On Easter Morning 2026, millions of Christians around the globe relived the miracle of the Resurrection of Christ in word, prayer, and music. Over two thousand years ago, divine intervention breathed new life into the dead, crucified body of Jesus, rolled the stone away from his tomb, and allowed him to leave the tomb and reveal himself to his followers.
This Easter a modern resurrection story was played out in the remote desert mountains of Iran. A downed American airman was evading capture deep into enemy territory after his plane was shot down by enemy fire 46 hours earlier. Iranian military forces were all over the area looking for him. If found, he would be paraded through the streets of Tehran to mitigate the depth of their imminent defeat to the U.S. and Israeli military forces.
On Good Friday, the other crewman was successfully recovered before the Iranians could react. Injured when ejecting from his jet fighter, this second crewman was all alone with little screening coverage and unaware that his fellow aviator was safe. He tended to his wounds while he maneuvered from his parachute landing spot into a mountainous area over a mile away. There he crawled into a rocky crevice where he hid. He must have known that with each passing hour into his second day evading capture that he was rapidly losing his race between resurrection with the Americans and tortuous humiliation and death from the Iranians.
American forces picked up his locator signal, found him, and rushed him out of Iran to Germany where he received medical treatment. The Iranian forces were not far behind, but when they arrived, the crevice where he was hiding was empty. An Easter Miracle!
In the background to this human resurrection story, Iran’s leaders were given an ultimation by President Trump to either engage the U.S. in serious peace talks to end the war or to face increased destruction from which it would take Iran a century or more to recover. Iranian’s deadline for responding was this past Tuesday night at 8 pm, two days after the second airman’s rescue.
If either airman had been captured, the entire course of this war would change by reversing the bargaining strength in the negotiations to advantage Iran. With both an American hostage and closure of the Strait of Hormuz in Iranian bargaining hands, a satisfactory conclusion of the war would be unlikely. Hamas used hostages to extend its war with Israel even after they had lost the war and were hiding in the tunnels under Gaza.
Wars become designated “asymmetrical” when warring nations have military forces that are vastly different in their strengths, but weaker forces can extend the conflict by their willingness to hide military assets shielded by citizens, who they are willing to lose, or by their valuing death while their opponents value life. Into their conflicts with America and Israel, Iran and its proxies brought both two demonic sides of Islam with them, making the wars difficult to end.
No post-Easter message would be complete, though, without considering the possibility of divine intervention. Two long days after being downed, this second American airman expressed his belief in God as he was pulled from his hiding point crevice deep into Iranian territory. The news of his resurrection from almost certain death at the hands of the Iranians must seemed to him a case of divine intervention.
The miracle of Easter continues.
A ragged band of Patriots 250 years ago created the greatest nation on the planet by winning their independence from mighty England. This feat carries the same divine characteristics. What force brought George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, and James Madison together to create and establish the unlikely United States of America from thirteen diverse, separate colonies under one Constitution?
And who would like to argue that divine intervention had no part in establishing Israeli independence against the odds against it in 1948?
“Why do you look for the living within the dead? He is not here; he has risen! Luke24: 5-6
TW3
April 9, 2026
John Whitmore Jenkins
