My brothers in Iasi, Romania had a busy week. They transported thousands of Bibles and children’s books to a safe place and now they were tired. Costica and Teodor and their wives worked night after night and all went well until Friday… They had received and distributed Bibles for many years. But President Nicolae Ceausescu, with his dreaded Securitate, had declared war against the Bible.

Costica was a mechanical engineer. He was also good at jobs around the house. He had light brown, slightly curly hair and green eyes and he always had a smile on his face. He lived with his wife and children on Strada Petru Rares in the center of Iasi. Oak and fir trees lined the old street.

Estera, Costica’s wife, was a pharmacist and also a good cook. She knew how to make borsch and cozonac for dessert. She was slim with beautiful features. She had long black hair down to her waist, warm brown eyes and long arched eyebrows.

The children were asleep. Teo, six and Genovieva, four both looked like their mother. Teo liked to help his father repair cars.

It was the middle of the night and the neighborhood was quiet. Even the dogs were asleep. In the kitchen, behind the curtains was a little light. There Estera made some strong coffee and served it with a piece of cake to Costica, Teodor and his wife Erzso.

Their single storey house had a porch and three steps up to the front door. Inside was a large living room with a soft carpet and two bedrooms with wooden floors. In the front yard was a cherry tree in blossom. Estera took good care of the flower garden, which had lilies, narcissi and red and yellow tulips ready to bloom. A low stone wall with an iron fence surrounded the yard. In the drive was a Dacia station wagon. It belonged to their pastor, Iosif Morcan, who had lent it to them for that week.

The four of them finished their coffee and went out into the yard. They made a chain from the woodshed to the car. The boxes were heavy and they were tired.

“Twenty-eight… twenty-nine…

President Nicolae Ceausescu, with his dreaded Securitate, had declared war against the Bible.

thirty boxes… ” Teodor counted.

“Why don’t you stay at home this evening?” Costica suggested to Teodor and Erzso when they were ready to go. “Let me go by myself. Then if anything happens, they will only get me."

“Costica, don’t talk like that!” said Teodor. “We have worked together for years… We won’t let you go on your own… As long as we get back to our flat by three o’clock to get some sleep… I need to go to work at six.”

“Then… let’s go,” Costica whispered as he got in the driver’s seat. “I also have to be at work early.”
Teodor got in the passenger seat and Erzso in the back.

“Take care and come back soon!” Estera said as she gently opened the gate.

“We will be back in a few hours,” Costica said. At least that is what he thought…

They drove out quietly and Estera shut the gate behind them.

Teodor and Erzso had been married only a few months. Teodor was short with brown hair and blue eyes. He was a doctor and all his patients loved him because he was kind to them. He used to write prescriptions for the poor and pay for them out of his own money. Erzso was an attractive young woman, slim with dark eyes and short hair. She was of Hungarian descent. She studied geography and English at the university. Teodor and Erzso lived in a house a few minutes’ walk away on Strada Karl Marx.

“What a blessing these Bibles will be!” Erzso said.

“Yes, what joy we had every time we received a load!” Teodor added. “When I first saw the beautiful children’s books that Genovieva wrote I cried for joy…”

Costica drove slowly along the dark narrow street full of potholes. He rubbed his sleepy eyes.

“Once we get out of the city limit we’ll be okay,” Teodor said.

As they passed a large house, a dog barked furiously at them. Costica recited a favorite psalm to encourage them, “The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not be in want. He makes me lie down in green pastures, He leads me beside quiet waters, He restores my soul. He guides me in paths of righteousness for His name’s sake. Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil…”

Then he turned the corner into Strada Culturii. At that moment a policeman appeared in front of them in the middle of the road. He motioned them to stop.

“Oh, no!” Teodor exclaimed.

“What shall we do?” Erzso panicked.

“You two run away… I will say nothing about you!” Costica ordered. “Then go at once and bury the Bibles! I will try to drive away and hide this load in a forest…”

Costica pulled in to the side of the road and rolled down the window.

“Actele la control! Driver’s license and identification!” barked the officer. He stared at them as if he knew them.

“What is in those boxes?” he asked. “Open the back for me!”

The policeman walked around to the back of the car.

“Let’s drive away and escape!” Teodor whispered and turned the key in the ignition. The engine turned over but wouldn’t start.

They looked at each other, fear on their faces.

Costica tried again and the engine started… The car moved forward a few feet, but then stopped for no reason… It was as if all the powers of darkness were against them that night…

The officer went back to the driver’s window.

“So… do you try to escape?” he taunted as he grabbed the key.

Then something strange happened… The officer ran back in the opposite direction as if someone at the end of the road had called his name…

“Run! Run!” Costica urged them at that moment.

Teodor and Erzso jumped out of the car, ran to a nearby fence, climbed over it and escaped into the dark…

They ran across a garden, crossed another fence and arrived in a back street. All the dogs barked furiously.

They walked along back streets and country roads to the hiding place where the Bibles were stored…

The officer returned to the car with a taxi driver as a witness. Costica was taken into custody at the secret police headquarters where the Sfatcu family had been interrogated many times for the Bible, the Word of God.
_________________
It was lunchtime again that spring day at the mission house in Vienna. The cook brought sausages and rice for the team of Bible smugglers. It smelt delicious, but I could hardly eat… I straightened my hair, tied up with a velvet hair band that matched my blue dress. I thought of my family in their distress… Stephen sat across from me at the table. He wore his wool sweater and corduroy trousers. I looked at him and his peaceful eyes comforted me.

“I feel that President Ceausescu revenged on me,” I said. “I spoke in almost every state in America about the plight of Christians in Romania. I remember how in 1980 after I gave a newspaper interview in New York, a Romanian spy called me and threatened me on the phone. ‘Don’t speak about persecution in Romania,’ he said. ‘If you do we will cut your throat, put you in a garbage bag and throw you in a dumpster. No one will ever know what happened to you…’”

“That sounds scary!” Trevor exclaimed.

“Another time I spoke in Indiana,” I continued. “In the meeting there was an old man who listened to me with great interest. He was a tall, heavy man with thick glasses. After the meeting he took me aside and said, ‘I saw your picture and the ad in the newspaper… You are a good speaker… I am retired from the CIA and I know all about the evil of Communism… Your name is on the Communists’ hit list. I would advise you to move every three months.’

“‘Thank you very much,’ I said. ‘But the Lord tells me in the Bible “to speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves” (Proverbs 31:8). He protected me in Romania and He will protect me here too.’”

By this time the young people at the mission had finished their lunch. Becky brought apples for everyone. She turned to me and said, “Now I understand why you feel responsible for what happened to your family. You risked your life to help others. The Lord said, ‘Whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for Me and for the gospel will save it’ (Mark 8:35). So though it seems without hope right now the Lord will fulfill His Word.”

“Thank you,” I said. “I needed that.”

“Another time, in the spring of 1984,” I continued, “I was invited to speak in a Mennonite church in Ohio. The people were dressed plain. An Amish girl, Rachel, accompanied me in the car to the evening meeting. About 150 people came to the old church building and sat down on the wooden benches. They sang a few songs, then the pastor called me up to the front. I spoke about the persecution of believers as usual. Everyone listened to me attentively. As I spoke, I noticed a strange couple on the last bench. He was a big man and looked Romanian, but was dressed in a black high collar Mennonite suit. She was small and stocky with a plain dress and a cape and had short hair under a white Amish bonnet. As I spoke, I felt that they were not with me. During my testimony, he got up and went outside for a while…

“What is he up to? I wondered.

“The service lasted about two hours and afterwards I drove home with Rachel on a lonely country road. But after a couple of miles my new car suddenly stopped… I got out and raised the hood.

“Just then a car stopped alongside us. To my horror it was the strange couple… The man opened the window, looked at me and asked, ‘Do you need help?’

“‘Yes,’ I said.

“He got out and took a few minutes to check the engine.

“‘I can’t help you now…’ he said. ‘You will have to take it to a garage… Come in our car and we will take you home.’

“‘No, thank you,’ I said.

“‘Please come with us,’ his wife insisted.

“‘No, I really can’t.’

“Then the man looked me in the eye and said in perfect Romanian, ‘I know who you are!’

“‘And I know who you are too,’ I said. ‘You are a Romanian spy and you work for the Romanian Embassy!’

“I felt trapped… Rachel took my hand in fear and I prayed in a low voice, ‘Lord, help us!’

“At that moment I saw headlights approaching. A car stopped and pulled up next to us. It was a young couple from the meeting. At that point the Romanians got into their car and drove off…

“‘That’s Genovieva,’ I heard.

“‘Can we help you?’ the wife asked.

“I explained to them what happened… He looked under the hood of my car, found a loose wire and reconnected it.

“‘Someone must have done that on purpose,’ he said.

“After that my car was fine. We arrived home about midnight.”

“So Ceausescu had his Securitate everywhere,” said Stephen.

“And the Lord has His angels everywhere too,” said Diane.

“I remember another occasion in September 1984,” I went on. “I was on a speaking trip in the Florida panhandle. I stayed with an old couple. I noticed that a man watched me from his car outside the house where I stayed.

“The church that invited me advertised my schedule in newspapers and on television. On the Sunday afternoon, Lynn, a girl in her twenties came to take me to the meeting that evening.

The Sfatcu family had been interrogated many times for the Bible, the Word of God.

Three other girls came with us in the car. I sat in the front seat with Lynn and we left at five o’clock. I saw that the car in front of the house followed us.

“We set off on a straight two-lane road with forests on both sides. The girls talked about their schools and boyfriends, but I was in my own world. What was the man up to? I wondered.

“I kept an eye on the mirror and prayed in my heart. As I prayed I sensed that a presence came in the car. Peace flooded my heart and I knew an angel came to protect me.

“There were no other vehicles in sight, apart from the car behind us. Then I saw a pick-up truck coming from the opposite direction. As it got closer, I saw that it had enormous wheels and that there were at least two men in it. The man in the car behind talked on a walkie-talkie with the men in the truck and then overtook us. At that point the truck steered into our lane and accelerated straight into our path…

“‘What is he doing?!’ Lynn screamed.

“The girls cried out in terror. Lynn drove onto the shoulder, then into the ditch. The truck missed us, but turned and came after us in the ditch and tried to hit us from behind. We almost overturned, but Lynn skillfully maneuvered the car back onto the road.

“By this time other vehicles appeared on the road and the truck sped away in the opposite direction.
“‘I’ve never been so scared in all my life,’ Lynn said.

“‘We could all have been killed,’ said another girl.

“I knew the Lord had saved me again. Lynn dropped me at the church. She then went with the other girls to the police to report the incident. The FBI told me later that they knew there was a communist cell in the area and that they had tried to kill me.”

“How far the Communists will go to silence those who expose them!” Becky said.

“I continued to speak in churches because it was the only way I could help my people with Bibles and food… Now it is my family who are in trouble and I feel responsible for them.”

“Genovieva, I understand how you feel,” Stephen said. “I also feel responsible for what happened because I helped to arrange the delivery of the Bibles.

“After we first met in 1973,” he went on, “I continued to travel to Eastern Europe almost every year with Bibles. In 1981 I joined the mission here in Austria. That is when I started to take large quantities of Bibles, thousands at a time. Altogether, I went to Romania eighteen times during Ceausescu’s dictatorship. Your family was among my best contacts. I went to visit them last month, as you know.

“I went to Teodor on that trip,” he continued. “I traveled with another young man from England, Roger. At that time there was a nationwide ban on the use of private vehicles in order to conserve energy. Only official and foreign vehicles were allowed.”

“How was my family?” I asked. “I haven’t seen them for five years because, as you know, I cannot go back to Romania.”

“They were all well,” Stephen replied. “They told me that Bibles were scarce in the country and that children’s books were almost non-existent. I met with them at Costica and Estera’s house. Teodor and Erzso and your mother came to see me there too. They all asked about you… We also had a lot of business to talk about. I asked Costica and Teodor if they could handle a large load of a few thousand Bibles. Teodor assured me they could. He asked if I could take out some films and cassettes for you. I agreed, as we had a good hiding place in the van. He said he would have another cassette of the children’s choir if I could return after a couple of days.

“We left your family and returned to our van, which was parked by the Palace of Culture in the center of the city. We had only driven a short distance, when we had to stop for a flat tire. It was too late to repair it that night so we had no choice but to spend the night in the van by the side of the road.
“In the morning a repair truck just ‘happened’ to stop and offer to help. The man repaired the tire, but I noticed he looked guilty, as if he knew who did it…

“That evening we arrived in Piatra-Neamt,” Stephen continued. “We visited Victor Tarniceriu, your friend Silvia’s brother. We parked the van in the shadows round the back of the block and walked up a flight of stairs to their apartment. Victor and his wife, Mihaela, welcomed us warmly. Mihaela served us a cup of mint tea and a piece of cheese pie. Then we talked business with Victor. He gladly agreed to take large load of Bibles. Just then there was a knock at the door… Victor looked to see who it was.

“‘Quick! Hide in the bedroom and keep quiet… It’s the secret police.’

“We stood still behind the closed door and listened. Is this the end?

Will they arrest us? What will happen to Victor? I wondered.

“Once the secret police had left, we came out and Victor explained. ‘They asked for the so-called Guest Book,’ he said. ‘You are supposed to write the names and addresses of any visitors, relatives included, even if they only stay for ten minutes. If you do not fill it up and they catch you, you can be fined three months’ salary.’

“I understood that the Securitate was after us,” Stephen said. “I knew we had to get out of there fast. Victor told us when it was safe to leave and we quickly ran down the stairs and out of the block to our van. We did not see anyone around, but as we started up and headed out on the road back to Iasi, a car followed us. It often kept less than a hundred yards behind us… We stopped at a hotel for the night in Roman. When we set out the next morning they were behind us again… I decided we should not try to go back to Teodor, but head for the Hungarian border, two days’ drive away.

“It was easy to see that they were behind us because there were practically no other vehicles on the roads,” Stephen remembered. “I noticed that they used a different car in each county we traveled through. When we arrived in Cluj we stopped outside a cofetarie to buy some cakes. The four men in the red Dacia that was following us stopped on the other side of the road. They were frantic in case they lost us. Roger went over to their car, offered them cakes and said, ‘We have driven together for so long, we might as well share dessert…’ But they pretended they did not understand.

“When we arrived at the border, one of the guards asked me, ‘Did you have any problems?’

“‘Oh… just a flat tire,’ I said with a smile.

“Then the officer came up to our vehicle and ordered, ‘Everything out!’

“We took out all our personal belongings from the vehicle, including the hidden films and cassettes. They then did a thorough search of the van… They checked our belongings and wallets as well.

“‘Drive up the ramp for a vehicle inspection!’ they then ordered.

“They spent a good half an hour examining the structure of the vehicle. They were very frustrated when they found nothing.

“We crossed the border safely and returned to our base here in Vienna. Again and again the Lord saved me at the borders.”

“Stephen, what you brought out on that trip was very important for me and for the work,” I said.

“Take courage, Genovieva,” Stephen said. “The Lord will save your family…”

My thoughts were back with my trouble. Where were Costica, Teodor and the rest of my family? What could I do to rescue them?

(to be continued)