Like Samson in Prison
Am I a Martyr or a Sinner?
Richard Wurmbrand was a Romanian Lutheran minister who spent 14 years in prison (three in solitary confinement) and published ”Tortured for Christ" after his release in the late 1960s.
He later founded Voice of the Martyrs, but son Michael Wurmbrand does NOT recommend VOM’s ministry today. (Read his “Open Letter” about VOM.) Michael runs his own ministry, and has made most of his father’s books (and formerly unpublished writings) available for free!
What follows was taken from “Samson in Prison”, one of the sermons in Wurmbrand’s book, Sermons in Solitary Confinement. You can read the book for yourself or listen to the audio version of this article on the latest episode of the China Compass podcast.
DEAR BROTHERS AND SISTERS, I used to consider those of my fellow-prisoners who are in prison for their belief as martyrs. But communicating with them through the wall (and the telegraph1 is functioning through many cells to my right and my left), I discovered that none of them were conscious of being martyrs. They felt that God was punishing them for their sins. Even St. Paul, who suffered so much for his faith, called himself "the chief of sinners".
And I think they are right. We must distinguish between the appearance and the substance, between what people call "facts" or "truth" and their spiritual significance. Who can work as a conspirator in the Underground church and always speak what is generally called "truth"? When I introduced myself, I did it under a cover-name. The one with whom I was speaking might be an informer. If asked by someone where I was yesterday, a factually correct answer might bring many people into great trouble. Today again the interrogator told me: "You are a Christian and a pastor. Your religion obliges you to tell us the whole truth." I had my own thoughts about this. If I had complied with his demands, other brethren would have been arrested.
Nobody can be a leader in the Underground church without re-evaluating the notion of truth2. So, to come back to the problem of martyrs. To outward appearance, anyone who has been killed or imprisoned for his convictions is a martyr. But the substance may be otherwise. God may use the Communists to punish you for a sin. He can lead them to put you in a solitary cell because he wishes to deal better with your soul.
How offended the Jews must have been by Jesus when they told him about some Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices. Now these were surely martyrs of the Mosaic faith and for the national cause. The Jews had a deep respect for men like those who had died "al kidush hashem", for the glory of the Name. But Jesus called the slaughtered Galileans simply "sinners”. He looked at the substance.
Sinners - that is what even martyrs are before God. Luther makes a distinction between "sinners of the left and sinners of the right”, between scoundrels and law-abiding men who observe the religious commandments, even that of self-sacrifice, in order to eam paradise. Both types of men are sinners. I am nothing else than a sinner. I have never known a man worse than me. The One who can free me prefers to keep me in prison as a punishment for my transgression. Samson was in prison because he had sinned, although the Philistines had jailed him because of his noble fight for the Mosaic cause. I am a sinner, but I know that if I accept my punishment with wholehearted humility, my strength will grow.
Like all the other prisoners, I had my hair cut short until today. Now they announce that I am to be allowed to let it grow, a sure sign that I shall soon be brought before the court. They make you look a little bit more human before presenting you to the judges. The hair will grow very slowly in this subterranean cell, in which never a ray of sun enters. But still it will grow.
This made me think about Samson. His strength grew simultaneously with his hair. I will become an embodiment of power, and will be able to slay more Philistines at my death than I slew in my whole Christian life. I will kill them, even if I die with them. Once this power has come back, I will no longer wish for my release. This age has produced powers unknown in the past. But I will draw from God the still unknown powers of the ages to come, the hidden spiritual powers. Though they remain behind prison walls, those who possess this power can demolish temples and build them again. They can remain in a dark cell, and yet make the sun shine in many hearts. They can be sad and depressed, yet fill many souls with gladness. How I would like to become what Samson became in prison!
True worship is not that on Mount Gerizim, the place of the Samaritan temple, nor that in Jerusalem. True worship is to grow in power to destroy everything which opposes the One crucified for me. Sin is every second of my life spent on something other than the destruction of what opposes the triumph of love. There are not certain deeds which are sinful under all circumstances, and other deeds which are always good. The mud with which we are all smeared contains in its mixture many compassionate actions. Charity given to a drunkard, who after having drunk liquor with your money, beats his wife, is sin. Judith, on the other hand, killed. So did Jael. But they freed the world from tyrants. Around me, in the other cells, are many patriots who have killed. It was for the sake of freedom. It is foolish to consider that knitting a pullover for some lazy man is a good deed, while the attempt of German generals to stop the slaughter of millions of innocent victims by killing Hitler is to be despised as murder.
For me, the only criterion of a deed is: does it prepare the way for the final triumph of love, or not? We have to choose between good as the means, and good as the end. If I am always good towards all men, even those who by deceit and terror hinder the victory of love, good will never triumph. The wicked will profit by my meekness, and consolidate the position of evil. If I choose good as my goal, I have to commit many actions which are condemned as evil in the moral catalogue of the world. So I have no scruples about using untruth to lead astray my interrogators. My only scruple is in having scruples about such an attitude. God praised those who killed Sisera, Agag, Holofernes. The same words are used in the Bible about Jael, who killed Sisera, as are used by the archangel to the holy virgin: "Blessed above women shall Jael, the wife of Heber the Kenite be, blessed shall she be above women in the tent." This, because she smote an enemy of God.
In one of the cells on this corridor is Nina, a Romanian girl, who did something similar. If it was right to kill a foreign oppressor several thousands of years ago, it must be right now also. The New Testament praises such heroes of the Old Testament. The Jewish people had to be defended. The Rumanian people have the same right. The same Spirit of God who inspired I Corinthians 13, the poem of love, inspired the book of Esther, in which the enemies of God are ruthlessly destroyed. The Holy Spirit has arranged for both to be part of the same holy book. What is more, the first Christians had as their only holy Scriptures the scrolls of the Old Testament. The New Testament was written decades later, and completed towards the end of the first century. God has brought together poems of love and books which teach determination to uproot the enemy, in order to perfect us and give us only one aim: to cause love to triumph at last.
Bloody fighting against tyrants must work together with acts of tender charity towards the attaining of this aim. We must set ourselves in our life the highest aim, to be his servants and the servants of all. Then "good" or "evil" deeds will have the same result, to bring love to triumph. The question is a very real one for me. Christians around me have participated in the patriotic fight against the Communist oppressor and have had to kill. They tap their confessions through the wall. But was their action sin? Would I take part in such a fight?
. . .
St. Augustine said: "Love God, and do what you will." It is written: "Sing unto the Lord a new song." This is a warrior's song. Nobody is so courageous a warrior as the Lord himself. He never slumbers nor sleeps. Christianity teaches us not so much to be good as to be warriors for the good. You cannot be a warrior for the good without fighting, and so striking not only abstract evil and evil institutions but also evil men. God is the beginning and the end. The middle of the day is ours. We do not know what the future holds for us. And I do not want his Kingdom in the future only. Fight today for his Kingdom of righteousness, peace and love. Amen.
If you enjoyed this, I highly recommend Richard Wurmband’s longer book of meditations from prison, In God's Underground: https://richardwurmbrandfoundation.com/pdfs/IGU-english.pdf
They would often use morse code to communicate through prison walls.
In the Preface to this book, Wurmbrand explains that he would not agree “today”, at the time of publishing, with all that he said “then”, at the time of composing these messages in prison. There are numerous possible examples of this kind of thing in each sermon.