Yesterday Rob went down to the lower basement to find a mini-flood. Something
had gotten pushed up against the sump-pump, preventing it from working. As soon
as the lever was liberated, the sump-pump immediately began to operate, pulling
most of the water from the basement back out. Fortunately, there were mostly
only empty boxes on the floor, so nothing was damaged. But after the pump had
pulled all the water back into the hole it sits in, although the motor continued
to operate, the water level didn't go down. After several minutes, the motor
began smelling hot, so I unplugged it. As we'd had lots of rain and snow, and
the snow was melting, I was amazed that the hole didn't fill back up and reflood
the basement, but it didn't. Every few minutes I would plug it back in, it would
suck out an inch or so, then it would sound like it was laboring and would get
hot, but the water would remain. As soon as it was unplugged, the water would
fill back up to the top, but it didn't overflow it.
I remember thinking that there must not be much water in the ground right then,
or we would have been reflooded immediately. Finally we started calling
plumbers, but everyone was busy. One person said they could come in 3 weeks . .
. We also had a Christmas production we wanted to go to that evening at the
church, and we had invited some friends to go along. We didn't feel comfortable
leaving the house with the pump not working. Anyway, to make a long story short,
I finally thought to pray about it. When I plugged the pump in again, and it
slowly began to drain completely, and the motor kicked off when it was empty as
it was supposed to. But IMMEDIATELY, water from under the house came RUSHING in
to refill the hole causing the pump to start working again almost immediately to
re-empty the hole! The water was pouring in from under the house so fast that
the poor pump was kicking in every few seconds.
Fortunately, it seemed to have completely forgotten it had been broken and
overheated! Three miracles! First of all, God "unstuck" the pump. Secondly, He
kept it from overheating with it's regular job once it was unstuck, and thirdly,
when it wasn't working, God kept the water out of the house until it was working
again. Oh. Another miracle. I had wanted to go to Toronto for the day, but it
didn't work out and I wasn't too happy about that! But God told me to trust Him.
Now I see why He didn't want me going to Toronto! The damage to the lower
basement could have been extensive if we hadn't caught it when we did. Praise
God for taking care of our little needs too!
Lyn (Received on Sunday December 23, 2001)
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