God's Smuggler - extract from Chapter 10

Lanterns in the Dark

Just ahead was the Yugoslav border. For the first time in my life I was about to enter a Communist country on my own, instead of in a group invited and sponsored by the government. I stopped the little VW on the outskirts of the tiny Austrian village and took stock.

The Yugoslav Government in 1957 permitted visitors to bring in only articles for their personal use. Anything new or anything in quantity was suspect because of the black market thriving all over the country. Printed material especially was liable to be confiscated at the border, no matter how small the quantity, because coining from out of the country, it was regarded as foreign propaganda. Now here I was with car and luggage literally bulging with tracts, Bibles, and portions of Bibles. How was I to get them past the border guard? And so, for the first of many times, I said the Prayer of God's Smuggler:

'Lord, in my luggage I have Scripture that I want to take to Your children across this border. When You were on earth, You made blind eyes see. Now, I pray, make seeing eyes blind. Do not let the guards see those things You do not want them to see.' And so, armed with this prayer, I started the motor and drove up to the barrier. The two guards appeared both startled and pleased to see me. I wondered how much business came their way. From the way they stared at my passport, it might have been the first Dutch one they had ever seen. There were just a few formalities to attend to, they assured me in German, and I could be on my way. One of the guards began poking around in my camping gear. In the corners and folds of my sleeping bag and tent were boxes of tracts. 'Lord, make those seeing eyes blind.'

'Do you have anything to declare?'

'Well, I have my money and a wristwatch and a camera. . .' The other guard was looking inside the vw. He asked me to take out a suitcase. I knew that there were tracts scattered through my clothing.

'Of course, sir,' I said. I pulled the font seat forward and dragged the suitcase out. I placed it on the ground and opened the lid. The guard lifted the shirts that lay on top. Beneath them, and now in plain sight, was a pile of tracts in two different Yugoslavian languages, Croatian and Slovene. How was God going to handle this situation?

'It seems dry for this time of year,' I said to the other guard, and without looking at the fellow who was inspecting the suitcase, I fell into a conversation about the weather. I told him about my own homeland and how it was always wet on the polders. Finally, when I could stand the suspense no longer, I looked behind me. The first guard wasn't even glancing at the suitcase. He was listening to our conversation. When I turned around he caught himself and looked up.

'Well then, do you have anything else to declare?'

'Only "small things",' I said. The tracts were small after all. 'We won't bother with them,' said the guard. He nodded to me that I could close the suitcase and with a little salute he handed me back my passport.

My first stop was Zagreb. I had been given the name of a Christian leader there, whom I shall call Jamil. The name had come from the Dutch Bible Society, which listed him as a man who occasionally ordered Bibles in quantity. However, they had not heard from him since Tito had become premier in 1945. I hardly dared hope that he would still be living at the same address, but with no other choice, I had written a carefully worded letter stating that towards the end of March a Dutchman might visit his country. And now I was driving into Zagreb, looking for this address.

To underline the wonders of that first Christian contact in Yugoslavia, I shall have to tell what happened to my letter, even though of course I did not know the whole story until later. It had been delivered to the address all right, but Jamil had long since moved. The new tenant did not know his whereabouts and returned the letter to the post office. There it was held up for two weeks while a search was made for Jamil's new address. On the very day I entered Yugoslavia it was finally delivered. Jamil read it, puzzled. Who was this mysterious Dutchman? Was it safe to try contacting him?

With nothing better than a vague feeling that he should do something, Jamil boarded a tram and went to his old apartment house. But then what? Jamil stood on the sidewalk wondering how to proceed. Had the Dutchman already arrived, and gone about asking for a certain Jamil? Did he dare go to the new tenant with the suspicious story that some day an unknown Dutchman might call asking for him? What on earth should he do?

And it was at that moment that I pulled up to the curb and stopped my car. I stepped out not more than two feet away from Jamil, who of course recognised me at once from my licence plates. He seized my hands, and we put our stories together.

Jamil was overjoyed at having a foreign Christian in his country. He repeated the theme I had heard first in Poland, that my 'being there' meant everything. They felt so isolated, so alone.

Of course he would help me set up contacts with believers in his country. He knew just the man to translate for me. So a few days later, with a young engineering student named Nikola as my guide and interpreter, I set off in my blue Volkswagen to bring 'greetings' to the Yugoslavian Christians.

On this first car trip behind the Iron Curtain I discovered that I had energy I never dreamed of. My visa was good for fifty days. For seven straight weeks I preached, taught, encouraged, distributed Scripture. I held more than eighty meetings during those fifty days - speaking as many as six times on a Sunday. I preached in large cities, hamlets, isolated farms. I spoke openly in the North, covertly in the South, where Communist influence was strongest.

At first glimpse it did not seem to me that the Church in Yugoslavia was under any particular persecution. I had to register with the police when I moved into a new district, but I was fee to visit believers even in their homes. Churches operated openly. After a while I abandoned the pretext of bringing 'greetings' and simply began to preach. No one objected. Except for certain restricted areas, mostly along the borders, I was tree to travel wherever I chose within the country, with no government guides to check on my activities.

This amounted to a real kind of freedom, much more than I had expected. But bit by bit as I got to know Yugoslavia better, I became aware of the slow wearing-down process the govern­ment was exerting on Christians. The effort seemed to be centred on the children. Leave the old folks alone, but wean the young people away from the Church.

One of the first churches Nikola and I visited was a Roman Catholic one in a small village not far from Zagreb. I noticed that there was not a single person under twenty in the entire congregation, and I asked Nikola about it. In answer he intro­duced me to a peasant woman who had a ten-year-old son.

A few days later in another town, we were visiting a Christian family when I saw a little girl playing in the dust outside the house in the middle of the day.

'Why isn't she in school?' I asked Nikola.

From the mother we learned the story. Marta was accustomed to saying grace before meals at home. When it came time for the school lunch, Marta had given thanks aloud as she always did, without even thinking about it. The teacher had been angry. Who had supplied this food, God or the people through their own good government? 'That was a wicked thing to say, Marta. You will fill the other children's minds with nonsense.'

But the next day, so deeply was the habit ingrained, that Marta did it again, and for this she had been expelled.

It was in Macedonia, however, that we encountered the first signs of real fear on the part of churchgoers. The poorest of Yugoslavia's six states, Macedonia is also the area where the Party is strongest. Our first speaking date in this part of the country was scheduled for ten o'clock in the morning. When we reached the church, however, not a soul was there.

'I can't understand it,' Nikola said, getting out the letter we had received from the pastor. 'I'm sure this is the right place.'

At eleven, we decided it was useless to wait any longer. We went outside to where we had parked the car. Just as we were getting in, one of the villagers strolled past, paused long enough to shake my hand warmly, wish me God-speed, and wander on. I was just turning again to open the door of the car when another villager ambled past, and the scene was repeated. For forty-five minutes that morning the entire village just happened to be out for a stroll, and as luck would have it, they all happened to pass the visiting preacher's automobile so that they could meet him and shake his hand.

Even Nikola was puzzled as to how to interpret this. A few days later we had an evening meeting scheduled in another town in Macedonia. The pastor invited us to dinner before the service at eight. At five minutes before eight I suggested to the pastor that we start for the church.

'No,' he said, looking outside. 'It is not yet time.'

At 8.15 I brought the subject up again. 'Don't you think people will be waiting?'

'No, the time is not yet.' Again I noticed he looked outside before he answered.

At 8.30 the pastor finally went to the window, peered out, and nodded.

'Now we can go,' he said. 'The people won't come to church, you know, until it gets dark. It isn't that we are doing anything illegal. But - well - it pays to be cautious.'

And then I saw the sight I was to become so familiar with all over Macedonia. From the darkened countryside kerosene lamps began to appear. The peasants came slowly across the fields, in twos and threes, never more, each man carrying a lamp. Then came the townspeople from the little mud houses that lined the only road, lanterns low so that their faces were in shadow.

No one seemed to mind being recognised once he was inside the church; after all, everyone there was taking the same risk. The lamps were hung on hooks along the side of the room so that there was a warm and pleasant glow for the meeting. I spoke on Nicodemus, coming late in the night to make inquiries of Christ. He too, I said, had felt it advisable to seek the Lord under cover of darkness. It didn't matter. Time and place would always dictate how we made our first steps towards God. More than two hundred persons had come that night to hear the foreigner speak. Eighty-five of them used the occasion to commit their lives anew to the Christian way, even when that way led for the time being through darkness.

Copyright © 1967, 2002 by Brother Andrew and John and Elizabeth Sherrill