Two of the helpers had gone to Wind Cave National Park in South Dakota, and one of them now gave her report. This helper had taken two cave tours. The first tour went into the cave through a man-made entrance and the helper got to see many of the unique features of this cave.
Wind cave is a very old cave, and it is a very big cave! The end of the cave has never been found, but there are 149 miles of twisting passages and rooms in the explored part of the cave. There is water in the cave around 500 feet below the ground, and this whole explored part of the cave is under 1.25 square miles of land! It is a very complex cave.
This cave also contains unusual formations called boxwork. Boxwork is formed over long periods of time as cracks and fractures in the limestone gradually fill with crystal material. When the limestone erodes away the crystal boxwork is exposed.
There is more boxwork in Wind Cave than there is in all the other caves of the world combined! The cave has other rock formations such as cave popcorn and frostwork, but the boxwork is the outstanding feature.
The other tour that this helper took involved walking on the outside to the natural opening of the cave. This opening is very small; a person would have to crawl on their stomach to get into the cave at this opening!
The natural opening is where the wind that gives the cave its name can best be felt and heard! The wind at the cave opening has been measured as fast as 25 mph! The wind does not always blow out of the cave, it also blows into the cave at times. The Native Americans have known of Wind Cave for hundreds of years and the Lakota (Sioux) people described the natural opening as the ‘hole that breathes’. Early explorers also found the natural opening to the cave, and in 1881 one explorer looked in the opening and the hat blew off his head! The next day he brought another person to show them this unusual wind coming out of the cave, but this time his hat got sucked into the cave!
The wind flow at the natural opening is caused by the difference in air pressure between the outside air and the air inside the cave. Because the cave is so big and the natural opening so small, the wind flow can be intense! If there is a storm coming; the wind will be blowing out of the cave. If there is good weather coming; the air will be blowing into the cave. The wind at the cave opening is usually totally different than the direction of the wind outside the cave.
Application for you and me:
The helper said that the God-Connection that she had discovered was the wind going in and out of the natural entrance of the cave. The Bible compares the wind to God’s Holy Spirit!
In the Bible in John 3:7-8 Jesus says:
So don’t be surprised when I say, ‘You must be born again.’ The wind blows wherever it wants. Just as you can hear the wind but can’t tell where it comes from or where it is going, so you can’t explain how people are born of the Spirit.
In John 14:26 Jesus says:
But when the Father sends the Advocate as My representative – that is the Holy Spirit – He will teach you everything and will remind you of everything I have told you.
In John 16:13 Jesus says:
When the Spirit of truth comes, He will guide you into all truth. He will not speak on His own but will tell you what He has heard. He will tell you about the future.
When a person asks Jesus to forgive their sins and come into their life, God’s Holy Spirit comes to live inside of them. The Holy Spirit teaches us the truth of God’s Word and helps us to remember the truth about God. The Holy Spirit brings change in a Christian’s life and gradually makes that person more like Jesus.
Just like the effects of the wind blowing in and out of Wind Cave can be seen and felt; other people can see and feel the gradual change that the Holy Spirit brings to a Christian’s life. The people of the world can see the change caused by the Holy Spirit just like a person can see the effects of the wind blowing in and out of the cave, but a person who does not have God in their life cannot understand why or how the change is taking place.
The wind coming in and out of Wind Cave does not depend on the outside wind, and most of the time it is going in a totally different direction than the wind outside the cave. In the same way, God’s Holy Spirit leads a Christian in a different direction in life compared to the people in the world who do not know God.
To sum it all up; the wind at Wind Cave reminds us of how the Holy Spirit is always at work in the life of every person who believes in Jesus and has asked for their sins to be forgiven and for God to come into their life.