Reading the Bible Slowly — Richard Wurmbrand

Reading Genesis Slowly and the Beauty of Scripture

Dear sisters and very beloved little children, my text for today is from the first chapter of Genesis, verse 1. In the beginning, God created heaven and earth. Now you will wonder why I read this verse so slowly.

That is what my sermon is about, about reading slowly. The Bible is a book apart. For the first time, men circled around the moon, they read from the Bible. Soviet astronauts also circled around the moon.

They would also have liked to read something. But what should they have read from the book of Lenin? Shoot? Kill? Destroy? Oppress? Make dictatorships? There is not one beautiful page in the works of Lenin, so they preferred not to read anything.

The first food which a man ever took while walking on the moon was, as you know, Holy Communion. The Soviets also were very near to the moon. What conspicuous thing could they have done? What should they have eaten?

I come from a communist country. In my fatherland, in Romania, Christian prisoners were compelled by beatings and tortures to eat their own excrements and to drink urine after these have been consecrated in a holy mass said by a Catholic priest who was half-mad already because of tortures and didn't know anymore what he does.

I don't judge him. Now suppose the first Russian will go on the moon to show what the Soviet Union is about he would have to announce over the television now I eat excrements and I drink urine because it is this which we give to eat to those who believe in Christ in our country.

Supporting Persecuted Christians and Broadcasting the Gospel

The Bible is, I think, a part also in another respect. I read to you this verse so slowly because I am director of an organization called Jesus to the Communist World. Our organization helps the persecuted Christians in communist countries.

We smuggle into them Bibles and Christian literature. We do a thing which we think right. But we help families of Christian martyrs. Only in the Soviet Union there are around one million Christians in jail today.

We consider it wrong that while they sit in prisons their children should hunger. You think about it as you like yourself. But our mission is also broadcasting the gospel to communist countries in Russia, in China.

They don't have Bibles as we have. So we broadcast the Bible in dictation speech giving them the possibility to write it down by hand. In the beginning. God! Hallelujah! There is a God! And what does this God create?

God created, before he created earth, he created a heaven where the earthly beings should go. A wonderful heaven. And they write slowly, word after word. And they rejoice about every word of this Bible.

There are two kinds of drunkards. Some, a glass of wine. These are not the real drunkards. The real drunkards, look at it. And the real readers of the Bible are those, our Russian and our Chinese brethren who write the Bible by hand and so taste the beauty of every word.

What a wonderful name, Jesus. I have said Jesus. Now, Jesus is like honey in the mouth. Normally we should say, it's so beautiful. They write it out, letter after letter. Would you write the Bible by hand?

If you would not have it. Would you value it so much? Now, why do we consider that it is so important to broadcast the Bible or, as much as we can, we smuggle it in? I know that as for myself the Bible is a book which has made me happy.

I passed through Nazi prisons. My family has been killed under the Nazis. I have passed through some 14 years of communist prisons. I have had a life of hardship outwardly. But even in communist prisons, I and other Christian prisoners, we danced for joy.

But literally, we danced. If we would not have danced, our hearts would have ran in pieces. So big was our joy. In solitary cells. Thirty feet beneath the earth. Not seeing during years sun, moon, snow, flowers, stars.

Never seeing a child for 14 years. Never seeing a lady. Never having a Bible, nor any other book. We rejoice as many American millionaires don't rejoice. An American millionaire can also rejoice when he has Christ.

We rejoice because of what the Bible gave to us. And now we feel this duty to share our joy with those who are forcibly hindered by the communists to know about this joy. The one great joy which the Bible gave to me was justification.

Forgiveness, Justification, and the Righteousness of Christ

We hear in America very much about forgiveness of sins. Forgiveness of sins and being justified of your sins are not the same thing. The Bible tells us that a man who owed to a king very much, he had all his debts canceled.

He had his sins forgiven. But then he had done something wrong. And he was called back and was said, I canceled the forgiveness and now you have to pay the whole debt. A pardon can be canceled. If I am released from prison on parole, I can be put back in prison.

But if the jury acquits me, if I am justified, then never again could I be put in prison for what I have done. And the Bible tells not only about forgiveness of sins, but in Romans 3, 24, it tells us that we are justified.

Justified means in English, you will observe, you will have observed already, that my English is real when you speak English with a foreign accent. So I will explain to you. Justified means in English, just as if I never sinned.

That is what justified means. We are justified before God. A snail is not forgiven for coming slowly. It is justified. It is a snail. It could not come otherwise. And the Bible tells us that we have it to do with a Savior who knows our weakness.

He has been in the flesh like we. In Hebrews 4, 15 it is written, We have not a high priest which can't be touched with the feeling of our infirmities, but was in all points tempted like as we are. Yet without sin, he has full understanding for what we have done amiss, and he justifies us.

He took upon himself our sins. It is written in history that Aeschylus, one of the great Greek writers of antiquity, he had been sentenced to death and had to be executed. But came to the place of execution his brother, who had lost an arm fighting for Athens, for Greece.

And he shew the stump which he had instead of an arm, and said, I have paid the debt of my brother. Free him, and Aeschylus has been freed. That is what Christ has done for us. He has untied me of all my sins, of all my burdens, and sentenced.

And in prison we could dance, knowing that the Communists look upon us as being the worst of men. But in the eyes of God I am justified, and I will use a very daring language perhaps, Jesus Christ is not a little bit cleaner before God than I am.

If you have been washed by the blood of Jesus Christ, if you have repented of your sins, if you have received him as your savior, you are whiter than snow, you have all the righteousness which he has.

He doesn't have a little bit of righteousness which is not also mine. Because I and he, we have become one. Jesus when he meets Saul of Tars, he says, why does thou persecute me? Saul of Tars could have answered, I never persecuted you, I persecuted your disciples.

But Jesus does not know any difference between him and his disciples. When he speaks about his disciples, he says, me, you have persecuted me. And I am meant, when I speak about Jesus, also not to say he, but to say me.

And so when I read the Bible, and I see how kind and gentle and good Jesus has been, I say to myself, now Burmbrandt, you are really a nice guy. Look how gentle you are. Look how kind you are, you didn't even know it.

Because he is me, and we are he. We are one, one single mystical body in which he is the head, justified forever. Whatever has been in the past is erased, as if it would never have been. Where is the snow of ten years ago?

It is gone forever. And this gives the Christians an unspeakable boldness, I admire St. Peter for his boldness when speaking before the Jews. In Acts chapter 3, verse 14, it was only a couple of weeks after he had denied the Lord, feeding a servant maid.

And now he preaches to the Jews, and says, ye denied the Holy One, and the just, and desired a murderer, ye denied. They could have answered, we denied, you denied. And he would have answered, not me.

What I have done is erased, justified before God. Christ has been in the flesh and has known our human weakness. He has been tempted as I have been tempted in that night. He has died for my sins. I am a free man, free from everything which is past.

And I have even the freedom of condemning sins in others. That is what Christ has done for me. He has overruled even all my past sins, so that they should also have worked together for the good. The former zeal of Saul in persecuting Christians has been overruled, making from him a zealous apostle.

The former loose life of St. Mary Magdalene made her now to love much great musicians, as Richard Wagner, for example, will use also discordances in order to create big musical themes. God will overrule also what has been wrong in your life.

You only today surrender to Jesus, believe in things, and you will be justified. You will be as men who have never sinned, whiter as the snow, clean before God, as clean as Jesus himself is. All bad things of the past will be past.

The Gospel to Christians Behind the Iron Curtain

Now this is very important to be known by every man. All hail the power of Jesus Christ, crown him king of all. Now all does not mean all Pasadena. It means also Red China, it means Russia, it means Romania, and the other communist countries.

And therefore we smuggle Bibles into them, and as I told you, we dictate to them the Bible they need. So many thousands of Christians in the Soviet Union are in lunatic asylums. I have published several books, which I hope you will have when you go out, books based on excerpts from the Soviet press.

The Soviet press boasts that on one single day, in one single town, they have put in an asylum 82 Christians, these having shown signs of craziness by prolonged prayer. Prolonged prayer is a sign of craziness.

We have this morning brethren who are in straitjackets and gags. But these brethren dare the torture, because before being put in the lunatic asylum, they had heard over the air, and they have written down, the Jews told Jesus mad.

And then these are brethren in straitjackets remembering this, begin to laugh, but the doctor, who is an officer of the communist secret police, when he told me that I am mad, he told me exactly what the adversaries told Jesus, so that there is something Jesus-like in me, there is the seed of Jesus, the seed of the Son of God in me, hallelujah, I am in straitjackets, I am considered mad, as Jesus has been considered mad.

They had written with their own hands how Festus, a governor of that time, said to Saint Paul, you are beside yourself. And now their wardens tell them, you have to be in straitjackets, you are beside yourself, hallelujah, then I am like Paul.

And this knowledge of the Bible, but a Bible which has not been read fugitively, but which has been tasted drop after drop, as a real drunkard does it, tasted word after word, this gives strength to our brethren who are in lunatic asylum.

Sister Natalia Grobanevskaya, one of the Christian poetesses of Russia, brother Titov, one of the great painters of Russia, he has committed the crime to paint pictures of Christ, and brother Borislav is in a lunatic asylum for his Christian faith since 25 years.

Can you imagine what this means? To be with ravening, real madmen, beaten in straitjackets, 25 years, many more years, than many of you in the choir have years of age, but they remember that Jesus has been treated like this, the apostles have been treated like this, and it is such a privilege to share the cross of Jesus Christ.

What a holy thing. Only in the Soviet Union there are now around one million Christians in jail. Those who don't know Christ, not only Christians, are in jail, but I have seen those who are not Christians in jail.

They simply were crushed, they cracked, under this terrible burden, because a Russian jail or a Romanian jail is not an American jail, it means daily beatings and tortures and slave labors and so on. But now, recently, died in Soviet jails Boris Talantot, our brother.

His father had died in prison for Christ. His brother, his older brother, had died in prison for Christ. Then he took the place of leadership, which first his father and his older brother had had. He was arrested, his wife was submitted to interrogations, and died of heart attack as a result of Russian interrogations.

She died of heart attack, and he was in jail. But this was a man who didn't have a Bible on a shelf, who did not hear the Bible quoted on Sundays in a short sermon, but who had written the Bible himself, word after word.

And he remembered, but prophets have been in prison. Jeremiah has been in prison. Joseph of the Old Testament has been in prison. He remembered Jesus has been in prison. Saint Paul has been in prison.

Saint Peter has been in prison. And if I am in prison also for the glory of God, but what a privilege to be in the same holy place in which Jesus has been. And we possess the last letter, which this third Talantot wrote before he died in prison.

The letter ends with the words, My spirit remains unbroken, and I accept with thankfulness from God's hand these bitter trials. I accept with thankfulness from God these trials. I remember I was in an American home, a home which had very bitter trials.

It was a very rich home, and they had the trial of great quarrel in the family. There was really what to quarrel about, because they wished to buy a new car, and she wished that it should be a Lincoln, and he wished that it should be a Cadillac.

So it was a very bitter trial. They quarreled about it. And she complained to me, and he complained, how misunderstanding and quarrelsome his wife is, and I could not make them to accept with thankfulness this terribly bitter trial.

Talantot's father had died in prison. Talantot's brother had died in prison. Talantot's wife had died. He was on his deathbed, and he wrote, I accept with thankfulness from God's hand these bitter trials.

Reading Scripture as a Source of Comfort in Trials

I remember when I was in prison, at a certain moment, I had near me a brother who passed through a time of depression. He thought about so many children whom he had left behind, and he told me at a certain moment, I can't bear it anymore.

And then I told him, I will remind you about one Bible verse, perhaps you remember it. And I will remind you about one sentence from the Christian Creed. In the beginning, God created heaven and earth.

I believe in one God, the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, of all things visible and invisible, you complain about certain things which happen to you, and God tells you that these things have been created by me, God, the Father.

Can't you believe that the Father does the right thing for you, even if you don't understand? My child did not understand when he was small why I had to call a doctor and to vaccinate him. It was so painful.

And why he had sometimes to swallow some bitter pill, or why he had sometimes to receive a spanking, he could not understand it, but it came from a loving father, and this brother was comforted. That is the knowledge which the Bible has given to me, and I feel it as my duty to share this knowledge which brings honey in your mouth, which brings light in your mind, which brings joy in your heart, which makes you to burn with love, to be bathed in sun, even if you are in a subterranean cell in which never a beam from the sun enters, we feel it as our duty to proclaim it to those who are under communist terror.

Crowning Christ King Among the Nations

It is not right that our songs should remain only words. We have sung, crown him Lord of all. Whom did you mean by this? Your neighbor, surely not, because how will you leave this interesting television program in order to go to a neighbor and to tell him something about Christ?

So to the neighbor, we can't crown him king as our neighbor. We can't crown him king of our colleague, because our colleague in my job would consider me a crank if I would give him out Christian tract, so Jesus must not be king of my colleague.

Of the Russians and of the Chinese, they are far away. Whose king do you wish to crown him? He has to be crowned king of all, and that is what we are working at. We are propagating the gospel in the languages of communist countries, and we have the joy that the Soviet press complains.

Nearly daily you will find in the Soviet press their complaints, how Christianity is growing with them. They don't understand how it is that members of their party, members of the communist youth, get baptized and marry in church and so on.

And even if they have not been Christians, there was a very interesting fact, lastly, in the Soviet press, two members of the communist party were married secretly by a pastor. It has been found out. They were called and they were asked, but why did you do it?

Don't you know that it is forbidden to a member of the communist party? Do you believe in God? They said, no, we don't believe in God. We have been told that there is no God. We don't believe in Him. Well, if you don't believe in Him, why did you go to the pastor to be married?

Well, we have heard that God helps even those who don't believe in Him. And therefore we went. And they have heard it from us. We tell them that God helps and loves also those who don't believe in Him.

And the fastest growing church of Europe today is the church, the underground church of the Soviet Union. At the same time, we do our duty to awake the West. Communism is not a thing for Russia or for China about whom you Americans have a contract with God that it will never come to America.

The most stupid fish would have learned already that this little piece of ham is just a bait on a hook. The American Christians have not learned yet to distinguish the communist baits, and we so often snap at these baits.

Many communist lies are believed here, and our mission speaks to the leftists in the free world. To the communists, we try to bring them to Christ, and we have here also great joys. Our mission publishes booklets for communists.

The cover of the booklet, the title, Why I am a Revolutionist. On the booklet, on the cover, there are three pictures. One of Marx, one of Lenin, and one of Che Guevara, a renowned Cuban revolutionist.

And there is a sickle and a hammer, and the whole cover is red. And we have the great joy that we don't have to bother very much about distributing the books, because the communist bookshops of America and of other countries take them.

A bookshop owner has no time to read the book. If he looks, Lenin, Marx, just fine. The first pages, he looks through them, the first pages are only quotations from Marx and from Lenin. That religion is worth nothing and stupid and so on.

So they take the book, and they spread it, thousands of them. When they arrive to page 11, the reader, in page 11 we say, the first 10 pages have been stupid. Now we will tell you what Christianity is about.

But until then, the book has been sold already, and so we consider it vital that men should know this beautiful news that I, born in sin, a sin from little childhood on, I remember I was a child of four or five, I lied to mother.

I stole already candy when mother was not there, and when mother would find out somebody has taken the candy, I immediately would say, my brother has done it. Then I did, at the age of five, I made mother to read.

Personal Testimony of Sin, Forgiveness, and New Life

And since then, now, years and years have passed, and now at once, to get the news, this all is forgiven, you are justified, just as if you would never have sinned, you are clean, you are beloved, you are beloved by the father, just as his only born son is beloved.

This has given us such a happiness that we wish to share it with others. I came to America, when I was in the first services in America in some churches of very big denominations, they reminded me of an abstract, abstractionist picture, which I have ever seen, I don't know if you all know what abstractionist pictures are, it is modernist art.

They make a few strokes, and they say it means, I don't know what. Now, there was a whole exhibition, and there were all kinds of such things, three strokes, and that was New York. And there was another stroke, and there was something else.

And there was a linen, the picture, but there was absolutely nothing on the picture, absolutely nothing, just white, and under it was written, a cow grazing. So I asked the painter, but I see no grass.

He said, well, there can be no grass, because the cow has grazed all the grass, she has eaten it. And I said, well, I understand, but where is the cow? And he said, what should the cow continue to do here after she has grazed all the grass?

Well, I found this picture to be very interesting, and then I entered in churches, in which the whole grass had disappeared. There was not a word about the great truth of the Bible. There was not a word about Jesus Christ, and not being Jesus Christ, the worshippers had also gone, there was nothing to do there.

Whosoever loves Christ, whosoever has been saved by Christ, wishes to propagate salvation, propagate it around you. Me, Christ, has made happy, a happiness which has never left me. My wife has also been in prison, my son has been on the streets, and so on.

There was a happiness which never left us. I come from the church from behind the iron curtain, I must say, it is a church of shining faces. I have seen Christians in prisons, the guards would push in a new prisoner, he would be so dirty, we have not washed ourselves three years.

Some of your children would like it. We have not washed ourselves three years, but the glory of God shone from behind the crust of dirt, all three years. They were happy, blessed men, they have found Christ.

Sharing the Gospel and Supporting Martyrs' Families

Our mission, Jesus to the communist world, considers it as her duty, not even as her duty, I am joyful, so I share joy. To share this joy, to share the gospel, with over one billion people who are kept under oppression in communist countries, being forcibly hindered to know this joy-bringing gospel, we broadcast it to them, we smuggle it into them, and again, you in prayer ask yourselves, imagine that you would be taken away from your children and put in an asylum or in a prison because you believe in Christ.

Would you like your children to go hungry? We help the families of Christian martyrs, we give their children a piece of bread, and also a dog. They have the right to this too. That is what our mission does.

Reading the Bible Slowly as an Invitation to Faith

I finish by recommending to you, read the Bible, but read it henceforth in a new manner, like the real drunkards, and henceforth read the Bible like this, in the beginning, God! Hallelujah! Well, the hallelujah is not in the Bible, that you put from yourself.

God! Hallelujah! Created! Hallelujah! What did He create? Heaven! Hallelujah! If He would not have liked anybody to be in Heaven, then why should we have created Heaven? It would have been very boresome for Him to sit alone in Heaven.

Probably He wishes me in Heaven too. And He created Earth, and I can accept Earth and its tribulations with thankfulness. If I believe in Christ, I will be in Heaven. God bless you all. Amen.

Write to the Voice of the Martyrs at Post Office Box 443, Bartlesville, OK 74005.