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Tuesday, March 2, 2010

Love Your Neighbor

“You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” (Matthew 22:39)


If you were living in Holland in 1944 when the Nazi’s were taking over the country, would you have hidden Jews in your home? Hitler’s “final solution” was to rid the world of those who were not blessed to be a part of Hitler’s “master race.” God intervened by using human hands to hide, feed, and protect the Jews from the Nazi slaughter. Two of those hands belonged to Corrie ten Boom. She would describe herself later as “the skin on the hands of God.”


On February 28, 1944 Corrie (the first female watch maker in Europe) was at work in the family watch repair shop in Haarlem, Holland when the machine-gun armed Gestapo patrolled the streets, unaware that Jews were hiding in a crawl space behind a bookshelf in her home. By this time the Jews of Holland had only two options: hide or die!


A Dutch stranger walked into the Boom watch shop under the auspice of needing a watch repaired and whispered that his family was also hiding Jews. He asked if she could help. Corrie, believing God led her to develop a network of families to oppose the Nazi’s by helping Jews, agreed to help the stranger, and then he left the shop.


Corrie and her family were aroused that very night by Gestapo, searching for anyone hidden in her home (for two days they searched but found no one). That very night over 30 in the network of families helping Jews were arrested, beaten, and charged with helping the Jews. Corrie and her sister Betsie were placed in the Ravensbruck death camp where, on Christmas day, her sister died. Casper, her father, died in prison ten days after his arrest.


Four months later (June 1945), Corrie was released from Ravensbruck. She wrote a letter to the Dutch stranger who betrayed her family to the Nazi’s. Her letter stated:


I heard that most probably you are the one who betrayed me. I went through ten months of concentration camp. My father died … and my sister died in prison. The harm you planned was turned into good for me by God. I came nearer to Him. I have prayed for you, that the Lord may accept you if you will repent. I have forgiven you everything. God will also forgive you everything if you ask Him.


Corrie ten Boom was led by God to establish Christ centered rehabilitation homed for people of all faiths scarred by the war. Later she came to America where her story of the Holocaust helped many understand the horrors of the Nazi regime and their crimes against humanity. Corrie’s message was simple: “My survival is not my personal miracle, but the reality of Jesus!” God gave her opportunities to speak well into her eighties, where thousands came to faith in Christ through her passionate appeals for salvation. Her hands, scarred from the concentration camp, wrote five best-selling books. She died in 1983 at the age of ninety-one.


Her challenge is still relevant today: Would you have hidden Jews? Could you have survived concentration camps? Can you display Christlike forgiveness? Will you be the hands and feet of Jesus? Will others define your life as “skin on the hands of God?”


Serving Him, Serving You,


Dr. Derek


PRAISE

This weekend was incredible! Mega-Awesome! Our servant training on Saturday was better than a “Monster Truck” rally! Man did you ever show up! Our training leaders were, in a word, exceptional. Marvin Shaw’s breakfast crew did an outstanding job! It was a great day! Our worship rally yesterday encapsulated all we had learned over the last two months in our “Servant’s Heart” study. Our challenge by Dr. Boutwell is simple: “Live magnetically the character of Christ!”


This weekend we will have our annual “Honduras Yard Sale.” A monster “thank you” to Suzie Howell and Debra Machen for their leadership, and for the host of volunteers who are organizing the yard sale.


This week we will begin a new four-week study, “Rescued: A Jonah Journey.” It is also hard for me to believe that Easter will be upon us in one month! This year we will have 5 worship opportunities. Our north campus schedule will be normal - 8:30 and 11:00 worship, Bible study at 9:45. Our south campus will have a Saturday night service at 5:00 PM, followed by a 9:30 and 11:00 service. Jay, our student pastor, otherwise known as the “sermonator”, will preach the 11:00 service at the south campus. Our goal is to exceed the 1200+ that we had last year! Begin now by praying and inviting your neighbors and friends to attend Easter worship with you.


On March 28, 3:00 PM we will unleash our volunteers on our community with our “GPS” flyers promoting our Easter services. You will not want o miss this event. Then we will gather at our south campus where Sr. Young will lead conclude our Jonah Bible study. He will take us “From Jonah to Jesus” as we begin Passion Week. You will not want to miss this key event!

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