During the Second World War,...

Richard D. Meyer

During the Second World War, I was serving as a navigator in the Army Air Corps. One day I flew in a B-17 (Flying Fortress bomber) which had a very heavy load. There were fifteen men on board in addition to personal baggage, depth charges for use against enemy submarines, and ammunition.

A short time after our take-off one engine went out of order, then another. The two remaining engines were not powerful enough to keep the heavily loaded plane aloft. We lost altitude slowly but steadily. Soon the pilot turned the plane around and headed back to our starting point.

During this time I was busy applying the teachings of Christian Science. I knew that God's power is everywhere. God knows all, and He knows only good about all of His children. He has complete control of every situation. He is all good and only good; so there is no room for an accident in His kingdom. I felt a great sense of God's loving presence and knew that no harm could come to any child of God. In this understanding I felt safe and secure. I recalled these words from a hymn in the Christian Science Hymnal (No. 53):

Everlasting arms of Love
Are beneath, around, above.

Finally, at an altitude of two hundred and fifty feet, the pilot called over the interphone, "Prepare to ditch." I rushed through the narrow passageway from the nose of the plane to the tail section. There I found all the passengers waiting for the ditching to take place, completely resigned to what appeared to be inevitable. I directed the passengers to throw out everything that was loose—the ammunition, baggage, everything. We had thrown out all the baggage and returned to our positions when we saw that our plane was no longer going down. It was then only seventy-five feet above the water. We realized with joyful hearts that we had lightened the plane enough to enable the pilot to keep it aloft. Soon we arrived back at our home base and came in for a safe landing.

Deliberate holding to the truth on many specific occasions has brought such wonderful blessings as make me firmly convinced that our deliverance was made possible only through divinely inspired action. My thought had been receptive to God's angel thoughts, guiding me to do the very thing that would save myself and others in this situation.

Some days later I received a letter from my mother, asking me if I had been in need of help on the date of that flight. In the night preceding the morning when the experience had occurred, she had felt as though I needed help. I wrote to her about the experience, and we rejoiced together. Later the practitioner who had been working for me told my mother that she too had felt impelled to get up that night and do some protective work for me. When I learned this, I was fervently grateful to God for the prayers of those at home, as well as for my own prayers. I am profoundly grateful for the freedom from fear, the confidence, and the clarity of thought which I enjoyed throughout this experience.—(Chaplain) Richard D. Meyer, San Antonio, Texas.

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