Saturday Selections: From Our Bookshelf

"Tortured for Christ", By Richard Wurmbrand

Have you ever been beaten for you faith? Stood on bed of nails for hours? Have you listened to men renounce the name of God for seventeen hours a day, for months straight? Put into prison for fourteen years?

For Richard Wurmbrand, this was only a taste of the torture that he experienced--all for the sake of Christ. During a congress in their Parliament the Romanian pastor and his wife, Sabina, watched four thousand pastors and bishops declare that communism and Christianity were the same, and could co-exist. Sabina could not stand it. She said, "Richard, stand up and wash away this shame from the face of Christ! They are spitting in His face."

"If I do," he told her, "you will lose your husband."

She replied, "I don't wish to have a coward as a husband."

So Richard stood up, and began to praise the name of Jesus. Because the congress was being broad casted, the whole country heard what he declared. "Later," he said in his book, "I had to pay for this. But it was worthwhile."

Richard and Sabina were separated for fourteen years. Their only child, Michael, was left to fend for himself at the age of nine. Sabina experienced horrible torture. The guards enjoyed throwing Sabina and other Christian women into the Danube river, then fish them out, laugh at them, then throw them in again. She was forced to dig earth in the winter, and eat grass to stay alive.

Can you imagine? All for the cross--what will we do for the sake of the cross? Can't we be willing to give up a little of our luxuries, for the sake of the cross? Is it a torture to give our money to the poor, to be kind to the people we don't like, to have a good attitude? Of course not! But look what the Wurmbrands sacrificed for the sake of their Savior. Can't we sacrifice as little as our time and money, if not our very lives?

Tortured for Christ will bring new perspective to your life. The Wurmbrands were a living example of that through suffering for Jesus, He brings joy. I encourage you to read it yourself!

Note: You can receive a free copy of this book at http://torturedforchrist.com/. It may take a bit of time for it to arrive (it did for me), but it is certainly worth the wait!