Possess the Truth

Dear friends and benefactors,

A perceptive child can often spot insincerity or indifference. In Sunday school, when the teacher recounted the story of Jesus’suffferings and death, a child remarked,"The story is not true."

Taken aback, the teacher asked, "What makes you say that?"

"If it were true," the boy replied quietly, "you could not tell it without weeping."

Sorrily, some Christian writers, authors of religious hymns, and preachers are boring; others are very good but burn out quickly; and some become soul-less—perhaps it is because they spend too much of their souls on their work without taking due precautions to refill them daily.

William Cowper wrote the renowned hymn:

"There is a fountain, filled with blood,

Drawn from Emmanuel’s veins,

And sinners plunged beneath that flood

Lose all their guilty stains.

The dying thief rejoiced to see

That fountain in his day,

And there may I, though vile as he,

Wash all my sins away."

One feels there is life in this song. Cowper poured into it the blood of his own heart. In his old age, he suffered several bouts of insanity; he who had written that "the precious blood shall never lose its power" doubted during his depressions that his own sins were washed away by Christ’s sacrifice.

It is necessary that we allow ourselves to be cleansed and purified.

To be in error is dreadful thing, but it is even worse to embrace truth for the wrong reasons: because it is convenient, because it is pleasant, because it is profitable, because it is socially acceptable. God wants us to love the truth. It is the water of life He offers us. Don’t adulterate it with pollutants.

Love truth for its own sake, and it will come to you.

But is there no hurry to find the truth?

St. Augustine says, "You would never have sought the truth if you had not already found it." "The truth induces men to seek the truth," said St. Makarios the Great. And Blaise Pascal wrote, "We could not seek God unless in some real sense we already possessed Him." The fact that you seek truth, that you ask for it, shows you have a love for it. Love for truth is an essential part of truth itself. If you seek it earnestly, you can afford to sit down quietly, like Mary Magdalene.

Which is more real to you, your problem or your-self? You existed before you posed the question to yourself about finding truth. How many hours a day do you seek it even now? You are much bigger and more important than your search for truth.

Don’t throw away the whole of your life for this particular, though valuable, preoccupation—this search for truth. Live your life. When you work, work. When you eat, eat. When you sleep, sleep. When you amuse yourself, amuse yourself. Truth and life are good companions. They are friends, not enemies. You don’t have to exclude the one in order to have the other. Jesus said,"I am the Way." What does this "Way" consist of? He explained Himself immediately: "the Truth and the Life."

Take it easy, take one step at a time, and you will reach the truth. Meanwhile, be yourself.

Truth is the supreme goal, except that truth alone can be nowhere, just as one cannot find either iron or gold alone in the earth; they exist only in combination with other elements.

Jesus said, "I am the way, the truth and the life". if one wishes to know truth, he must know life too. If he wishes to fulfill the demands of truth, he must be attentive to the demands of life as well.

St. Paul taught us to beware of vain philosophy.

Long ago there lived a king who had a very valuable stallion. He appointed a watchman to do nothing else but guard the magnificent animal during the night. To satisfy his concerns, the king arose at night and went to the guard.

"What are you doing?" he asked.

"Well, your majesty, I was just reflecting on why a circle is round and a square rectangular."

The king exclaimed, "I am happy to have in my service a real philosopher. Just continue."

Later in the night, the king went again and asked the watchman, "What were you doing now?"

"I was trying to find out what happens to the hole in a bagel after it is eaten. I did not eat the hole, but notwithstanding it has disappeared."

the king was very pleased to have a soldier with such interesting thoughts. He came a third time and asked the watchman, "What now? What are you thinking?"

"Now I have a really serious problem. There was a stallion in the stable. It is no longer there. Where could it be?"

For the sake of philosophy, he had lost the stallion of truth.

Seek the truth, but be careful not to destroy your life and the lives of other men for the sake of philosophizing about truth. Without men, where will the truth settle and of what good will it be?

The story is told that Pol Pot, the Communist dictator of Cambodia, declared, "I have a truth that will make people happy."

He was asked, "What if your people do not accept your formula of truth?"

He replied, "I will kill al those who oppose the truth. Truth is for me above all things." Out of a population of five million, he killed two million of his own people.

This is the attitude of the inquisitors of all convictions. This is the philosophy of those who tyrannize their families, forcing them to accept what they consider as truth.

God says, "You shall therefore keep My statutes and My judgments, which if a man does, he shall live by them..."

Truth is given that you and others might live by it, not die by it.


Be careful. Be forewarned.

Richard Wurmbrand

Our greatest guest

Our dearly beloved,

Jesus was once told that a Roman officer was worthy of being helped. We may pray for individuals, but our request alone is not sufficient. If others ask us to pray for them, we must understand that our entreaty alone will not help. They must also take steps to sweep with their own brooms—they must allow Christ to cleanse their hearts and lives too. Jesus is the greatest guest you will ever receive into your life.

There is a story about a Christian father who told his son to clean up the garden "because Jesus and His disciples will visit us today." The boy knew Jesus and loved Him, so he worked diligently in the garden before telling his father, "I’m finished."

The father, after walking through the garden, said, " Everything is really clean, but not clean enough for Jesus."

The child went back to the garden with renewed vigor, picking up every withered leaf and every scrap from the pathways. The father then had a second look, saying, "Bravo! The garden is really clean now, but not with the special cleanliness needed for Son of God."

The boy asked, "What is this special cleanliness like?" The father replied, "For such a guest it is not enough to eliminate what is ugly. You must also beautify the garden as never before. Quickly, as a friend of Jesus, plant in it beautiful orchids, roses, and lilies—things it never had before—to adorn it. Then add lights to give it a warm glow. Jesus is a guest of unsurprising excellence and must be hosted accordingly.

Romanian Martyrs

Thinking of this cleansing of the heart, I remember a Romanian martyr. In Communist Romania, many Christians died a martyr’s death. I knew a number of them personally. Nelu Sultaniuc was twenty, in prison for his faith. Hungry, cold, beaten, he fell sick of pulmonary tuberculosis, like so many other prisoners. The prison doctors were unable to help because they had no medicines, but his family brought him streptomycin, the cure for this disease. The political officer of the jail said to him, "I will give you the medicine on one condition: you must become an informer. "Now, the inmates were all there because of their anti-Communist stand. Since Communism is anti-God, what other attitude could a Christian have? Because of this, even their conversation with their cellmates were spied on, in order to provide an excuse for new accusations and longer sentences.

Sultaniuc refused. Matzkevitch, another young Christian (of Jewish origin), also refused. Both died of tuberculosis in jail. They sacrificed their lives to maintain their integrity. What would their lives have profited at such a price? They died as martyrs.

Virgil Ionescu was tied to a chair, with a strong electric lightbulb shining in his eyes. This meant certain blindness. He could escape this torture only by agreeing to be an informer. Today he is completely blind, in utter poverty, but happy to have remained clean in heart.

Problems of Conscience

While I was in Romanian prison (and surely now in Muslim jails), individuals with a tender conscience had problems.

In the morning, the guard would ask through the opening of the door, "How many in this cell?"

Now, if a prisoner had died during the night and we still answered "Sixteen" rather than "Fifteen," we would have an extra piece of bread that day. This was a great boon to a sick prisoner. Should we tell this lie? We remembered that David once did a forbidden thing in order to feed his hungry soldiers (I Samuel 21:1-6). But what about us?

Several times when some prisoner was scheduled for twenty-five lashes with a whip for some trespass against the rules, the Hebrew Christian Milan Haimovici stepped forward and offered to take the beating in place of his fellow prisoner.

Since the guard who specialized in beating did not know the people on his list for the day, it was easy to deceive him. But is it right to tell the obvious lie, "I am so-and-so" in place of another? Isn’t this being deceptive?

We also had other problems besides those of conscience. In winter the Communists would offer the prisoners hot tea and hot soup. We had the choice of declining these and suffering the piercing cold or accepting a little bit of warmth and then suffering the protracted pain of needing to void and not being taken to the toilet. In the end, we sometimes solved the problem by using for this purpose the bowls from which we ate.

The brethren living lives with such choices were far from being depressed. How could they be? They desired to live according to the Bible, which says nothing about being depressed! This word isn’t even mentioned in Scripture. Instead, the Bible tells us to overcome every difficulty with the joy that God is ready to give abundantly to those who ask.

In the Sudan, the priest Bagriel Dwatuka was whipped while he hung from a rope, then salt was rubbed into his wounds. He and others who were beaten were obligated to say "Thank you " after every ordeal.

A Christian can do this even when not constrained. Those who hurt us ennoble us if we understand the mystery of suffering.

In the Sudan, many Christians have been killed. Some were confined in churches and tied to chairs with thick ropes. A Muslim officer then said, "We are going to shoot you in your church. May God come and save you!" Then the soldiers emptied their guns on the helpless people and the building was set on fire. We are shipping help to Sudanese Christians.

The martyrs live outside of time. The apostle Paul wrote, referring to such martyrs, "We are surrounded by them as by a great could of witnesses." they have been the inspiration of our mission, which publicizes the heroic stories of martyrs in over forty languages. They "surround" us when we preach, write, and minister to the needs of today’s martyrs and their families.

Jesus desires to work together with His church. If you are willing to let Him unite with you will continue on the path of the heroes of the faith, past and present.

In our own Christian life and work we should all show ourselves worthy of the abundant blessings God gives us by being faithful to Him. May God bless you !



Your in Christ,

Richard Wurmbrand

Easter Message of the Director

Dear friends and benefactors,

After the period of Great Lent, time of prayer and asceticism, time for sharing, we are coming closer to the time of the painful passion of Christ, which precedes the time of great joy, his Resurrection. We had time to reflect on ourselves, our relations with others, and our relationship to God. In this journey towards the light of the Resurrection, we must listen to the voice of our conscience that tells us to be merciful.

By the time you read this, our envoys will be in Eastern Europe, Romania and Hungary to provide assistance and support to those suffering because of all the social inequalities in these areas. Some rich people, including some individuals of the former torturers, benefit while the vast majority live below the poverty line. We also respond to the invitation for our delegates to participate in meetings of the aid missions involved in these countries so that efforts are coordinated. Our mission will meet friends from different countries who have been helping for years to rebuild a life of faith and a more just society in that region.

Help right now by giving them a gift by calling 450-967-7792. Have your credit card with you.
Thus, you realized in the past acts of faith and of charity while helping our mission to accomplish its projects. All that we undertook is under the sign of your big love! The command of charity is situated in the same heart of our life of faith. Help all these well-loved martyrs, when you bring to them again and again your assistance. Find happiness to give... Put your gifts to the service of these martyrs and God will help you.

We are all concerned about the difficulties of the brothers and sisters of the regions of the Caribbean (Mexico, Ecuador, Haiti), and also from Romanian country, Slovakia, Ukraine, Russia...

Your gifts can create once again, more joy. An illustrated Gospel for children costs $5; the average salary is of $40 a month; a prayer book costs $5; a car costs $5,000 and people cannot pay it. Your gifts can make us much more effective. Help us to contribute again to the reconstruction of faith in these countries deteriorated by extreme poverty and by atheisms!
It is now the privileged moment for us to be ready to help, to bring the joy in the homes and the communities where faith is so low, after so long and so much suffering.

We send our gifts exclusively to the persons in charge of the communities that we know, to the families in suffering and in scarcity of everything, that distribute the gifts. More than a million youth await our gifts and our books. Help us to distribute good to them!

And pray for the success of our apostolate, for we need your prayers! In the expectation of your contribution that we hope will be generous, please receive the thanks of God that awaits your gifts.

Yours, in the service of our Lord,

Rev. Radu Roscanu, director of the Mission