Thoughtful Moments

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 8, Issue 51, 23 February 1945, Page 2

Thoughtful Moments

(Supplied by the Whakatf

A SERVICE IN A DUTCH VILLAGE

By "An Observer" T WAS at church today in a little Dutch village. Outside the autumn winds were blowing the last leaves from the trees, and grey skies looked down on the gleam ol water and moorland and the huge turning arms of windmills. The church is a little, white-washed building at the corner of the village street. At ten minutes to ten o'clock the worshippers began to crowd in, and soon it was clear that the church was going to be filled as seldom before in its hundred years of existence. The reason for this large number Avas twofold: the people are grateful to God for their deliverance from the German occupation, and there are, in the second place ; a great number of refugees here from the country "north of the great rivers" (the M«as and the Rhine), lands which are still under the Nazi yoke. Looking around me at the earnest faces of the men, women and children there, 1 felt myself back Tn the atmosphere of an lan Maclaren novel. But there was no sentimentality; the piety was intense and sincere: it had been tried in the (ires of persecution and had stood the test. I shall long remember the faces in front of me; the.old peasant man under the whose face was worn with age and suffering, who must have wondered during these years if he would live to see this day; the two brothers farm workers obviously dressed in their Sunday best; the fair-haired girl who sat under the window. Here perhaps more men than women. I noticed an old woman wearing a beaded black bonnet, and many children, for this is a church-going land of large families. The minister a man of about 65 9 1 with a long, grey s flowing beard and black velvet robes and Geneva bands climbed into the big pulpit; two verses of a metrical psalm were sung in unison, slowly with vigorous strong singing in a tune unknown to me. There was a short prayer of praise to God, the third chapter of Ephesians was read as a lesson. Then followed the Apostles' Creed, and after this- a verse of a hymn praising God "with angels and arch-angels and all the hosts of heaven" was sung by the seated congregation. All the hymns and psalms were sung thus-: at the. prayers the younger men rose the women and children and the frail old men remained sitting. The man on my left shared with me his copy of the hymn book, open at the Creed. There was a pencil mark underlining tjie iast clause of the Creed: "I believe in the Resurrection of the Body and the Life Everlasting." Many of those worshippers have lived near to death in these days. Two months ago the Burgomaster was taken across, the

•it Mifiisteas' Association).

OUR SUNDAY MESSAGE

canal and shot —a revenge murder to pay for the death of a National Socialist in a near-by town. The. sermon was preached in preparation for next week's celebration of Holy Communion. The text was Ephesians 17: "That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith that ye being rooted and grounded in faith may be able to comprehend . . . and to know the love of Christ." The preacher spoke with great force and clarity so that even a foreigner could understand practically all he said. He pointed to the fact that all nations, haul thought of communion with God as something dangerous to life. And such communion would not in truth be securely achieved by our own efforts. For we are sinful and frail in our innermost being. But such an effort was not only ineffectual, it was also needless, for God had opened up to us a way in Jesus Christ His Son, by faith in Whom we had assurance of "God's love and forgiveness. "And those who come to the Communion table in faith " he said "have the > 1 assurance of such a- door opened fcir them to the heart of God. I do not say that their own prayers will be ineffectual but how much more will the prayers, of Christ Himself before th e Throne of God be powerful on their behalf." This bare outline utterly fails to give the intense atmosphere of worship of attention, and the sense of the majesty of God which were present in the place. Here were men and women who could no longer place hope in any false consolations, for whom sin and death and man's guilt were realities of experience that did not need to be stressed. A prayer of interce&sion then followed in which "those dear to us in exile Ave know not where " were J '9 prayed for and God was asked to shield them with his love and jjrotcction. Those also were remembered whose dear ones' fate at the hands of the enemy was still unknown. And the minister then prayed "for those brave men who have come amongst us as deliveries and who at the. risk of 'pain and death: are standing forth as champions, of our life arid liberty. Defend them, O Lord in their battle and grant them and us. the victory. May they have the continual sense of Thy divine aid and guidance," Then he said the Lord's Prayer in English. As. the congregation slowly filed out I noticed the khaki greatcoats of the British soldiers among them. Probably they had already become friends of villagers, for they seemed to be members of various family parties. So, I thought it should be —all who love God are members of the great family be their homes far away or near. And though these soldiers may not have understood much of the sermon, they must have felt as I did that "Surely the Lord was in this place; this was none other than the House of God."