Outside his cabin, John Clarke paced up and down until he had almost worn a rut in the hard, sunbaked clay of the mission station.
Why did the Lord allow his wife to suffer so, to approach death with no hope of a doctor’s help for another week? Perhaps they should never have come to this lonesome jungle not with the white man within hundreds of miles, not even a government outpost. Why had they ever come to Africa? But no! That was doubting God. He had sent them there, and He had blessed their work; souls had been saved. God wanted them here.
But why was He allowing Mina to die? She couldn’t last the week out until the messenger could bring the doctor from the coast. And that strange request of hers—three ripe tomatoes. She thought they would help her and give her necessary nourishment to sustain her until the doctor arrived.
As far as he knew, there weren’t three ripe tomatoes in the whole of the Congo. There might be some canned tomatoes at their distant outpost, but ripe ones? They did not grow tomatoes in this part of Africa. John Clarke thought of praying for tomatoes, but considered it unreasonable to ask God for the impossible. Tomatoes couldn’t grow and ripen that fast, even if he did have seeds, and he didn’t.
Steadily the tropical fever was burning the very life from Mina Clark. By nightfall she was so weak she couldn’t talk; lack of food had sapped her strength until she could only moan and whisper occasionally to her husband. Only the prayers of the entire mission kept her alive that night, alive to face another day of suffering-physical for her, mental for her husband. As John leaned over her bed early in the morning again he heard her whisper, “If—only—I had—three ripe tomatoes.”
In agony of spirit Clarke heard that dying request-three ripe tomatoes. If only it were humanly possible to get them, he would go to any extreme. He picked up his wife’s hot hand and gripped it compassionately in his.
As John stood looking down into his wife’s face, a native servant appeared abruptly at the door and said there was a nearby tribesman out in front who wanted to see the missionary. Reluctantly John left his wife and stepped outside into the burning sunlight of the African summer morning. He had never seen this woman before, yet her tribal dress was familiar. Questioning her, he found that his guess had been correct-a bush-woman from the tribe he had visited last month. But what was she doing here this season of the year?
His question was easily answered. She had been sent to him for advice. Food was scarce this season, but she was afraid to eat this queer fruit she had grown from seeds left her by a white man. Were they all right to eat?
As John Clarke peered into the crude basket she carried, he almost cried for joy. There in the basket THREE RIPE TOMATOES. From seed sown months before in the providence of God, these tomatoes came now in answer to Mina’s prayers, in rebuke to his doubts.
And not only that, but the bewildered black lady said she had more! She scurried to get them at the missionary’s plea.
Mina Clarke ate the tomatoes and lived-lived until the doctor arrived with healing medicine, and lived to serve the Lord through the miraculous appearance of three ripe tomatoes, planted, raised and ripened at the appropriate time by the hand of the all-wise God.
“Behold, I am the Lord, the God of all flesh: is there anything too hard for Me?”
Miracles and Melodies
ML-06/11/1978