Dear People Who Keep Company With God,
In the 1970’s I had the privilege of hearing Richard Wurmbrand speak. He had been imprisoned and tortured for 14 years in Romanian Communist prisons during the 1950’s and 60’s for his faith in Christ.
I can only remember a few things he said that evening and it didn’t seem very profound, in actuality it was simple on the surface, but I knew what he was saying was real. I left that meeting richer than when I arrived. He had imparted something into me that I did not have before.
Richard wrote a book titled Tortured for Christ that is still in print. I highly recommend the book. Here is what he said about the book, “This book is written not so much with ink, as with the blood of bleeding hearts.”
He also started a ministry called Voice of the Martyrs. It is a non-profit, inter-denominational Christian organization dedicated to assisting the persecuted church worldwide.
The following is something he wrote concerning prayer; it is extraordinary.
“I thank God for the years that I passed in solitary confinement. I was, for three years, thirty feet beneath the earth. I never heard a word. I never spoke a word. There were no books. The outward voices ceased. The guards had felt soled shoes; you did not hear their approach. Then, with time, the inner voices ceased.
We were drugged and beaten. I forgot my whole theology. I forgot the whole Bible. One day I observed that I had forgotten the “Our Father.” I could not say it any more. I knew that it began with “Our Father” but I did not know the continuation. I just kept happy and said, “Our Father, I have forgotten the prayer, but you surely know it by heart. You hear it so many thousand times a day, so you assign an angel to say it for me, and I will just keep quiet.”
For a time my prayers were, “Jesus, I love You.” And then after a little time again, “Jesus, I love You. Jesus, I love You.” Then it became too difficult even to say this because we were doped with drugs that would destroy our minds. We were very hungry. We had one slice of bread a week. There were the beatings, and the tortures, and the lack of light, and other things.
It became impossible to concentrate my mind to even say so much as, “Jesus, I love You.” I abandoned it because I knew that it was necessary. The highest form of prayer that I know is the quiet beating of a heart that loves Him. Jesus should just hear “tick-a-tock, tick-a-tock”, and He would know that every heartbeat is for Him.
And then, one glorious day I got the answer from Jesus: ‘You love me? Now I will show you how I love you.’ At once, I felt a flame in my heart, which burned like the coronal streamers of the sun. The disciples on the way to Emmaus said that their hearts burned when Jesus spoke with them. So it was with me. I knew the love of the One who gave His life on the cross for us all.”
Many Blessings, BW