[Faith-talk] Good Night Message for Saturday, March 2, 2013

[Paul]

Hello and good day to all of you, whether that be for you morning, afternoon or evening.  Here in the Americas it's evening and, depending where in our hemisphere you happen to reside, time to at least prepare our hearts for tomorrow to receive the Word of the Lord as imparted to us by our pastors and/or Sunday School teachers.  More importantly, I pray that, as we will hear and learn from hopefully those Godly people, that we will apply the same to our individual lives as the gracious Holy Spirit will enable.  I also hope and pray that you on the other side of our world had the same thing.

OK, I know that you are all in suspense waiting for the conclusion of this exciting and thrilling story.  As I stated yesterday, even though God's name is not explicitly mentioned, that He was acting "behind the scenes" in the drama.  
For biblical proof of the same, look at the Hebrew version of the Book of Esther found in most Bibles.  As you recall, we left Herman and Company in that German concentration camp in the middle of World War II, and now we pick up the story entitled "The Girl With the Apple," Part Two.

We were at Theresienstadt for three months.  The war was winding down and Allied forces were closing in, yet my fate seemed sealed.  On May 10, 1945, I was scheduled to die in the gas chamber at 10:00 a.m.  In the quiet of dawn, I tried to prepare myself.  So many times death seemed ready to claim me, but somehow I'd survived.  Now, it was over.  I thought of my parents.  At least, I thought, we will be reunited.  At 8:00 a.m. there was a commotion.  I heard shouts and saw people running every which way through camp.  I caught up with my brothers.  Russian troops had liberated the camp! The gates swung open.  Everyone was running, so I did, too.  Amazingly, all of my brothers had survived; I'm not sure how.  But I knew that the girl with the apples had been the key to my survival.  In a place where evil seemed triumphant, one person's goodness had saved my life, had given me hope in a place where there was none.  My mother had promised to send me an angel, and the angel had come.

Eventually, I made my way to England, where I was sponsored by a Jewish charity, put up in a hostel with other boys who had survived the Holocaust, and trained in electronics.  Then I came to America, where my brother Sam had already moved.  I served in the U.S. Army during the Korean War and returned to New York City after two years.  By August 1957 I'd opened my own electronics repair shop.  I was starting to settle in.

One day my friend Sid, who I knew from England, called me.  "I've got a date.  She's got a Polish friend.  Let's double date."

A blind date? Nah, that wasn't for me.  But Sid kept pestering me, and a few days later we headed up to the Bronx to pick up his date and her friend Roma.  I had to admit, for a blind date, this wasn't so bad.  Roma was a nurse at a Bronx hospital.  She was kind and smart.  Beautiful, too, with swirling brown curls and green, almond-shaped eyes that sparkled with life.

The four of us drove out to Coney Island.  Roma was easy to talk to, easy to be with.  Turned out she was wary of blind dates, too! We were both just doing our friends a favor.  We took a stroll on the boardwalk, enjoying the salty Atlantic breeze, and then had dinner by the shore.  I couldn't remember having a better time.

We piled back into Sid's car, Roma and I sharing the backseat.  As European Jews who had survived the war, we were aware that much had been left unsaid between us.  She broached the subject.  "Where were you," she asked softly, "During the war?"

"The camps," I said, with terrible memories still vivid, the irreparable loss.  I had tried to forget.  But you never forget.

She nodded.  "My family was hiding on a farm in Germany, not far from Berlin," she told me.  My father knew a priest, and he got us Aryan papers." I imagined how she must have suffered, too, with fear a constant companion.  And yet, here we were, both survivors, in a new world.  "There was a camp next to the farm," Roma continued.  "I saw a boy there, and I would throw him apples every day."

What an amazing coincidence that she had helped some other boy.  "What did he look like?" I asked.

"He was tall.  Skinny.  Hungry.  I must have seen him every day for six months."

My heart was racing.  I couldn't believe it.  This couldn't be.  "Did he tell you one day not to come back because he was leaving Schlieben?"

Roma looked at me in amazement.  Yes."

"That was me!" I was ready to burst with joy and awe, flooded with emotions.  I couldn't believe it.  My angel.  "I'm not letting you go," I said to Roma.  And in the back of the car on that blind date, I proposed to her.  I didn't want to wait.

"You're crazy!" she said.  But she invited me to meet her parents for Shabbat dinner the following week.  There was so much I looked forward to learning about Roma, but the most important things I always knew:  her steadfastness, her goodness.  For many months, in the worst of circumstances, she had come to the fence and given me hope.  Now that I'd found her again, I could never let her go.  That day, she said yes.  And I kept my word:  After nearly 50 years of marriage, two children and three grandchildren, I have never let her go.

And there you have the story, albeit in two parts.  Secularists and atheists would just call this incident a mere coincidence.  I personally think not.  To conclude the matter, you be the judge.

And now may the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob just keep us safe, individually and collectively, throughout this night or day and especially in these last days in hwich we live.  Your Christian friend and brother, Paul