... As quickly as we could for the press of people, Betsie and I made our way to the rear of the dormitory room where we held our worship "service". Around our own platform area there was not enough light to read the Bible, but back here a small light bulb cast a wan yellow circle on the wall, and here an even larger group of women gathered... with each moment the crowd around us would swell, packing the nearby platforms, hanging over the edges, until the high structures groaned and swayed.
At last Betsie or I would open the Bible. Because only the Hollanders could understand the Dutch text we would translate aloud in German. And then we would hear the life-giving words passed back along the aisles in French, Polish, Russian, Czech, back into Dutch. They were little previews of Heaven, these evenings beneath the light bulb. I would think of Haarlem, each substantial church set behind its wrought iron fence and its barrier of doctrine. And I would know again that in darkness God's truth shines most clear.
At first Betsie and I called these meetings with great timidity. But as night after night went by and no guard ever came near us, we grew bolder. So many now wanted to join us that we held a second service after evening roll call. There on the Lagerstrasse we were under rigid surveillance, guards in their warm wool capes marching constantly up and down. It was the same in the center room of the barracks: half a dozen guards or camp police always present. Yet in the large dormitory room there was almost no supervision at all. We did not understand it.
This has nothing to do with this post, but there are more pictures up in the Photo Album. :)
ReplyDeleteI am planning to finish the serial with the final post very soon. I "scanned" the page into Hannah's camera before we left. (The book was Angela's.)
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