"Sisters of First Century Christians" in the Soviet Gulag

Nobel Prize winner Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's classic, Gulag Archipelago, recounts the horrors of the Soviet forced labour camps where "political" offenders (referred to as "politicals") were imprisoned and subject to brutal forced labour on account of various "political" offences which ranged from the ridiculous to absurd, as were other prisoners who were jailed for other offences. 

Among those imprisoned for "political" offences were Christians. In Solzhenitsyn's book, he records the best and worst of their responses to persecution. Of these were a group of believers, simple people with a simple faith, that shone in the darkness of the Soviet Gulag: 

And not only socialists were now politicals. The politicals were splashed in tubfuls into the fifteen-million-criminal ocean, and they were invisible and inaudible to us. They were mute. They were muter than all the test. Their image was the fish. 

The fish, symbol of the early Christians. And the Christians were their principal contingent. Clumsy, semiliterate, unable to deliver speeches from the rostrum or compose an underground proclamation (which their faith made unnecessary anyway), they went off to camp to face tortures and death - only so as not to renounce their faith! They knew very well for what they were serving time, and they were unwavering in their convictions! They were the only ones, perhaps, to whom the camp philosophy and even the camp language did not stick. And these were not politicals? Well, you'd certainly not call them riffraff. 

And women among them were particularly numerous. The Tao says: When faith collapses, that is when the true believers appear. Because of our enlightened scoffing at Orthodox priests, the squalling of the Komsomol members on Easter night, and the whistles of the thieves at the transit prisons, we overlooked the fact that the sinful Orthodox Church had nevertheless nurtured daughters worthy of the first centuries of Christianity - sisters of those thrown to the lions in the arenas. 

There was a multitude of Christians: prisoner transports and graveyards, prisoner transports and graveyards. Who will count those millions? They died unknown, casting only in their immediate vicinity a light like a candle. They were the best of Russia's Christians. The worst had all... trembled, recanted, and gone into hiding.

For these blessed believers, perhaps "the world was not worthy of them" (Hebrews 11:38), and certainly "God had planned something better for [them]" (Hebrews 11:40). 

They may have died silently, unknown and unrecognised by the world; but on the side of eternity awaits a crown of righteousness which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will award to them on that day of His appearing (cf. 2 Timothy 4:8).

Faith Without Action is Dead: The cowardice of a pastor in the face of Nazi terror

"What good is it, my brothers, if a man claims to have faith but has no deeds?" (James 2:14)

It is often only in times of testing when the rubber hits the road and when faith is put to the test that we truly see whether one's faith is a living faith accompanied by action or a dead faith.

The Bible records numerous accounts of heroes of faith, well-known and relatively unknown, who have stood against evil even when it cost them dearly. The genocidal impulses against the Hebrews or the Jews have always been strong and, on many occasions, godly men and women stood against the tide. For example, there were the Hebrew midwives Shiphrah and Puah, who disobeyed Pharaoh's order to kill the Hebrew newborn boys (Exodus 1). There was Esther, who stood against Haman's edict seeking to exterminate the Jews.

The pastor, from the film The Hiding Place (1975)

In our own not-too-distant history, the evil one has not relented in his efforts to destroy God's people. In her book, The Hiding Place, Corrie ten Boom records an account where she was looking for a place where she could hide a Jewish mother and child from the Nazi secret police, the Gestapo. With the scourge of Nazi Germany and its genocidal impulses, arrest would almost certainly mean death:

And the very next morning into the shop walked the perfect solution. He was a clergyman friend of ours, pastor in a small town outside of Haarlem, and his home was set back from the street in a large wooded park.

“Good morning, Pastor,” I said, the pieces of the puzzle falling together in my mind. “Can we help you?”

I looked at the watch he had brought in for repair. It required a very hard-to-find spare part. “But for you, Pastor, we will do our very best. And now I have something I want to confess.”

The pastor’s eyes clouded. “Confess?”

I drew him out the back door of the shop and up the stairs to the dining room.

“I confess that I too am searching for something.” The pastor’s face was now wrinkled with a frown. “Would you be willing to take a Jewish mother and her baby into your home? They will almost certainly be arrested otherwise.” Color drained from the man’s face. He took a step back from me. “Miss ten Boom! I do hope you’re not involved with any of this illegal concealment and undercover business. It’s just not safe! Think of your father! And your sister – she’s never been strong!”

On impulse I told the pastor to wait and ran upstairs. Betsie had put the newcomers in Willem’s old room, the farthest from windows on the street. I asked the mother’s permission to borrow the infant: the little thing weighed hardly anything in my arms. Back in the dining room I pulled back the coverlet from the baby’s face.

There was a long silence. The man bent forward, his hand in spite of himself reaching for the tiny fist curled round the blanket. For a moment I saw compassion and fear struggle in his face. Then he straightened. “No. Definitely not. We could lose our lives for that Jewish child!”

Unseen by either of us, Father had appeared in the doorway. “Give the child to me, Corrie,” he said.

Father held the baby close, his white beard brushing its cheek, looking into the little face with eyes as blue and innocent as the baby’s own. At last he looked up at the pastor. “You say we could lose our lives for this child. I would consider that the greatest honor that could come to my family.”

The pastor turned sharply on his heels and walked out of the room.

So we had to accept a bad solution to our problem. On the edge of Haarlem was a truck farm which hid refugees for short periods of time. It was not a good location, since the Gestapo had been there already. But there was nowhere else available on short notice. Two workers took the woman and child there that afternoon.

A few weeks later we heard that the farm had been raided. When the Gestapo came to the barn where the woman was hidden, not the baby but the mother began to shriek with hysteria. She, the baby, and her protectors were all taken. We never learned what happened to them.

Such was the cowardice of the pastor. Indeed, faith without action is dead.

Give Glory to God

Then Joshua said to Achan, "My son, give glory to the LORD, the God of Israel, and give him the praise. Tell me what you have done; do not hide it from me."

(Joshua 7:19)

A second time they summoned the man who had been blind. "Give glory to God, " they said. "We know this man is a sinner."

(John 9:24)

Many would be familiar with the taking of oaths to tell the truth in a courtroom. 

In a Singapore court, a Christian would take the oath by placing his left hand on the Bible, and raising his right hand, saying the words "I swear by Almighty God that the evidence I shall give in this Court shall be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. So help me God."

In Biblical Israel, "Give glory to God" was a solemn charge to tell the truth. In the Book of Joshua, Joshua begins questioning Achan about his disobedience by asking him to "give glory to the LORD, the God of Israel, and give him the praise". In John 9, the Pharisees question the man born blind who had been healed by Jesus by charging him to "give glory to God". 

We see the very same principle expressed in Mark 9:39 when Jesus told His disciples, "No one who does a miracle in my name can in the next moment say anything bad about me". Superficial praise offered to God will not glorify Him if we curse our fellow brothers. For this reason, James highlighted this grave inconsistency in his epistle:

With the tongue we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse men, who have been made in God's likeness. Out of the same mouth come praise and cursing. My brothers, this should not be. Can both fresh water and salt water flow from the same spring? My brothers, can a fig tree bear olives, or a grapevine bear figs? Neither can a salt spring produce fresh water. 

(James 3:9-12)

We glorify God when we tell the truth. At the same time, we tell the truth when we glorify God. Justice, whether in court or otherwise, is inextricably linked with truth. Without truth, there is no justice. All that is left is your "truth" versus my "truth" with no objective standard to adjudicate between them, leaving only what Friedrich Nietzsche called the "will to power".

Is it any wonder that the collapse of justice that we see in these last days comes hand-in-hand with the denial of God and the objective, absolute Truth? 

Be Faithful with the Little Things

2016.

I began this year feeling purposeless and meaningless, feeling like I have seen all that I need to see in life. Whether in my work, ministry, or anything else, I felt that I had enough and there was - to borrow a phrase used by the writer of Ecclesiastes - "nothing new under the sun". 

"What's next?" This was the question I posed to God repeatedly over the next few days. 

This morning, God finally gave me an answer, "Be faithful with the little things."

It was a deeply unsatisfactory answer, since I had been hoping for something I would consider more precise, such as a clear direction to "do this" or "do that". 

But upon further reflection, I recalled various passages that I had read recently in my quiet time. As Jesus said, "One who is faithful in a very little is also faithful in much, and one who is dishonest in a very little is also dishonest in much." (Luke 16:10, ESV)

Likewise, in both the Parable of the Talents and the Parable of the Minas, the talent or mina of the unfaithful servant was taken and given to the servant who had been faithful with what he was given. 

Jesus added, "I tell you that to everyone who has, more will be given, but from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away." (Luke 19:26, ESV)

The little things that God entrusts to us are not to be taken lightly, since faithfulness is what counts in God's eyes. So, take heed, and "Be faithful with the little things."