.

What is supernatural about this true story? When the sheriff did arrive, he listened to Patty’s story and spoke with mom via phone, but he didn’t believe either of their stories. Why? He took Patty to the front door and lightly banged his palm against it. The door flew open. Then he took her to the back door and did the same thing. It too banged open. You see, that trailer was as old as the hills. All it took was a minuscule amount of force against either door, and they knocked open. A seven-year-old child could have broken in without much effort. Yet that man, kicking with all his might, even throwing his body against it, had failed to gain entrance.

This event, along with several others that involved my family members or me, events that were physically impossible, is part of the reason that I do believe in angels.

#RockieSueBooks #TreacheryAndTheInnocent

God’s Providential Care: A Gift for all Ages

Paul Harvey, in his book More of Paul Harvey’s The Rest of the Story, tells of a time when God’s providential care was clearly seen in the lives of the eighteen choir members of West Side Baptist Church in Beatrice, Nebraska. It was March 1, 1950, and their practice should have started at 7:30 on the nose, yet it didn’t because every single member, for one reason or another, was running late. Their excuses included oversleeping, difficult homework, car trouble, cold weather, child care issues, and the inaccuracy of a wristwatch which was always accurate. All eighteen members had just as valid of an excuse as these, and yet “never before nor since had each and every choir member of West Side Baptist Church been late for choir practice on the same evening.”

That evening, at the exact time when their practice should have begun, a natural-gas leak surfacing in the basement of the church was ignited by an old furnace. The following explosion demolished the entire building. That old furnace, the igniter of this bomb, was located directly below the empty choir loft. Accident? Perhaps according to this world’s manner of thinking, but not according to the teachings of the Bible.

Just as with the members of this choir, God’s promise to us, his children, is his protective care. Soon, it will once again be 9/11, reminding us to be thankful that God has legions of angels under his charge, and if he chooses to protect us supernaturally, then all the demons of hell must flee–terrorists included!

In 1950, God chose to protect the choir members of West Side Baptist Church; on September 11, he allowed the Twin Towers to fall. In both instances, the key is the sovereignty of God. In his sovereignty, God chose to protect one but not the other. This is a concept many Christians seem to forget or ignore. They believe and teach that nothing bad can ever happen to a dedicated Christian, yet that’s not biblically accurate–as seen in the life of Job. There were many Christians who lost their lives when the Twin Towers fell, and they died, not because of their own wickedness, but because of the wickedness of evil terrorists. Could God have prevented those towers from falling? Absolutely! Yet for some reason, a reason we may never understand, he chose not to intervene.

Remember, God thinks in terms of eternity, we don’t!!!

#rockiesuebook.com

Angels Unaware

When I was 10 years old, my father asked me to “pick up a stick and poke the steer in the butt” in an attempt to load him onto the shoot and into the back of a cattle truck with several other steer. I wanted to show how brave I was, so instead of poking him from behind the safety of the fence, I jumped down into the loading pen. When I poked the steer, he became enraged and attempted to crush me. Just before he would have succeeded, I felt my father’s hands grab beneath my arms and jerk me upward to safety. Even so, I had to lift my legs to prevent them from being smashed. As you can imagine, Dad was furious that I had so foolishly risked my life and sent me inside the house.

Years later, mom told me when he came inside that day he had tears in his eyes, was as white as a ghost, his hands were trembling, and all he could say was, “I almost lost her. I almost lost her.” When he calmed down enough to tell her what had happened, he realized that his story didn’t make sense. He had not seen me jump into the small pen, and since there were two solid wooden fences between where he was standing and where I had been, he should not have been able to see me, yet he saw the entire incident. He took mom back out to the corral’s loading shoot and had her stand exactly where I had been. He stood where he had been, and even though mom was larger than I was, he could not see her. All he could do was credit my life to a miracle of God.

There have been several times in my life, and in the lives of my family, where events like this happened that have no earthly explanation. My fiction books show both the physical and spiritual realms (meaning angels and demons), and I have included some of our personal miracles in them. I would like to include some of yours, as well. So, if you have a miracle you would like to share, miracles you would not mind my readers hearing about, please share them with me. Even if they are not included in my books, I would love to hear your stories. It is encouraging to hear how our God cares for us.

If you have a miracle you would like to share, please respond to this blog. Whether or not I can use your story, I know I will enjoy it.

My books can be found on http://www.rockiesuebooks.com.

God Always Answers Prayer – Part 4

Last time I posted a blog was about 11 months ago, just before learning that my 54-year-old sister had passed away from Covid. My review of her illness was mentioned several times during her six weeks of hospitalism, and after re-reading my posts, I want to reaffirm my stance on God’s protective care. My absence from writing has not been due to changing my mind about this issue, but because I had another major family upheaval that has dramatically altered my life. This issue was the catalyst that pushed my husband and me to sell our home and move in with our daughter and her preschool children. In a future blog, I will write about the circumstances that caused this move. But for now, let’s go back to Patty.

During Patty’s illness, I did believe that the Lord would allow her to recover. I believed that she still had much work to do for God’s kingdom, but when she passed away, I was once again reminded that God’s ways are not always our ways. For whatever reason, the Lord chose to take her home instead of healing her.

Since 2010, I have worked as the bookkeeper at the veterinary clinic she owned, and whether at the clinic or at church, most of my time was spent with her in one capacity or another. As you can imagine, her absence has ripped a huge hole in my heart. At the same time, I understand that, had it been God’s will for her to remain on this earth, nothing could have taken her away. Her death has not changed my stance on this biblical principle.

When we walk in God’s path for our life, he directs that path. He is a great and loving God, but he dwells outside the realm of our understanding. Remember, his ways are not always our ways.

Palms 116:15, “Precious in the eyes of the LORD is the death of one of his saints.”

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