Will You Join Me on a New Year's Journey?

I never met him; I wish I had. I don’t know him; one day I will.
Please meet my mentor Robert Murray M’Cheyne, a minister of the gospel in Scotland in the 19th century.

M’Cheyne’s Life:
 

Robert Murray M’Cheyne was born at 14 Dublin Street, Edinburgh, May 21, 1813. After a brief, but abundantly fruitful ministry, he died of typhoid fever, March 25, 1843 before his 30th birthday. At the time of his death, he was minister of the pulpit at St. Peter’s in Dundee. One of M’Cheyne’s abiding concerns was to encourage his people, and himself, to read the Bible.(D.A. Carson, For the Love of God)
 

M’Cheyne’s Legacy:
 

Why do I refer to M'Cheyne as my mentor? Let me explain. Reading systematically through the Bible has been my ethos for decades. Over the years, various methods enriched my pursuit. But when I met M’Cheyne’s Daily Bible Calendar, I ceased looking for other resources. His simple plan seems anointed; I have never been able to explain why. 

The Daily Bible Reading Plan of Robert Murray M’Cheyne takes readers through the Old Testament once in a year, and the New Testament and Psalms twice in a year. In my original experience with his plan, I found the pace to be like a sprint; I wanted a marathon. So, I halved the content and adapted the method to read through the New Testament and Psalms in one year, and the Old Testament in two years. This works beautifully for me.

More prominent than his constant longing for the salvation of souls is his passion that speaks loudly down through the years: "Above all things, cultivate your own spirit," he wrote to a fellow-minister. "Your own soul is your first and greatest care. Seek advance of personal holiness.” http://www.mcheyne.info/life.php

The work M’Cheyne prepared for his parishioners remains available today. If the Lord leads you to join in the ongoing legacy of this minister mentor of mine, you can download the practical plan here: http://bibleplan.org/plans/mcheyne/ Follow the prompts, and you can even discover the audio button as well.

A word of grace; dismiss the notion that you are behind. Today is the perfect time to begin.

Living with eternal intentionality:
What is your plan in 2017 for living daily in the Scriptures? 

The Day That Stays With Me Forever

To read Part 1 of this two-part story, click on the link My Agonizing Question That Refused To Be Answered

December 13, 1981 - The Day That Stays With Me Forever

"Where is Larry? At a time like this, where is Larry? 

Today, the 35th anniversary of these events, I remember...

Friday: Blizzard

Friday night the 11th of December 1981, The American School of Warsaw held its annual Christmas concert. (Our family of five lived life normally, that is, as much as one can live a covert, double life normally.) Wanting to participate in the festivities at our little girl’s school, Larry determined to attend the concert, and leave afterwards for Vienna and the required directors' conference. The weather hijacked his plans.

We emerged from the concert to the stunning reality of a blizzard of epic proportions. This hazardous snowstorm prevented Larry's Friday night travel, and shoved his departure forward into Saturday, the next day. (This factor becomes significant.)

Saturday: Sunny

Saturday, December 12, 1981, Larry departed from our home in Warsaw, headed for the southern border crossing between Poland and Czechoslovakia. He intended to drive through Poland, through Czechoslovakia, into Austria and the free West to attend the scheduled conference in Vienna.

As darkness fell, he approached the Cieszyn border station on the Olza River, south of Katowice in the region of Silesia. The border guard took his documents, passport and travel permits, and disappeared into the guards' booth. Time passed; the bitter cold made waiting in the car nearly unbearable. Why the delay in returning his documents? Puzzling.

Without explanation, the guard eventually returned to the bridge separating Poland from Czechoslovakia, gave my husband his passport and papers, but authoritatively denied him permission to leave the country. What?! This made no sense! Why?

“A technicality. Return to Katowice and correct your visa error with the Czechoslovak consulate when they reopen tomorrow or Monday.” Conversation over.

Larry, not being one to easily take ‘No’ for an answer, argued his case (in Polish, of course). The guard refused to budge, and threatened to impound the car within minutes if its driver hesitated further to remove himself and the vehicle off the bridge.

First the blizzard, now the border guard… this journey was fraught with difficulty.

Exit denied, plan foiled, a frustrated Larry reluctantly backup up, drove away from the border bridge, and returned to Katowice. Nothing more could be done tonight. This bizarre clerical error, a minor technicality with the Czechoslovak consulate, would have to wait.

Exhausted, he looked for a hotel, and accepted the inevitable: he would be late to the conference. In the morning, he would make the third attempt to leave the country.

However, traveling mindlessly through the dark city, a puzzling occurrence caught his attention. Outside the police station, a caravan of vans stood on the curb as Zomo (military police) unloaded scores of arrested, handcuffed victims. Puzzling. Even on Saturday night when vodka flowed freely, this defied explanation.

Sunday: Martial Law!

Dawn brought the sickening reality when an irate citizen stormed into the hotel restaurant where Larry ate his breakfast. The rage in this man’s voice communicated the fire in his soul. He screamed:

They have done it! The Communist government has shut down our country. Stan Wojenny (Martial Law) has been declared!

Anger! Larry surged with outrageous anger against the military government for this cruel treatment over its own people. Truly, Poland faced a dark and devastating future. Now last night's street scene became clear. These were police raids making arrests of citizens with political ties. Sadly, this brutality was only a foretaste of harsher realities.

My husband surveyed the restaurant to gauge the response of other customers. As he absorbed the vehement reactions, he considered his own plight. What now?

Suddenly(!), anger gave way to relief as the curtain pulled back. Oh God! You kept me here!

Clarity came into focus. God, you dramatically used a blizzard and a border guard to prevent me from leaving the country, and leaving my young family behind The Iron Curtain. The gravity of the situation, the realities of God’s supernatural protection, washed over him like a spiritual tsunami.

Where is Larry? - the question which plagued me all day- now had its answer. Larry sat at a border crossing on a bridge in southern Poland with angels standing in front of his vehicle, preventing him from leaving the country.

For husband and father, relief gave way to urgent action; every second mattered. Returning to Warsaw and our family became uppermost in his mind as he formulated a plan. First, he purchased much-needed gasoline from a taxi driver on the black market. (No apologies)

Then, he set out to make a journey like none before or since. A typical three-hour drive stretched into twelve long, bitterly cold hours driving through one military roadblock after another.

At each of the sixteen roadblocks, soldiers with machine guns checked his documents, searched his vehicle, and demanded answers regarding his return to Warsaw. All this time he raced the clock; he must beat the mandatory curfew at sundown or meet with serious consequences. (Remember, we were undercover missionaries living a dual life. We worked diligently to obey the law and avoid attracting attention to ourselves.)

Just as the sun dropped in the western sky, he finally pulled up, unannounced, to Ulica Dembińskiego 4B. Home! Squeals of joy, tears of relief marked our unexpected reunion. Regardless of the future we faced, we now faced it together.

Before going to bed, Larry and I embraced and gazed together, one final moment, out the same window I gazed out all day. A soldier, with his machine gun held at ready, patrolled back and forth on our street . Though it felt like Leonard Brezhnev held control over lives, we knew he did not. God held our lives in the Hollow of His Hand. This day, December 13, 1981 proved it.

The story of Martial Law made its indelible mark on my life and the life of my family. But this is just my story. Anyone who lived those dark days has a story which deserves to be told. The real heroes, the heroes of my heart, are my Polish friends who suffered mental, spiritual, emotional and physical agony through a history we shared. With these words, I pay heartfelt tribute to each of them. You know who you are. I love you dearly and deeply. Looking back, God gave me the privilege to share your history alongside you. You are am amazing people!

I know. I was there.

My Agonizing Question That Refused To Be Answered

Children, please come here; I need to talk to you. When you attend 8th grade, you will read of this day in your history books. But today, I need you to just bake Christmas cookies. I must focus on other matters. The dough is prepared for you in the refrigerator.

So, while the world held its collective breath, my three children made Christmas cookies.

T-55A on the streets during Martial law in Poland J. Żołnierkiewicz 

December 13, 1981, Warsaw, Poland - The day that stays with me forever.
Ringgg. There Grażina stood, ringing the bell at our front gate. Bizarre. What brought her here so early on this December Sunday morning? The shocking answer walked in the door with her. 

Standing in our tiny hallway, Larry’s assistant announced in a nervous, high-pitched voice: Stan Wojenny has been declared! The military controls everything; the entire country stands halted! (Stan Wojenny, English translation: Martial Law)

The Polish population feared this dreaded collision. For month’s political strikes, student protests, and street riots marked the landscape of this nation seeking freedom over Communism. December 13th the surge shifted. “Enough!” The Soviet Union issued an ultimatum to General Jaruzelski, Poland’s leader: “Bring your people under submission or we will do it for you.” 

Now, Soviet tanks lined the Polish-Soviet border. They waited impatiently to give the Polish military one final chance with Martial Law to restore order. The clock ticked like a time bomb. If the government failed, the Kremlin and Leonid Brezhnev sat poised to succeed. 

I collapsed onto the foot of our stairs, as three wide-eyed little people hovered around me. Feeling like a pawn trapped on an international board of chess, I uttered, “Well, my parents were right. They always said something like this would happen.” 

Then a sickening question shoved its way to the forefront of my thinking: 
“Where is Larry? At a time like this, where is Larry?"
Larry departed the previous day, driving through Poland, through Czechoslovakia, into Austria and the free West, to attend a required directors’ conference in Vienna.

Dramatic events now placed the children and me behind the Iron Curtain in a country on the brink of war with the Soviet Union. Closed international borders separated us from Larry. I wondered, “What on earth should I do?”

“If in danger, call Roy.” The predetermined crisis management plan kicked in. I lifted the receiver to telephone our colleague Roy to receive further instructions from him. 

Instantly, I heard the sickening sound of silence. Dead. All phone lines turned off across the entire country with one simple flip of a switch. Further reality descended on Debby: no contact with Roy across town; no contact with Larry across the border; no contact with my family across the ocean.

Bolting to my kitchen table, I turned on our shortwave radio, which sat in the window nearby. Normally, the top of the hour provided a brief five minutes of news from the outside world. But this was not normal. Would the news come through? My heart raced. 

With shaking fingers, I adjusted the dial. The crackling static caused near panic of a jammed broadcast. But then  – it came through! Grabbing the only item available, paper napkins (see below), I feverishly jotted down sketchy notes from the words of the foreign correspondent of the BBC. I felt like I listened to the voice of my best friend.

His reporting removed all doubt: 
Martial Law has been declared in the nation of Poland, and all contact with the outside world is severed. The Soviet military sits poised for intervention on the border between the two nations. Thirty five million citizens are given 48 hours to return to their legal place of registration; a mandatory curfew is enforced. All borders are closed; all international flights and international trains are cancelled.

Hastily, I collected water in the bathtub in the event our water was turned off. Then, I moved through my mental checklist for preparedness:
•    Gasoline stored in canisters in the garage should gasoline be denied
•    Dollars hidden in the freezer if banks closed
•    Extra batteries on hand for the shortwave radio to guarantee five minutes of uncensored news, every hour on the hour 

Yet, no amount of preparedness could answer the nagging, recurring question: “Where is Larry?”

I desperately needed to be alone with The Lord. My missionary manual contained no chapter on Stan Wojenny, but I knew my Bible did. The Soviet Union would have to wait while I talked to Jesus.

The cry of my heart and the question on my mind turned to Psalm 91. In the margin I wrote: Where is Larry? 1st Day of Martial Law, Dec. 13, 1981. The Ancient Words spoke their supernatural peace to this missionary wife’s heart:

Because he loves me, says the Lord, I will rescue him; 
I will protect him, for he acknowledges my name. 
He will call upon me, and I will answer him; 
I will be with him in trouble, 
I will deliver him and honor him. 
With long life will I satisfy him and show him my salvation.

Larry’s whereabouts remained a mystery, but God’s whereabouts remained Rock Solid. His protection surrounded Larry in the mysterious unknown; His presence surrounded the children and me right here at Ulica Dembińskiego 4B, Warsaw, Poland. My faith, though being tested in fire, found solid footing in His Word.

Now what…? Life consumed my attention. 

The day progressed. My children baked cookies; I listened on the hour to the BBC’s five-minute updates. From time to time, I stared at the scene out my window. The slant of the anemic winter sun offered no warmth. Sub zero December temperatures made the landscape appear frozen in time.

Our street stood deathly quiet. The cheerful sounds of neighbors’ greetings - gone. The screeching sounds of trams and buses on their routine routes – gone. The laughing sounds of children jostling and dragging sleds to the nearest hill – gone. Gone - all of it.  Fear hung a foreboding curtain of silence as thick as the frozen layer of ice on the streets. My Żoliborz neighborhood mirrored the paralyzing anxiety that gripped this nation. 

Eventually, Roy came. I still don’t know how he managed, but he did. He came to check on us. 

Together we contemplated: What would happen when darkness fell? What would tomorrow hold? How long would this last? Would the Soviet tanks roll in or would they stay at the border? 

And no, we could not dodge the question: “Where is Larry?” Is he safe or is he in danger? When will we see him? How will we even talk to him with the phones lines cut? Questions without answers stared us in the face. 

Having established contact, our friend set out again to care for his own family. He promised to return in the next couple of days.

Routine offers comfort in the middle of a crisis. I busied myself with the thought of making dinner for the children. As darkness fell, I couldn’t resist one more gaze out the living room curtain before going to the kitchen….

Gasp! What is that?! 

Shock and disbelief gripped my entire being. The brake lights belonged to our car! On the dark frozen street in front of our house stood our automobile and its driver. Fireworks of thanksgiving set off in my soul, and a waterfall of relief washed over my heart.

Questions of confusion exploded, but only one question mattered. "Where is Larry?" Larry is safely back home to us! Because he loves me, says the Lord, I will rescue him; I will protect him, for he acknowledges my name. He will call upon me, and I will answer him; I will be with him in trouble… 

To be continued…