My husband and I currently have guests staying with us: one couple is my husband's sister and her husband who have driven here from Michigan, the other couple, childhood friends of my husband and his sister, have flown here from what once was, for 28 terrible years, Communist East Germany. The latter two were only children when their hometown became Communist. Thus, they have lived most of their lives in a state of war or a state of occupation by Americans first, British second, and finally, by the Russian Communists to whom they and their country were handed over as part of a peace negotiation; the same country and even the same town that my husband and his immediate family daringly escaped from more than 60 years ago, while my husband was still a child.
When our guests, whose families did not escape, speak of the events leading up to the taking down of the Wall over 20 years ago that divided East Germany from West Germany, they become overwhelmed with emotion. While no comparison can be made to anything else when describing the horrors of living in a Nazi concentration camp, still the intensity of emotions displayed by our guests clearly defines, for me at least who has lived always in freedom, what value liberty has to those who have had it taken away from them, been made prisoners in a "camp" of a different type for 28 long years, and then suddenly, almost overnight, had freedom restored to them again.
In my attempt to grasp the depth of those emotions I was seeing in our guests as they talked, I went online (after all had gone to bed for the night) and viewed videos of the taking down of the wall in 1989. Here's some of what I saw on those videos:
Confusion: When the announcement was made that people were going to be free to cross the border again, hundreds of people in the city of East Berlin stormed the gate areas or the wall itself only to be told by the guards there that there was a mistake, it wasn't true that they were free to walk out of Communist East Germany.
Distrust: While neither the guards nor the people became violent towards each other, words were exchanged indicating that once more the people could not trust those in authority to be honest, and the people, who had been given a "teaser" of freedom were not going to back down now.
Mass persistence and courage: You could just see the courage rise up in the people as they seemed to decide that this regime was beginning to lose its strong-hold on them; they began to test the waters. First two young men went over the wall and walked towards the guards who did nothing to repel them. In only a moment or two longer many others went over the wall.
Freedom! Once through the gate and actually standing on free West German soil, there were many quick backward glances to make sure they were not about to be attacked from behind, and then, seeing that the guards were just standing and watching and making no attempt to change anything, their faces took on looks of unbelief followed by huge smiles of joy, unbridled excitement, jumping up and down for joy, dancing with one another, hugging one another, and tears….
…tears that were being shed at the same moment far away in America and elsewhere by those Germans, such as my husband and his sister, who had managed to escape; but at the cost of never seeing again some of their elderly loved ones who could not go through the rigors of escape and were left behind; pain still clearly felt when remembering the terrors of war and occupation, and for many, even communism. Tears that are shed again when being reunited with friends or family, such as our guests, who hadn't seen each other in over 50 years.
How much does someone, like our guests who have had no liberty for so long, value that liberty that they now have? And how about us?
So much can be said here about our current battles, militarily and politically, to keep us free in this country. But as critically important as it is to maintain freedom in our country, there is an even greater liberty that we need to fight for and maintain once we have it. And that's the liberty which the Son of God, Jesus Christ, has provided to us through His death and resurrection.
How much do we value that liberty? Do we really understand what that liberty means to us?
We'll discuss our spiritual liberty – the terrorist regime we have been freed from and the value of that freedom - in the next posting.
While you were describing the emotional gambit your relatives faced while living under Communism and afterwards when the people actually realized they were free, made me think of what the disciples and women who followed Jesus must have felt at the very moment the found that their Savior had not truly died, but had overcome death and was standing there before them in the flesh. They experienced a joy that only someone who has been imprisoned, then freed, could understand.
ReplyDeleteThose of us who are Christians also understand. We were imprisoned by Evil, the belief that nothing we did really mattered. We could act upon our selfish desires without cost to others, and even if it did affect others, who cares was our motto and is the motto of unbelievers today. They believe we have only one life…and nothing beyond.
Thankfully, Christ possessed the key to unlock our chains and we are now free. Free to have a personal relationship with our Heavenly Father, free to share in our adoptive inheritance, free to worship our Lord and Savior.
On a side note; when you describe the reaction of the East Germany’s prior to and after the Wall coming down, you speak of their distrust of their government. I believe many Americans today feel similarly towards our government. Distrust about the money running through the hands of our elective officials without rhyme or reason, of course some Americans belief that we should not be at war, and many other reasons for distrust of our government. My personal belief is American is quickly changing into a country I do not recognize. GW