Reading "The Hiding Place"

One of the things about teaching English is that you have to read all of the books you assign to your students. And when I'm in the first year of teaching four different levels of English (6th, 7th, and 8th grade at my school, and my 10th grade daughter and a couple of her friends at home), that means I have to do a lot of reading to keep up.

My daughter and her friends were assigned – by me – the autobiography The Hiding Place to read a couple months ago. If you're not familiar with Corrie ten Boom or her story, you really must read this. She and her Dutch family were sent to a concentration camp (where her father and sister died) because they hid Jews from the Nazis in a secret room in their home, along with a great deal of other dangerous work they did for the Underground in the Netherlands.

I mainly chose this book for the kids because I wanted them to read at least one biography/autobiography this year, and they covered the Holocaust in history that month, so it seemed appropriate. (Yes, my daughter also read Night by Elie Weisel, in case you literature buffs are wondering. She wrote a fascinating essay comparing the two stories: how Elie lost his faith in the camps while Corrie found hers.) And I constantly heard great things about Corrie ten Boom and her book when I was a child.

The hidden room in the ten Boom house.

So, of course, I had to read it first. And now I understand what the fuss was about.

Oh, my gosh, this book.

I would read one chapter and then have to stop and think and pray. So many things God had to teach me through the reading of this book.

For example, I was struck by the character of Betsie, the author's sister. She was almost too good to be true. In fact, my daughter mentioned that she thought it was a good thing Corrie wrote the book and not Betsie because the reader could relate more to Corrie and her struggles and doubts. Betsie's faith was so rock solid. Her compassion, even for her enemies, was unfathomable. Upon hearing the name of the man who betrayed them to the authorities, she said, "I pray for him whenever his name comes to my mind. How dreadfully he must be suffering!"

Oh, Lord, give me Your love like that, to desire the best for others despite what they've done to me.

I will probably never forget the story of Betsie leading Corrie to thank God for the fleas in their new barracks – because scripture told them to give thanks in all things. And of course, not until much later do they find out that the fleas kept the guards from coming into their barracks, which allowed them to hold Bible studies in there, among other things. A valid reason to be thankful for them.

Lord, give me that kind of faith, that everything in my life is ordained by You and deserving of my gratitude.

While I read, I kept thinking, I could never do this. I could never be this strong or this brave. I could never put myself on the line like this. But then I read how, at the end, when she was released from the concentration camp, Corrie tried to go on working for the Underground and couldn't. She was seized with fear on her first "mission." That's when she realized that the only reason she and her family had been able to do what they had done was because God had empowered them with the strength and courage to do it. Now, He had different work for her, and so the power for this particular work was not there anymore.

Lord, help me always remember that I don't have to fear whatever trials my future may hold, because You are already empowering me to face them when the time comes. Fresh manna for each day . . . with none to save for tomorrow.

I really need to read more biographies. I never seem to put them down as the same person I was when I picked them up.

Lessons from 1912

I found a link the other day to an exam given to 8^th grade students in 1912. So, because the girls and I were sitting around bored, I started quizzing them.

Good heavens. I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. So I laughed – a lot.

We laughed more and more as the night went on. The funniest moment for me was when I asked them who invented the cotton gin. "Martin Luther!" my eldest called. "Kabalevsky!" the youngest screamed. I decided to just content myself with the fact that a good number of kids their age don't know who Martin Luther is to even offer him as a joke answer, and even less have probably even HEARD of Kabalevsky.

But to be fair, I wouldn't have passed the test either. Not even the grammar section, and we all know what a grammar diva I am. "What properties have verbs?" Yeah, right. And I took some comfort in the fact that these 1912 kids had one hundred years less of history to learn than we did. So, I don't mourn my inability to "sketch briefly Peter Stuyvesant."

It also has occurred to me, when I've seen such items in the past, that we can't necessarily compare those kids to ours. While I would argue that we need to do a better job of educating our children these days, still, comparing public school results today to public school results in 1912 is like comparing apples and oranges.

In 1912, they did not have this lofty goal of "No Child Left Behind." America has decided that every single student in the country needs to be equally well-educated. That was not the goal in 1912. A much smaller percentage of students were attending school back then. Many did not have access to schools . . . many had to work to support their families and couldn't take the time for school . . . and many, frankly, just couldn't cut it in school, and they quit. And they were allowed to quit. It's much easier to hold your students to a higher standard when you don't have to worry about getting EVERY student to that standard.

That's the thing about high standards: they sometimes give the illusion of grand success, but they often reflect a reality of selective success.

My daughter had a different reaction to the test, however. In the car the next day (after finishing her history assignment for the morning over the second World War), she said, "You know, it's weird to think that those kids in 1912 knew nothing at all about either of the World Wars."

They didn't. They had no idea that these stunning, cataclysmic, world-changing events were just around the corner in their lives. Life probably seemed to them pretty calm, pretty smooth, pretty much like this is how it has always been and always will be.

Makes you wonder, doesn't it? In thirty years, what stunning, cataclysmic, world-changing events could disrupt the calm, smooth lives of MY teenagers?

I almost shudder to think.

On Elections, Prayer, and William Wilberforce

My Iowa friends have been posting pictures of themselves meeting presidential candidates. 'Tis the season.

It was quite an experience living in the Hawkeye state for the 2012 caucuses. Candidates were everywhere. We simply stopped answering the phone because we got pre-recorded calls from one campaign or another all day long. By the last week, I was erasing 10-12 messages from our voicemail every night -- including the occasional one that sounded suspiciously like it might have been the actual candidate on the phone and made me kind of wish I'd picked up the receiver and asked the man a few questions.

Despite such annoyances, I liked being in Iowa for a presidential election. Frankly, it was the only time I've ever felt like my vote mattered much, like it might actually make a difference in things. But I think I'm grateful not to be there this year because I have no bloody clue who I would vote for.

I hate elections. Admittedly, I would probably hate any alternative even more; they are a necessary evil in a free society, which is where I want to live. But the process of choosing people to represent us in the government has become such an unsavory one. I despair of our being able to elect an intelligent, capable, and moral person to national office unless it just happens by accident.

For Christmas, I got Eric Metaxas' book Amazing Grace about the life of William Wilberforce, the man behind the abolition of the slave trade in Britain. Great book. Great, great book. Highly recommended.

Interesting thing about Wilberforce: he didn't become a believer until after he was pretty well established in the House of Commons. In fact, the man who eventually became the nation's moral compass was something of a moral mess when he was elected to Parliament. And it sounds like he couldn't have been elected if he had been otherwise. Parliament was so corrupt at the time, Wilberforce pretty much had to buy his way into office.

Once he met Jesus and his life turned around, he was convinced he would need to resign, that remaining in his elected position would have to be inconsistent with his new convictions. It was John Newton (former slave ship captain and author of the lyrics to the famous hymn "Amazing Grace") who convinced him that he needed to stay where he was -- that perhaps God had brought him to this place "for such a time as this." And the rest is world-changing history.

Reading about Wilberforce convicted me in so many ways. But it also changed my approach to and my attitude about elections and government.

As I said, I despair of our electing a righteous person to the office of president -- rightly or wrongly, that's where I'm at. I fear the the election process has become such that it requires things of our potential leaders that make them decidedly less than righteous, moral, or ethical.

But Wilberforce's story reminds me that God isn't hampered by that fact. God is in the life-changing business, and our elected officials are not beyond His reach. If God can change an 18th century British Parliamentarian and use him in such a mighty way, He can certainly do that with a 21st century American president.

So while I will still vote my conscience this year, hoping for a candidate that has the moral direction I want in a leader, I will not be discouraged at my lack of choices or my apparent impotence in the matter. I am not impotent. I am a pray-er. And God still uses pray-ers to move the world, perhaps even by moving the moral compasses of the ungodly people in power.

Christmas and the Six C's of History

Mrs. A is the history teacher extraordinaire at our school, and last Friday, she had lunch with my daughter and her homeschool cohorts to discuss the six C's of history: change over time, causality, context, complexity, contingency, and connection. To think like a historian, you need to look for these things in the stories you study.

This conversation came back again in church yesterday as we talked about Joseph.

See, as much hullabaloo as Christmas gets, we need to remember that it is the lesser of the two primary Christian holidays. The Christmas story is only the prelude to the real story -- the one we celebrate on Easter.  But, of course, Easter wouldn't have happened without Christmas. Contingency.

And our view of the Christmas story is pretty sentimentalized. As Aaron, our Sunday School teacher pointed out, while Luke's presentation of the story could be almost lullaby-ish (and that's the one you hear the most), Matthew's brings out the brutality of the age. Herod the king was a genuine lunatic; that slaughter of hundreds of babies was bloody and unspeakable. Picture this happening in a middle eastern country today and the international outcry it would cause. But back then, the king was the king, and he did what he wanted. Change over time.

Joseph must have been a pretty resourceful man to pick up his wife and newborn at the drop of a hat, in response to a warning in a dream, and move them to Egypt (the closest place out of Herod's jurisdiction) and just live there for a couple years. Finding a way to make a living and a place to live among a people of a different language, culture, and religion. We have romantic images in our mind of them camping out or something down there for a couple weeks . . . no, it was years. Herod died and his son took over. They had started a new life. And then they picked up and came home again at another angel's instructions in a dream. Causality . . . complexity . . . and prophetic fulfillment thrown in there, to boot.

But a certain detail of the story stuck out to me yesterday. When Mary was found to be pregnant, this was scandalous. Actually, scandal is hardly the word for it. Extramarital sex is so commonplace anymore, a single woman getting pregnant is hardly news these days, unfortunately. But the Jewish law said that Mary could be stoned to death. Joseph had every right to call her out and have her executed. Context.

But he didn't. Even before the angel came to fill him in on what was going on with this baby, he had already made the decision to "put her away quietly." Just end the relationship. No public condemnation. Leaving her alone with a baby may sound cold-hearted to the modern ear, but folks, this was a tremendous act of mercy on his part. More context.

Fascinating to think: the whole story could have ended right there. She's my betrothed -- she's pregnant -- it's not mine -- hand her over to the authorities for punishment, which was death. Had that happened, of course, God would have found another way to save the world, but He chose these people for this task because he knew that wouldn't happen. He knew Joseph. He knew he was merciful. He knew he would hear God's voice and obey. And the Christmas story -- and therefore the Easter story -- depended on Joseph's mercy and obedience.

Contingency.

So much depends on mercy and obedience. So much that we are not even the least bit aware of. This small act of mercy . . . this seemingly insignificant act of obedience . . . could have monumental effects on your life, other lives, society, even history. I must never forget to be merciful and to obey.

And there, my friends, is connection.