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It is written:
Matthew 7:12-Therefore, whatever you want men to do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets.
The Jewish Holocaust was undoubtedly one of the darkest periods of human history. It is estimated that some six million Jewish people-men, women, and children-were horribly murder by the command and influence of Adolf Hitler. One survivor describes some of the horrific things that he witnessed:
“One day, as I was about to enter the synagogue, I saw Moishe the Beadle sitting on a bench near the entrance. He told me what had happened to him and his companions. The train with the deportees had crossed the Hungarian border and, once in Polish territory, had been taken over by the Gestapo. The train had stopped. The Jews were ordered to get off and onto waiting trucks. The trucks headed toward a forest. There everybody was ordered to get out. They were forced to dig huge trenches. When they had finished their work, the men from the Gestapo began theirs. Without passion or haste, they shot their prisoners, who were forced to approach the trench one by one and offer their necks. Infants were tossed into the air and used as targets for the machine guns….My father was crying. It was the first time I saw him cry. I had never thought it possible. As for my mother, she was walking, her face a mask, without a word, deep in thought. I looked at my little sister, Tzipora, her blond hair neatly combed, her red coat over her arm: a little girl of seven. On her back a bag too heavy for her. She was clenching her teeth; she already knew it was useless to complain. Here and there, the police were lashing out with their clubs: “Faster!” I had no strength left. The journey had just begun and I already felt so weak … “Faster! Faster! Move, you lazy good- for- nothings!” the Hungarian police were screaming. That was when I began to hate them, and my hatred remains our only link today. They were our first oppressors. They were the first faces of hell and death. They ordered us to run. We began to run. Who would have thought that we were so strong? From behind their windows, from behind their shutters, our fellow citizens watched as we passed. We finally arrived at our destination. Throwing down our bundles, we dropped to the ground: “Oh God, Master of the Universe, in your infinite compassion, have mercy on us …”…The baton pointed to the left. I took half a step forward. I first wanted to see where they would send my father. Were he to have gone to the right, I would have run after him. The baton, once more, moved to the left. A weight lifted from my heart. We did not know, as yet, which was the better side, right or left, which road led to prison and which to the crematoria. Still, I was happy, I was near my father. Our procession continued slowly to move forward. Another inmate came over to us: “Satisfied?” “Yes,” someone answered. “Poor devils, you are heading for the crematorium.” He seemed to be telling the truth. Not far from us, flames, huge flames, were rising from a ditch. Something was being burned there. A truck drew close and unloaded its hold: small children. Babies! Yes, I did see this, with my own eyes … children thrown into the flames. (Is it any wonder that ever since then, sleep tends to elude me?) So that was where we were going. A little farther on, there was another, larger pit for adults. I pinched myself: Was I still alive? Was I awake? How was it possible that men, women, and children were being burned and that the world kept silent? No. All this could not be real. A nightmare perhaps … Soon I would wake up with a start, my heart pounding, and find that I was back in the room of my childhood, with my books …He didn’t answer. He was weeping. His body was shaking. Everybody around us was weeping. Someone began to recite Kaddish, the prayer for the dead. I don’t know whether, during the history of the Jewish people, men have ever before recited Kaddish for themselves. “ Yisgadal, veyiskadash, shmey raba … May His name be celebrated and sanctified …” whispered my father. For the first time, I felt anger rising within me. Why should I sanctify His name? The Almighty, the eternal and terrible Master of the Universe, chose to be silent. What was there to thank Him for?. (Ellie Wiesel, Night, 6, 19, 31, 33 (Kindle Edition); New York, NY; Hill and Wang A division of Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
When I first read these words years ago, I asked myself, “Where was the church when this was happening?” It seemed that so many Christmas in Germany were silent. Some praised Adolf Hitler as he was the one restoring “honor” to Germany. He was the leader that everyone adored! He was good for the economy! Surely he loved Germany and the German people.
Sadly, the evidence of Hitler’s evil was manifest, yet it was ignored. Many people would not listen to the cries of the ones being targeted. It began with a purge of any in the German government who could be a potential obstacle to Hitler’s plans. After that, he began to seize more power, while using the media to convince the population that the source of all the problems in Germany were one group: the Jewish people. It became easier and more acceptable for the German people to go along with each immoral action, as they were desensitized and brainwashed with the next step along the way.
To be sure, some Christians were bothered by what they saw taking place. Yet they chose to remain silent, deciding it was better to maintain a fragile peace then to speak out against the evil that was being committed while they stood by and watched. In this, they were much like the people of Edom that stood by and watched while the Jewish people were attacked, plundered, enslaved, and murdered long before the time of Hitler. God sent a Prophet named Obadiah to preach His Word to that nation.
Obadiah 1-21 (GW)-This is the vision of Obadiah. This is what the Almighty LORD says about Edom: We have heard a message from the LORD. A messenger was sent among the nations to say, “Get ready! Let’s go to war against Edom.” 2 “Edom, I will make you the smallest of nations. Others will despise you. 3 Your arrogance has deceived you. You live on rocky cliffs. You make your home up high. You say to yourself, ‘No one can bring me down to earth.’ 4 Even though you fly high like an eagle and build your nest among the stars, I will bring you down from there,” declares the LORD. 5 “If thieves or looters come to you during the night, won’t they steal only until they’ve had enough? You will be ruined! If people come to pick your grapes, won’t they leave a few grapes behind? 6 But you, Esau, will lose everything. Even your hidden treasures will be looted. 7 All your allies will force you to leave your land. The people who are at peace with you will deceive you. Those who eat food with you will set traps for you, and you won’t even know about it. 8 “On that day I will destroy the wise people in Edom and take wisdom away from Esau’s mountain,” declares the LORD. 9 “Teman, your warriors will be terrified. Everyone on Esau’s mountain will be slaughtered. 10 “Because of the violence you did to Jacob, your relative, you will be covered with shame. You will be destroyed forever. 11 While you stood there doing nothing, strangers carried off Jacob’s wealth. Foreigners entered his gates and threw dice for Jerusalem. You acted like one of them. 12 Don’t gloat over your relative’s misfortune or be happy when the people of Judah are destroyed. Don’t brag so much when they’re in distress. 13 Don’t march through the gates of my people when disaster strikes or gloat over their misery when disaster strikes. Don’t take their wealth when disaster strikes. 14 Don’t stand at the crossroads to kill their refugees. Don’t hand over their survivors when they’re in distress. 15 “The day of the LORD is near for all nations. Edom, you will be treated as you have treated others. You will get back what you have given. 16 As you, Israel, drank on my holy mountain, so all nations will drink in turn. They will drink and guzzle down everything in it. They will be like those who have never existed. 17 “But refugees will live on Mount Zion. It will be holy. The descendants of Jacob will get back their possessions. 18 The descendants of Jacob will be like a fire. The descendants of Joseph will be like a flame. But the descendants of Esau will be like straw. They will be burned and destroyed. There will be no one left among the descendants of Esau.” The LORD has spoken. 19 “People from the Negev will take possession of Esau’s mountain. People from the foothills will take possession of Philistia. They will take possession of the lands of Ephraim and Samaria, and ⌞the descendants of⌟ Benjamin will take possession of Gilead. 20 Exiles from Israel will take possession of Canaan. They will possess land as far as Zarephath. Exiles from Jerusalem who are in Sepharad will take possession of the cities in the Negev. 21 Those who are victorious will come from Mount Zion to rule Esau’s mountain. The kingdom will belong to the LORD.”
Wow!
Please notice one thing in particular from this passage: by their refusal to step in and take action, God said that the people of Edom were “as one of them.”
Obadiah 11-In the day that you stood on the other side—In the day that strangers carried captive his forces, When foreigners entered his gates And cast lots for Jerusalem—Even you were as one of them.
When we allow to progress and proceed unchallenged, then God holds us responsible. We may not commit the immoral actions ourselves, but God says that we are held responsible for failing to do what we could have to step that evil.
How are we doing, Christian?
Do we step up and help those who are victimized?
Are we willing to stand up for those who are being bullied?
Do we make excuses for evil and tell ourselves that the evil isn’t real?
Do we pat ourselves on the back and instead of defending the helpless and brutalized, do we defend our idols?
Right now, there is a terrible war going on that is being waged by a dictator named Vladimir Putin. He has been attacking the nation of Ukraine relentlessly. One survivor has written of her experiences there:
“Soon after reading the news, I discovered that the liberation of the Kyiv region was overshadowed by horrifying revelations. The extent of what had been done by the Russians emerged after their army retreated from small towns on the outskirts of Kyiv, such as Bucha, Irpin, Hostomel, and Borodyanka. When reporters visited these towns, they uncovered numerous cases of violence and killing inflicted on the residents, such as mass murders, rapes, and torture. In the first days after the deoccupation, dozens of bodies were found right on the streets. Some had clearly been executed with their hands tied, some were shot for simply trying to leave the house, and some were attempted to be burned to conceal the traces of Russian army crimes. The mayor of Bucha, Anatoly Fedoruk reported: “The number of civilians killed by Russian invaders in Bucha in the Kyiv region, which is already known, has exceeded 400 people. That is how many bodies were found in the time that has passed since the city was liberated by the defenders of Ukraine. All the bodies bear traces of torture and violent death.” Bucha is only 24 km from my home! All this horror happened so close. While I heard only distant explosions in Kyiv, people in nearby cities were going through real hell. I had no idea how truly lucky I was. In Bucha, President Volodymyr Zelenskyi delivered a deeply emotional speech to the world media. “Concentrated evil has visited our land—murderers, executioners, rapists, marauders who call themselves an army and who deserve only death after what they have done. “This is how the Russian state will be perceived now. This is your image. Your culture and human nature died together with the Ukrainian men and women to whom you came. “What did they do? Why did they kill them? What did a man riding a bicycle down the street do? Why did they torture to death ordinary peaceful people in an ordinary peaceful city? Why did they strangle women after ripping their earrings out of their ears? How could women be raped and killed in front of their children? To mock their bodies even after death? Why crush people’s bodies with tanks? What did the Ukrainian city of Bucha do to your Russia?” Fragments of news reached me from every direction: social media, Ukrainian and Polish media, conversations with friends and family… I didn’t even realize how deeply I had become immersed in this brutal reality. My vivid imagination and sensitivity were working against me this time. The weight of this tragedy crushed me, and I felt a profound sense of grief. It didn’t take long for me to realize that I couldn’t go on like this and that I needed to prioritize my mental well-being. Fortunately, I found a way to cope with my anxiety. I began to read the Gospel, which I had hastily packed when leaving Kyiv. I also finally started praying regularly, and through this, I felt that I was not alone.” (Stefania Miro, Light in the Darkness: Escaping the War in Ukraine, 99-100 (Kindle Edition): Kelowna, BC, Canada)
Instead of standing by our neighbors in Ukraine, our President has turned his back on them. As the latest example, today (March 6, 2025) I awoke to the news that some 240, 000 Ukrainian refugees who came to America because of the war in their homeland are now having their legal citizenship stripped and are being sent back (https://www.reuters.com/world/us/trump-plans-revoke-legal-status-ukrainians-who-fled-us-sources-say-2025-03-06/?fbclid=IwY2xjawI2qHtleHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHZaVImqapp8_CuONBXTv94TMQvtBM5dvWiZaeqI0YdNeRAgzSvr9eT21mA_aem_ewi26ER_333h8E_Cn7iX8A).
My friends, will we stay silent in the mist of the atrocities we are seeing every day in our country?
As Christians, it is our responsibility to speak up and to speak out.
In conclusion to this article, I want you to please consider these words by Erwin Lutzer. He was writing about the rise of Hitler and the Nazi party in Germany that led to the Holocaust.
“Unfortunately, the church did not, for the most part, come to the aid of those who were ostracized or sent to the death camps. In fact, some joined in the persecutions…. The church simply failed to be the church. In a letter sent to Right to Life supporters, there is a story that I reproduce here in summary form. In a small church on the East Coast a pastor delivered a sermon on abortion, and after the service a German man who had lived in Nazi Germany told of his experience: I lived in Germany during the Nazi Holocaust. I considered myself a Christian. We heard stories of what was happening to the Jews, but we tried to distance ourselves from it, because, what could anyone do to stop it? A railroad track ran behind our small church and each Sunday morning we could hear the whistle in the distance and then the wheels coming over the tracks. We became disturbed when we heard the cries coming from the train as it passed by. We realized that it was carrying Jews like cattle in the cars! Week after week the whistle would blow. We dreaded to hear the sound of those wheels because we knew that we would hear the cries of the Jews en route to a death camp. Their screams tormented us. We knew the time the train was coming and when we heard the whistle blow we began singing hymns. By the time the train came past our church we were singing at the top of our voices. If we heard the screams, we sang more loudly and soon we heard them no more. Years have passed and no one talks about it anymore. But I still hear that train whistle in my sleep. God forgive me; forgive all of us who called ourselves Christians yet did nothing to intervene. That story, which speaks so pointedly to the weakness of the church in Germany, speaks also to us: Do we hear the train here in America—the cries of the pre-born children in our abortion clinics, the abused child across the street, or the minorities who are daily discriminated against in the normal course of their existence? Or does our busy service for Christ drown out these muffled cries? Unfortunately, only a few German Christians saw the Jews as their brothers and sisters; only a few saw them as Christ; only a few stood against the devils of hell that were unleashed by a satanic leader. A delegate to the 1950 Synod of the Evangelical Church in Germany declared, “In every train which carried Jews to their death-camps in the East, at least one Christian should have been a voluntary passenger.” 17 Those who preserved their lives lost their honor.” (Erwin W. Lutzer, Hitler’s Cross: The Revealing Story of How the Cross of Christ Was Used As a Symbol of the Nazi Agenda, 99-100 (Kindle Edition): Chicago, IL: Moody Publishers)
What will be our legacy?
Will we stand up for the oppressed?
Or will we be like Edom and let evil go by unchallenged?
Will we plug our ears to the cries of the afflicted while singing songs to God?
The decision is ours.
The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit, be with you all. Amen.