BEYOND THE ODDS:
Providence in Britain’s Wars of the 20th
Century
By John Scriven and Tim Dieppe
Wilberforce Publications. 602 pages. £15.00
ISBN 978 1 916 121 126
This book aims to examine some turning points in Britain’s wars in the last century, in the light of prayer and the Christian faith of commanders.
We know that God overrules in human history (Acts17:26, Isa.37:26-29), and that He hears and answers His people’s prayers (Matt.7:11). The difficult bit is understanding why individual defeats and victories happen.
Most of this book is a discussion of selected British military history from the First World War (1914-18), the Second World War (1939-45) and the Falklands War (1982). This includes the events leading up to the evacuation from Dunkirk in 1940, the Battle of Britain (1940), the campaigns in North Africa (1940-43) and the allied landings in Normandy in 1944. These discussions would be most relevant to those already interested in British military history. With few maps, no pictures and a detailed focus on particular campaigns (largely from a British perspective), this isn’t a book for those looking for an overview of these wars.
However, the history is there to give context to accounts of prayer and faith. This was the most encouraging part of the book. It includes testimonies of senior commanders, such as General Alan Brooke and Air Chief Marshal Hugh Dowding, and of junior officers in the front line in the Falklands War. For example, Dowding said of the Battle of Britain that: ‘[I] say with absolute conviction that I can trace the intervention of God, not only in the battle itself, but in the events that led up to it.’
Readers may find the discussion of reported visions of angels over the battlefields at Mons in 1914 and Béthune in 1918 rather odd. There is also a chapter on Winston Churchill’s Christianity, and an Appendix listing national days of prayer between 1900 and 1950.
Overall, I would have preferred less history and more testimony.
