The Miracle At Naseby

The Miracle at Naseby

Nothing much ever happens in sleepy Naseby. Yet by happenstance of history, two armies collided there on the morning of June 14, 1645. The battle outside that little village would change the course of Western civilization.

Massed on the sheep pasture outside Naseby was the proud army of His Catholic Majesty King Charles I of England. His Royalist forces were shined and polished, their steel and muskets flashing in the cold sunlight under scarlet banners dancing in the breeze. Supporting the massed infantry were the Cavaliers, the finest swordsmen and cavalry in Europe, led by Prince Rupert, the swashbuckling nephew of King Charles. With swaggering bravado, he boasted that his Cavaliers would rout their ragtag enemy and be back in camp in time for lunch.

Across the field, the army of Parliament waited with fear rising in their throats. Mostly made up of drafted farmers and vastly outnumbered, they stood little chance at Naseby that day. While royal princes led the king’s forces, Parliament’s army was led by rugged Puritans more familiar with Bibles and plows than muskets and cannons. Among them was a farmer, Oliver Cromwell, leading the cavalry that would face Prince Rupert and his Cavaliers that morning.

Cromwell shouted out to his men, “Boys, keep your powder dry and your prayer books handy. Our battle is in the Lord’s hands, and he alone gives the victory.” As one man, his army fell to their knees. One by one, Puritan preachers among these farm boys began to cry out for supernatural strength.

At Naseby the prayers of country bumpkins overcame the polished steel of the royal army. Prince Rupert and his vaunted Cavaliers charged across the field, only to be outmaneuvered by Cromwell and put to flight. The army of Parliament surged forward and the rout was on. Prince Rupert was right: the battle was over before lunch. But it was the Royalists who were broken and in disarray.

The fate of a civil war that divided England was decided that day. It wasn’t long before the rule of elected assembly replaced the absolute authority of the king. On the fields of Naseby, the blood of citizen farmers purchased a radical new government that would later flower in America.

Those of us who enjoy the freedoms of a government of the people, by the people, and for the people, should never forget the moment that turned the tide from king to Parliament that day. As Prince Rupert’s Cavaliers charged across the field, Oliver Cromwell whispered a prayer to God before he pulled down the visor of his helmet: “If in the heat of battle this day, I should forget to remember thee, I pray that thou wouldst not forget me.” Surely, the Lord did not forget him.

Cromwell’s army was at its most lethal when it was on its knees in prayer. A battlefield may be looming before you today. Perhaps the odds are overwhelming. Before you pull down the visor to your helmet and march off to war, why don’t you get down on your knees? The battle of Naseby is another proof of this inviolate principle of warfare:

The greatest powers cannot overcome the humblest prayers.

It is not by force nor by strength, but by my Spirit, says the LORD of Heaven’s Armies.

Zechariah 4:6