When I reached the summer before ninth grade I was finally old enough to participate in the canoe camp at the Christian camp that I had attended for years. My brother had been a canoe camper when he was in high school and for years I looked forward to the week of canoeing and camping under the stars. I had never canoed before, but I did not think much about that before rushing to sign up and head off to the river.

We had one day of training for the adventure by spending some time at the river learning how to navigate our canoes through different situations. I was a little bit intimidated, but not the least bit deterred in my excitement. Sometime that night before our big departure I did get a little nervous. I decided that I would join the canoe with the nurse, thinking that I would be safer, somehow, that way.

It turned out it was also the nurse’s first time in a canoe! In order to ensure that the nurse could help everyone in case of an injury or other emergency, the nurse was in the last canoe … with me. We had one other person in our canoe who decided it would be fun to lazily float down the river. Being not the most athletic of people, I was content to let the river do the work!

This was all well and good until the current suddenly quickened and we were completely out of control. The canoe hit a rock and spun sideways against a large fallen tree that was in the river. We were still in the canoe and uninjured, but we couldn’t dislodge the canoe from the log. We made the mistake of getting out of the canoe and without our weight in it, it capsized sideways into the water and was trapped with water rushing into it and pinning it against the log.

Despite repeated efforts, we could not dislodge the canoe. And because of our genius idea for a lazy day on the river, as the last canoe there was no one left to come upon us. We finally sat ourselves on the bank of the river with no plan for our next steps. None of us were panicking, at least not on the outside! We talked about how they would surely realize we were missing and come back to find us. Eventually. 

After some time, the nurse decided that we should pray. I thought it was silly at the time, but I rationalized that it was also silly to sit on the side of the river and wait. So, we stood up, walked into the water alongside our trapped canoe, laid our hands on the canoe, and said a prayer for deliverance from the situation. Before we could even leave our spot in the river, the canoe suddenly came dislodged and started floating down the fast-paced river. After we caught up to the canoe and climbed back into it, we all three looked at one another with a bit of awe and anxious wonder.

I sometimes like to think about that incident and how different factors played a role in dislodging the canoe. I know that currents change frequently in the river and that our presence in the opening of the canoe influenced the flow around the canoe while we were praying. But I also know that in that moment, regardless of any other factors, we experienced a miracle that wouldn’t have happened if the nurse hadn’t interrupted our silence and said, “let’s pray.”