Corrie ten Boom

One of my favorite Christian women, famous for hiding Jews from the Germans during WWII, was Corrie ten Boom. There is much to be found about Corrie on the internet. And there is a book and a movie telling her complete story, both titled “The Hiding Place”,

For our purposes here, I will give a brief synopsis of Corrie’s story, and then in the days to come I’ll look at specifics of her story in light of the scriptures that guided and helped Corrie and her family through all that they endured in obedience to the Lord.

At the time that Corrie and her family began working as part of the Christian underground to save the Jews from the atrocities of the Germans, Corrie lived in a house in Haarlem, Holland, with her father, who was a watchmaker, and with one older and much-beloved sister, Betsie. They were all members of the Dutch Reformed Church, loved Jesus Christ, and because the Bible called the Jews “God’s chosen people” (and because Jesus was Himself a Jew) they loved the Jews as well. It didn’t take much family discussion to make the right decision to risk whatever might come their way in order to help the Jews during that terrible period in history. They were all in absolute agreement. In fact, it was the discovery that Corrie’s brother Wilhelm, a Christian minister, was already part of the secret underground movement that helped them decide just how to help the Jews. They ended up having a secret room built into their home, which was above their father’s watch shop. The room was large enough to hide several people for a short period of time. They soon were able to smuggle Jewish people into their home, along with occasional members of the underground, where they all lived together tightly, but fairly comfortably, with the “guests” having to resort to hiding in the secret room only when someone came to the door.

But eventually they were found out. The German police came one day and arrested every member of the ten Boom family in the house: Corrie, her very elderly father, her sister Betsie, and her brother Wilhelm who happened to be visiting. The well-hidden Jews, however, were never discovered, and eventually, with the help of the underground, were able to safely escape. Meanwhile, the ten Boom family, after being beaten and interrogated, but revealing nothing about the hidden Jews to the German police, were all sent to a nearby prison, where the girls were separated from their father and brother. Their father died early on from illness. Wilhelm also died later at a concentration camp. Corrie and Betsie, after spending months in the local prison, eventually were taken to the dreaded Ravensbruck concentration camp.

They were housed in a barrack built for 400, but containing 1400 women. The building was so flea-infested, that even the guards avoided entering it, something that the ten Boom sisters later came to acknowledge was God’s provision for them, even as horrible as it was living with fleas! A small Dutch Bible had been smuggled to Corrie before she was transported to Ravensbruck, and she was miraculously able to smuggle it past the guards when she entered the concentration camp. That little Bible became not only a source of comfort and hope for Corrie and Betsie, but also for many of the women in their barrack. It spoke to them of God’s love and life everlasting, and gave them hope in the midst of that terrible death camp. It was only because the guards so greatly avoided their building, that they were able every evening to read the words of the Bible amongst themselves without being found out and being punished for it….all because of the fleas!

Life in Ravensbruck was as brutal as at other camps, in some ways more so: long hard work days, barely any food, the fleas, very early morning roll calls in the bitter cold, daily shootings, women being sent daily to gas chambers. Corrie and Betsie felt they were experiencing “hell on earth”. And yet, in the midst of all of their suffering, they read of the horrible suffering Jesus also endured for their sakes, and in this they were comforted. Corrie, being by personality very stubborn, had greater difficulty dealing with the fleas and the terrible living conditions. But Betsie seemed to have some sort of peace with it all and seemed closer than ever to the Lord, even though she suffered more than Corrie because of her physical weakness and ill-health throughout the entire ordeal. Her deteriorated state caused her to be slower than others at her work, for which the guards beat her severely, and over which Corrie was incensed! But Betsie refused to allow hatred for those guards to enter into her heart. She prayed for them as much as she did for her fellow-prisoners.

Betsie later died in Ravensbruck from malnutrition and illness, but not before the Lord gave her very specific visions about future events that Corrie would see come to pass. Nevertheless, Corrie was heartbroken at the loss of her sister. Then, only a few days after Betsie’s death, Corrie, miraculously, was released by what she later learned was an administrative error, just a week before all the women of her age were executed at the camp. She returned to Holland, and later moved to the United States, traveling extensively to tell hers and Betsie’s story and how good God had been to them through it all.

What Corrie endured, or more importantly how she endured it, will be the topic of study (and hopefully discussion) for awhile here, as the Lord leads. Meanwhile, I leave you with a scripture that Corrie’s father recited from memory to his family on the day of their arrest: “You are my hiding place and my shield; I hope in Your word.” (Psalm 119:115 NKJV)