If Prison Walls Could Speak by Wurmbrand Richard

Author:Wurmbrand, Richard [Wurmbrand, Richard]
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: Religion
ISBN: 9780882640754
Publisher: Living Sacrifice Book Company
Published: 2011-07-31T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 11: Problems of an Underground Church

DEAR BROTHERS AND SISTERS,

Perhaps some of you have met the fighters of the underground church of the Soviet Union when the Red Army invaded our country. What beautiful characters they were, but what intriguing and gruesome stories they told us about their lives.

Now the best of you who are outside prison have no alternative: you must organize an underground work. The official churches either will be closed, or will accept Communist limitations on how much of the gospel can be proclaimed. The small legal opportunities that the Communists leave must be used to the maximum. But we will accept their fragments of freedom on the point of a spear. We will fight to be able to proclaim the whole, which will be possible only in a church like that which existed in the catacombs of Rome. Except that the conditions of modern life, the perfection of police methods and equipment, will make the task much harder.

It makes sense to attempt only what you are able to perform. The Christians of the Soviet Union could organize an underground church. So we shall succeed, too. But I do not approve of everything our Russian brethren told us. Their stories of the heroism of the martyrs thrilled and inspired us. But the best underground church is surely that which has the least number of martyrs, just as the best spy ring is one that remains forever undiscovered. It is not martyrs we want, but victories.

Be careful about accepting new members into the underground church. To be a member of an ordinary church, you have to fulfill two obligations: to believe and to be baptized. Some denominations consider you a member even if you don’t believe, once you have been baptized. But acceptance into the underground church lets a man in on secrets. He will know hidden meeting places and pastors who are wanted by the police. If he cracks under torture, he may destroy a whole organization. To be baptized and to believe is not enough. Paul was a convert for only three days, but he had to be told about one further condition: “how many things he must suffer for My name’s sake” (Acts 9:16).

The capacity to suffer is an absolutely necessary condition for being a member of the underground church. You must teach converts from the very beginning to be like Paul, who submitted to whippings, beatings, countless perils, and imprisonment for the sake of the gospel. They will have to bear such pain with patience, with joy, and with thankfulness.

But it is not only torture for which they must be prepared. Beatings and a certain amount of torture can be borne by every well-prepared Christian who is filled with the Holy Spirit. But just as the atomic weapon is absolute and irresistible, so there are some tortures that men cannot stand. Under torture, Savonarola recanted, and Cranmer’s courage deserted him and he repudiated his own writings. Under such torture Thomas Munzer recanted, too, and so did many Catholic heroes tortured by the Protestants.

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