1976-1983
CONTENTS
11. Extraordinary Years, Extraordinary Results 171
1968-1976
12. I Am Yours! 183
1976-1983
Appendix 1: The Influence of Isaac Da Costa 195
Appendix 2: On Women and Preaching 199
Appendix 3: Ten Boom Family Resources and Timeline
of Corrie ten Boom's Life 202
Notes 224
Index 227
(Bhcknomlements
(I would first like to express my grateful appreciation / to the Corrie ten Boom House Foundation in Haar- % S lem, the Netherlands, and to the Billy Graham Center Archives in Wheaton, Illinois, U.S.A., for their permission to quote from the Ten Boom family letters and other documents. Some of the references have been printed earlier in various of Corrie ten Booms more than twenty books of past decades, but the above two organizations hold the original material. In addition, a few of the letters are from my personal archives.
The excellent Dutch book De Eeuw van mijn Vader (My Father's Century) by Geert Mak was very helpful to me in de¬ scribing the history, culture and people of the Netherlands in chapters 2 and 3.
I deeply appreciate the contributions made to this book by many family members, friends and professional contacts. These include my sister, Sylvia Baker, who helped me develop the con¬ cept; Terry Bensmiller, my research assistant; and Jane Campbell, Grace Sarber and Stephanie Vink, my editors.
Invaluable help was also given to me by Dr. Michael E. Wil¬ liams, dean of the College of Humanities and Social Sciences and professor of history, Dallas Baptist University and by Dr. Ronald D. Rietveld, professor of history, California State Uni¬ versity, Fullerton.
Qntzouction
Th e Power of a Good Story
evening in 2001, a handful of children from a Chris- | l /tian school in Stalybridge, a small town in the north V_of England, performed a short play based on Corrie ten Boom's life. The setting was a simple school hall. As the boys and girls acted their parts, a hush descended on the parents and friends in the audience. The riveted attention in the room went beyond what would normally be expected of proud parents watching their children act. When the play ended, several parents commented on the story.
A mother exclaimed, "What a powerful story! I was so moved by it."
One father said, "I want to see it again; it was so good." What makes this story powerful?
Robert Pickle came to visit me one day from east Texas. He was one of the biggest men I have ever seen. I am fairly tall, but
INTRODUCTION >
the broad-shouldered biker loomed above me. He was middleaged and wore a ponytail and a thick black jacket studded with silver. Robert wanted to tell me how the story of Corrie ten Boom changed his life completely. While in prison, he was given a copy of The Hiding Place. Although he was not normally given to reading, Robert picked up the book and became engrossed in the story. Skeptical at first, he went on to read Corrie's Tramp for the Lord.
"There is nothing you can think of that I have not been guilty of," Robert told me, "but after I read those books I asked the Lord Jesus Christ to be my Savior. I gave Him all my life. He has changed me and given me a ministry to prisoners." Robert Pickle told his story with passion and joy, expressing his love for and gratitude to Corrie ten Boom.
How did a woman he had never met have such a strong influ¬ ence on the hardened heart of Robert Pickle?
Diagnosed with bipolar disorder and later with clinical de¬ pression, Cindy suffered mental anguish for decades. She read
The Hiding Place and said, "God has given me a second chance. He collects our tears. There are always tears in the heart when one is sad. Our wonderful Lord is deeper than the deepest pit in this fallen world. He is my Hiding Place."
Mindy told me how one story from Corrie's life helped her regain peace. It was the story of Corrie's meeting with one of her former tormentors at a speaking engagement in Germany shortly after World War II. The former guard from Ravensbriick concentration camp asked Corrie to forgive him for the way he had treated her and her dying sister, Betsie.
INTRODUCTION
"And she forgave him," said Mindy. "This had a huge impact on me because at the time I read The Hiding Place I was person¬ ally dealing with serious issues of unforgiveness. Corrie taught me how to forgive, and I did forgive."
Gail was a young mother with three preschoolers when she first heard Tante Corrie's story. Her husband supported her fully and helped her during all the hours he was not at his job, but it still seemed to Gail that life was filled with diapers, baby bottles, cleaning and seldom a good night's sleep. "My life was the Lord's," she said, "but deep inside I yearned for fresh inspiration for my walk with Christ. I found the model I was seeking in The Hiding
Place. Strangely, in my twenties, I found this much older, nevermarried woman's story to be one that lifted my heart and brought richness and purpose to my ordinary, daily steps. She gave me a completely new perspective on life."
Melody told me, "As a single woman I have always been challenged by how Corrie ten Boom lived so fully for Christ and did not settle into bitterness or hopelessness or self-pity. As I get older, I find myself often looking to those who have gone before me, and through them God says to me, 'Keep walking in faith, in the direction of hope. I am faithful. You can trust Me.'"
Thousands more have their own stories. And most of them have never met Corrie ten Boom, let alone have the insights into
INTRODUCTION
her life and death that I, as her companion for the last seven years of her life, was allowed to receive.
Many concentration camp survivors have written autobiogra¬ phies. What makes the story of The Hiding Place so powerful? Why does Tante Corrie's life have such unusual and lasting influence? The question intrigues me as much now as it did on that night in East Africa in the mid-1960s when, unknowingly, I was about to take part in her story.
Meeting Tante Corrie fit was during an evening meeting in tropical East Afy rica that I first heard her name. The year was 1966. v, ^ In my early twenties, I was working as a volunteer assistant for the Anglican Church of the Province of East Af¬ rica and had been invited to attend a nondenominational prayer meeting in a suburb of Nairobi, Kenya. Crickets chirped loudly outside. This was still a novel sound to me. I had never heard it in my home country of England. Nor had I ever before caught the sweet, heavy scent of the white and waxy frangipani flower that drifted through the wide open yet iron-barred window of the single-story suburban home where the prayer meeting was taking place.
Dozens of missionaries, men and women, filled that warm living room. Many of them described their work and asked for prayer. Seated at the back of the room, I kept quiet. I had never been one to speak up in public. But in my inner self I joined in the enthusiasm and prayers of the group.
LIFE LESSONS from the HIDING PLAICE
Near the front of the room a middle-aged lady in a floralprinted frock raised her hand and stood up. "I would like to ask for prayer for Corrie ten Boom," she said. "She is in her mid¬ seventies now and has recently spent many months in Uganda. Her doctor had prescribed a sabbatical rest for her. But now she has resumed her world journeys."
I had never heard of Corrie ten Boom, but it seemed to me that the words of the woman in the floral dress were received with a kind of reverence, as if this elderly Corrie ten Boom were a legend in her own lifetime. I was intrigued. Not wanting to ask who she was, I listened interestedly as several missionaries volunteered experiences they had shared with her. From these reports, I was able to assemble my first impressions of the life and work of this Dutch missionary evangelist who had hidden Jewish people in her home in Holland during the Second World War and had been imprisoned by the Nazis for doing so. I also ascertained that after her release she had traveled the world for twenty years telling how she had proven God's love to be stronger than the deep darkness of Ravensbriick concentration camp and had learned to forgive those who had caused the deaths through imprisonment of her father, sister, brother and nephew. Inexplicably I was drawn to this old lady and her story. As the group prayed for her, I felt grateful I had been invited to the prayer meeting.
A chorus from the cricket choir greeted me as I left the house in that Nairobi suburb. I would like to know more about Corrie ten Boom, I said to myself. I wonder if she has written any books about her work.
First Impressions of Tante Corrie
In August 1968, the summer after my return to England from that short-term assignment in Africa, a friend invited me to go with her to a mission conference comprised of Dutch and En¬ glish young people. It was to be held in the town of Matlock, Derbyshire, a beautiful, hilly part of north central England.
MEETING*TANTE CORRIE
"Corrie ten Boom is one of the Dutch speakers," said my friend. I knew the name sounded familiar. Then it was as if I heard again the cricket chorus outside the suburban East African house a couple of years earlier, and I remembered the elderly lady who had saved Jewish lives in the Second World War. Recalling my intrigue about her story and curious to learn more about her, I traveled with my friend to Matlock and found myself part of the most unusual conference I had yet attended.
For one thing, there did not seem to be many halfhearted Christians among the fifty English and fifty Dutch young people. And for another thing, these Dutch were so different from the average English young person with whom I had grown up. They looked different; many of them were above the average English height, and they were mainly fair-haired and long-limbed. They also acted differently in that they spoke more loudly than I had been taught to speak. And they laughed a lot and heartily. I found this contrast with the more circumspect and cautious approach of the British a bit daunting.
One morning during the five-day conference, for example, it was discovered that about half the participants had contracted food poisoning from the meal the night before. I was fortunate to escape the affliction but not the frank questioning of a young Dutchman with whom several others and I sat at the half-empty breakfast table.
"Have you diarrhea?" he inquired with apparent interest as we began breakfast.
From the beginning of my acquaintance with them, I could see that there was no beating about the bush with the Dutch. On the whole they seemed to be honest, friendly, noisy, unpretentious, straightforward and opinionated. And I really liked them.
A Dutchman known as Brother Andrew was the main speaker. Also called "God's smuggler," he had a powerful message about what he called "the Suffering Church" under communism in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. He challenged us Western Christians to personal involvement, whether that meant taking Bibles and other help behind the Iron Curtain, giving or praying.
LIFE LESSONS from HIDING PLAQE
But his main emphasis was on going, whatever the personal cost or danger involved. I learned that he had carried out a Biblesmuggling mission from the Netherlands since 1955.
Soon it was Corrie ten Boom's turn to speak. She was 77 years old and physically strong-looking with a chin that can be well described as determined. Her height was about the same as mine—five foot seven. As I contemplated her size, I thought of the description on the army uniform my father was issued in England in the Second World War. "Slightly
Portly" was the diplomatic British army description of Jim Rosewell's size. Not "Portly" or "Large," just "Slightly Portly." This phrase certainly described Tante (Aunt) Corrie, as the Dutch contingent referred to her. Just back from working in Asia, she was tired and always surrounded by people. I do not remember being introduced to her at that conference and had no idea that her life and mine would one day be closely bound together.
As I had learned was characteristic of the Dutch, Corrie ten Boom's messages during the five days of that conference were delivered with no sentiment or emotionalism. She just gave us the facts as she had experienced them.
"There is no pit so deep, the love of God is not deeper still," she said, speaking of her imprisonment in a concentration camp.
"We do not know when the Lord Jesus will return, but we do not know of one moment when He may not return. Are you ready? Have you forgiven your enemies? There was a time when I could not forgive those who had been so cruel to me and to my dying sister, Betsie. But God has taught me how to forgive.
"The Lord Jesus is coming again soon," she told us young people. "Are you obeying the Lord? Are you His ambassador?
"The Lord Jesus has promised to return. And He will. It may be very soon. In the meantime, are you taking hold of all the riches God has given us in Jesus Christ? We so often live like paupers when we are really children of the King of kings."
During that first week of August 1968 I heard Corrie ten Boom speak for the first time on the truths that formed the basis
MEETING. TANTE CORRIE
of her work and life. Later I was to hear the same consistent messages hundreds of times.
As the conference in the beautiful Peak District progressed, I noticed something in Corrie that went beyond the straight¬ forward, frank and honest approach I had already noted in the Dutch participants—something harder to define. Her words seemed to carry an impressive authority and were delivered with unusual energy and dynamo. I felt rather intimidated by her powerful personality. But at the same time, observing her interaction with the young people through our five days together, I saw her love for them and their loving and interested response to her. She extended the same love with the same results to the conference leaders, the cooks, cleaners and gardeners as well. And I could not help noticing that every time Corrie ten Boom entered a room or took part in conversations, she was imme¬ diately the center of attention. It did not seem that she sought this. It simply happened.
A Surprise Invitation
As the conference drew to its close, I received a surprise in¬ vitation. Brother Andrew, whose book God's Smuggler had been released the previous year, told the group that he needed help. In response to that book, a large amount of correspondence in English arrived weekly at his ministry headquarters in Hol¬ land—mainly from American readers. He had even brought some items needing attention to the conference, and I volunteered to help him take care of them. Soon he asked if I would come to the town of Ermelo in central Holland, where his mission was based, to assist him. All the other team members were Dutch, and he wanted somebody whose first language was English to deal with the hundreds of inquiries being generated by the new book. I was free to go, having recently resigned from a temporary secretarial position, so I agreed to join him and his team in Holland for what
LIFE LESSONS from the HIDING PLACE
I thought would be a short time—perhaps three weeks. Little did I know my stay was to be much longer than that.
To Holland
After the conference ended, I said good-bye to my new friends, some of whom I would meet again in Holland. Returning to my family home in Hastings in East Sussex on the south coast of En¬ gland, I packed my suitcase and took the cross-channel ferryboat to a port in Belgium, then a train to Holland. Before it stopped at Utrecht, a main railway junction, the train had introduced me to a land whose history, culture and people I was soon to love deeply. The landscape was orderly, green and flat with plenty of wellplanned, open country areas between the cities. And forever re¬ markable to me, it was diffused with a clear and beautiful light.
I knew that Holland, although small, was one of the most densely populated countries in the world. From my seat in the train I saw that most of the cars the Dutch drove were small. Nearly all of the houses seemed small, too. They were mainly very clean and inviting. Most front room curtains were drawn back, and I was offered clear views into family living rooms, sometimes with many occupants, through high and wide pol¬ ished windows.
I changed trains at that large junction and took a slower one that traveled in a north-easterly direction toward the small town of Ermelo, where Brother Andrew had said he would be waiting for me. To my relief, he was. We shook hands and observed each other briefly. Andrew (not his real name) was dressed in slacks and a casual shirt. His build was slight, his hair brown, his voice quiet. I contrasted his bearing with the loud and boisterous Dutch people I had met at the conference. Perhaps it is easierfor Andrew to keep anonymous in the Eastern European countries he visits, I thought. He would be less conspicuous in those places than if he were tall and fair. As he shook my hand he studied me, a 23-year-old woman with dark brown hair, brown eyes and fair skin. I was wearing a
MEETING.TANTE CORRIE
1960s minidress and Dr. Scholl's wooden sandals, which clacked noisily.
"Welkom in Holland, Pam," he said in his warm and charming way. As we hoisted my luggage into an oversized gray car—Why such a large car for a missionary in a country of mainly small cars f I asked myself—Brother Andrew explained he would drive me first to his home. He and his wife, Corry, had four children with a fifth on the way. We drove through quiet, tree-lined streets, and after reaching a busier street Brother Andrew stopped outside a house with a pointed red roof. Here Corry welcomed me, and then God's
Smuggler led me up two flights of steps, the second of which was a steep, short, ladder-like staircase to the third floor—the attic under the pointed roof. It had been converted into an office and was large enough to contain four desks with chairs, typewriters and a few bookshelves and filing cabinets. The setup became even more fascinating when through the back window I saw a couple of station wagons parked on the property. Three large cars in one family? I also saw a medium-sized shed.
"We keep Bibles in the various languages of Eastern Europe in that shed," he told me. "And these cars belong to our mission. You may have noticed that they are larger than the average car in Holland, but they need to be. On our journeys to Eastern Europe we take as many Bibles as we can pack into them."
The intrigue was mounting. Was a dangerous international smuggling ministry really being carried out from this ordinary house in this fairly small town? I wanted to know more.
We descended the steep staircase, and I said farewell to Corry and the children. I supposed I would be back the next day to start my duties.
Brother Andrew then drove me to a small town nearby named Harderwijk, where he had arranged for the rental of two rooms in the little home of an elderly Dutch midwife, Miss Jo de Graaf. She spoke no English and I as yet no Dutch, but from the beginning we liked and understood each other. As he took leave, Brother Andrew told me that one of his team members would pick me up and take me to the office in the morning. And then he said, "Here
LIFE LESSONS from the HIDING PLACE you are. You will want to read this book to find out what our work is all about." And he handed me God's Smuggler.
My new landlady showed me to my bedroom. It was quiet, with a large picture window overlooking the backyard. The walls were white and so were the ceiling, sheets, pillowcases and candlestick bedspread. My room was comfortingly clean and inviting. I made myself ready for bed, propped myself up on pillows and started one of the most fascinating journeys of my life up to that time.
I do not remember how long I read that night, but God's Smuggler transported me to another world. I learned of the 1955 beginning of Brother Andrew's mission to Communist countries, of God's provision for his family, of his learning to listen to and obey the Holy Spirit. As the story progressed I was caught up into the fastmoving adventure of Bible smuggling. It sounded rather risky. I wanted to help by carrying out administrative work in the Dutch headquarters. I also wondered with a certain apprehension if in the future I would be invited to make journeys to any of those mysterious lands behind the iron curtain.
Beginning Work
As I began work the next day there were lesser mysteries to uncover. "Why is this country known by two names?" was one of my first questions to my co-workers. They told me that the country's official name, the Netherlands, refers to the low-lying nature of the country (;nether meaning "low"). The name Holland is frequently used instead of the Netherlands, but it actually refers to the two western coastal provinces, North and South Holland, which have played an important role in the country's history.
And why were the language and the people of the country called Dutch? I learned that the noun derives from the word Deutsch, meaning "German." Europe was widely inhabited by Germanic and other tribes for countless centuries, and the German influence is still evident in the name of its language.
Another question I put to my new colleagues had to do with Dutch surnames. Brother Andrew's surname, which he did not
MEETING. TANTE CORRIE
publish for the sake of the Christians in Eastern Europe, had two words in its prefix. And then there was Ten Boom. I knew that Boom meant tree, but what did the prefix Ten mean, and why did I sometimes see the first letter T written in upper case and sometimes in lower?
Ten, it turned out, means "to the" in old Dutch. In Dutch gram¬ mar, when the word Ten stands alone, as it does when one refers, for instance, to the Ten Boom family, the first letter of the surname is capitalized. When the surname is combined with a Christian name, or family tide such as Betsie ten Boom or Father ten Boom, lowercase is used for the first letter of the surname. Being a per¬ fectionist in nature, I wanted to learn Dutch quickly and correcdy and colloquially, but my unpretentious and down-to-earth new friends soon put me in my place, often laughing at my mistakes. They were kind and helpful, however, and eventually I learned their language—and to take myself less seriously.
Acclimating to Dutch Life
A couple of months after arriving in Holland I purchased a bike and pedaled my way to work and back each day, but for my first six weeks in the country in that autumn of 1968 I rode the bus because it rained incessantly. There was not one day when the sun appeared.
"Pam, you must make sure that you have plenty of sunshine inside when you live in Holland," said my new boss, "because there is not much outside."
My stay in Holland was to last more than seven years, dur¬ ing which time I came to love Holland and its people deeply. I made new friends and was often invited to team members' homes for meals, where I entered into a delightful Dutch state called gezelligheid. There is no translation for that word. Coziness is perhaps the nearest English word, but that does not capture gezelligheid at all. The dictionary says it means "companionable, convivial, sociable, clubbable and pleasant," but it is much more. It is togetherness in a deep, trusting, open, safe and enjoyable
LIFE LESSONS from the HIDING PLACE way. Coffee and cookies, low lights, flowers and laughter often accompany it. There are so many Dutch people that it is impos¬ sible for them to get away from each other. A person cannot be gezellig alone.
But being single, I was often alone. There were bike rides on Sunday afternoons on the trails in the woods just outside Harderwijk. It was exhilarating. I rode there in ah seasons, autumn being my favorite. There were also many times when I left my lodgings and Miss de Graaf on Sunday afternoons and rode my bike a short distance to the dike and the low-lying polder lands beyond. Rows of tall and slender trees acted as windbreaks along the road to the polder and on the polder itself—trees that, along with grass plantings, stabilized the land so recently reclaimed from the sea. It was often very windy there, and when the wind was against me I leaned closer to the handlebars and kept going as quickly as I could pedal.
I persevered in my work, too. It was fulfilling, very busy, youthoriented and adventurous. Eventually it did include several visits to Eastern Europe, where I had encounters with the persecuted Church that changed the way I looked at life. I was to learn many things from the Dutch and East European Christians, including how to pray so as to get what you ask. And I spent much time thinking on such things as the ethics of smuggling. Of course, the years contained disappointments and loneliness and some sad¬ ness. Life always does. But although there were many rainy days, it seemed to me there were a lot more days when that beautiful light appeared.
My First Encounter with Tante Corrie
But I must return to the time when my Dutch adventure was just beginning.
"One of the first things I want you to do," Brother Andrew told me upon my arrival in the Netherlands, "is to help my friend Corrie ten Boom."
MEETING-TANTE CORRIE
He told me that the American authors John and Elizabeth Sherrill, co-writers of God's Smuggler, were now writing a book with Tante Corrie. It was not yet named, but work had begun.
Hours of interviews with the writers and their subject had been audiotaped, and a typist was needed to transcribe them.
"I have volunteered you," said Brother Andrew. And so my first personal encounter with Corrie ten Boom came to pass. She was usually absent from her home country on world journeys—her favorite title of the several ascribed to her by her friends was "Tramp for the Lord." But she spent several months in Holland during that autumn of 1968, mainly for the purpose of working on the new book. Her temporary residence was a borrowed apartment in the town of Soestdijk, about 45 minutes' drive from Brother Andrew's mission base.
As I traveled from my lodgings in Harderwijk to Tante Corrie's residence on that first misty, mellow autumn day, I looked forward to what promised to be an interesting undertaking. But I also felt rather apprehensive. This was the lady whose powerful presence I had found rather overwhelming at the mission conference in England two months before. Self-confidence had never been a strong point with me. And this lady seemed so very confident. I knew I had much to learn about the culture of the Dutch, and I certainly had never worked closely with Americans—or writers of any nationality for that matter—so the prospect of working with John and Elizabeth Sherrill was daunting as well. Would I be able to complete this assignment in a satisfactory way? I thought, There must be many others more capable than I of helping with the production of a book.
I arrived at Tante Corrie's lodgings, which were in a beautifully appointed apartment owned by a member of the Dutch nobility who was working in Israel and had made her home available to Corrie. My fears were put to rest quickly as I was welcomed so warmly. Blue, discerning eyes looked into my brown ones. I noted the healthy, olive-toned skin and the silver and gray hair arranged around a doughnut-shaped roll on the crown of her head.
LIFE LESSONS from the HIDING PLA£E
"Come in, child," she said, "and lets have a talk. The Sher¬ rills will be arriving soon. We will all travel together to Vught. That was the first concentration camp where Betsie and I were imprisoned. My co-authors want to be sure about the site of the camp and its surroundings and how it looked in 1944."
During the few minutes we had together before the arrival of her American friends, I was immediately drawn into Tante Corrie's world. We drank a cup of coffee, ate cookies made with butter and took each other in. It was gezellig.
"I am so glad you are going to help us with this book," she said, somehow conveying the assurance that I was a vital part of its birth.
A little later, as Tante Corrie, Elizabeth, John and I were driven to Holland's most southerly province and the site of the concentration camp, I watched the swiftly passing trees all dressed in gold, red, brown and yellow and reflected on the coffee time of half an hour before. Corrie ten Boom may have done courageous things during the war, traveled the world for decades, addressed hundreds of thousands of people and possessed a very powerful presence, but she certainly knew how to make an individual feel important and valuable. She had talked as if I were indispensable to her current project. And I believed her!
Beginning Work with Tante Corrie
We soon arrived at the site of the concentration camp, and I began to witness the care and determination with which the Sherrills recorded the facts of Corrie ten Boom's incarceration and, indeed, whole life story. At one point they asked Tante Corrie to describe how the tree-lined avenue on which we were walking had looked on the night in 1944 when she and her sister were brought to the camp.
"Corrie," said John Sherrill, "you told us that when you and Betsie were brought here soldiers stood near the trees on each side of this avenue. Where were the soldiers exacdy—in the trees, or
MEETING TANTE CORRIE
beside the trees? And those floodlights you told us were shining on you—were they in the trees or between the trees?"
"I don't remember," Corrie responded with no hesitation and with emphasis, unwilling to unlock memories of her wartime experiences. They were clearly hard for her to recall, but she stated that fact very honestly. This forceful personality was not afraid to show her fears and vulnerability.
During the coming months of the writing of the book, however, she made herself remember. I transcribed many tapes, and when The Hiding Place was published in 1971 it was fascinating to see how the skillful blending of such details as soldiers and trees with the element of danger for the Ten Boom family and the rescue of the Jewish people made this a book about which many still say, "I could not put it down."
Brother Andrew's work expanded, and so did the number of co-workers. We moved from the attic office under the pointed roof to a much larger headquarters, which housed more vehicles, Bibles and Christian book supplies in the various East European languages. An increasing number of people for whom English was their first language joined the team. I was no longer the only person who dealt with the continuing correspondence.
Asked to Be Tante Corrie's Companion
After I had worked with Brother Andrew for seven years, Corrie invited me to become her companion. Her Dutch companion of nearly nine years, Ellen, was soon to marry an American minister. I wondered how I, by now a rather independent Englishwoman in my early thirties, could possibly blend my lifestyle with that of a determined Dutch lady more than fifty years my senior. Was I cut out to be a companion? I did not think I was the type.
Deciding to accept Tante Corrie's invitation to an interview, however, I left Brother Andrew's headquarters on a March day in 1976 and drove to Overveen, a suburb of her hometown of Haarlem. She had a house there that had been her base since the previous year. A bunch of yellow tulips, a gift for Tante Corrie, LIFE LESSONS pom the HIDING PLACE lay in the passenger seat of the small, French, yellow-green car I was driving. As I entered the ancient city of Haarlem above which rose the roofs of the St. Bavo Dutch Reformed Church, also called the Great Church, I could not help but reflect on what had happened there. I thought of the small house lying almost in the shadow of that church on a street named Barteljoris where, more than thirty years before, Corrie ten Boom and her family were arrested for their part in saving Jewish lives.
Light rain was falling as I entered Juliana Avenue, where I would find Tante Corrie's home and headquarters. The wind blows across the Netherlands on most days, and this day was no exception. The cyclists on the bicycle paths on each side of the avenue had their heads down, those on the right side battling into the wind and rain from the nearby North Sea.
Pulling up to the curb as near as possible to house number 32,1 parked the car. A short walk took me through part of the tree-lined street with its large and well-kept houses. The street was clean and neat in spite of its fairly heavy traffic. As I turned in at 32 Juliana Avenue, I noticed that the front yard had no gate. Dutch houses normally did. I later learned that since her imprisonment, Tante Corrie did not like to be shut in.
I rang the front doorbell and a few seconds later, Ellen de Kroon, Tante Corrie's companion, let me in.
I stepped into an atmosphere of peace and acceptance. I had experienced this several times before on visits to Tante Corrie over the years in whatever house she might have temporary residence. And from reports I heard, nearly everybody felt the same at her house—peaceful and welcome. Needed even.
Ellen welcomed me and said, "Let me take your coat." She was tall and blond and, having seen her in action many times previously, I knew Ellen was a very able woman. Depend¬ ing on the travel circumstances, her job responsibilities included, among many other tasks, those of chauffeuse, cook, cleaner, speak¬ ing schedule organizer, nurse, public speaker and counselor to many. She dealt with thousands of people and always tried her best to see that Tante Corrie got enough rest.
MEETING.TANTE CORRIE
As she led me to the bottom of the stairs, Ellen explained that on the advice of her doctor Tante Corrie, then nearly 84, had recently begun to take one rest day each week. On this day of my visit, she was resting in her room on the second floor of the house.
"Tante Corrie is waiting for you. You know the way to her room, don't you?" asked Ellen. "Go on up, and I will bring tea in a little while."
I had visited this house before and did know the way. Clutch¬ ing the yellow tulips, I climbed the steep staircase with slight trepidation but also with a sense of mounting adventure.
That Is Settled!
How on earth does Ellen do all those tasks and at the same time provide almost constant companionship to Tante Corrie? I asked myself. I did not know how the coming interview would turn out, but I was certain that I could not fulfill all of Ellen's roles as companion to Tante Corrie, should this elderly lady ask me to take her place. I was not a nurse, and Corrie's doctor had told me that her heart was not strong. I did not like cooking or driv¬ ing, and I had a reserved personality, which might make dealing with thousands of people rather difficult. And although I had deep respect for Tante Corrie, I could hardly imagine being in this strong personality's presence 24 hours a day for an openended time.
Reaching the landing I knocked on her bedroom door, and Corrie ten Boom's firm and clear alto voice invited me to come inside. Entering her bright, fresh, colorful bedroom, I found her sitting up in bed wearing pale yellow nylon pajamas. The bedspread was covered with books, notebooks and writing implements, and her Bible was at her side. This elderly lady may be resting her body, I thought, but she is not resting her mind. We greeted each other with smiles, and I handed her the yellow tulips.
She thanked me, deposited the flowers on a bedside table and invited me to sit down. Drawing a comfortable chair closer to her bed, I looked into her blue eyes and thought how good she
LIFE LESSONS (tom the HIDING PLACE looked. Her silver-gray hair was not arranged in the usual roll around her head on this, her rest day. Fine and straight, it was neatly combed and rested on her shoulders, somehow making her look rather vulnerable. These observations did not last longer than a few seconds, however, because, characteristically, Tante Corrie came straight to the point.
"Well, child, what has the Lord told you?" "I am willing to help you, Tante Corrie ..." I ventured, by way of a start.
"Praise the Lord! That is settled then!" But for me it was not settled at all. I had not even finished the sentence. I had been going to say, "I am willing to help you until you have found a more suitable companion."
Tante Corrie began to tell me about her plans for the coming months, which included returning to the United States, where most of her work in latter years had taken place. "I have so many opportunities in America," she said. "The Hiding Place has been read by thousands of people. And now there is a new movie giv¬ ing the story of the book. I have many more invitations to speak than I can accept."
She went on to tell me that among many other appointments, she was soon to speak at a sunrise service in Florida, work for several days with a pastor in Brooklyn, be interviewed for a television program in Toronto and receive an honorary degree from Gordon College in Massachusetts. After all this, she was to speak to prisoners in Chicago and Hawaii. At the same time she told me she would work on several writing projects, includ¬ ing a new book.
"The whole journey will take seven months," she stated matter-of-factly. "Do come with me to help me."
Seven months for a person in her mid-eighties. How ever would she get through it? How would I get through it? But I was begin¬ ning to catch her enthusiasm, and besides, it sounded like a good adventure.
'Til-go with you for the next seven months, Tante Corrie," I promised. My boss, Brother Andrew, knowing of her need
MEETING TANTE CORRIE
for a new companion, had told me he would give me a leave of absence for several months to help his old friend Corrie, should she ask me.
Getting to Know Tante Corrie
Ellen joined us, bringing the tea, and we three spent a couple of hours talking about the travel itinerary and what my duties would be. While Ellen went to the kitchen to prepare supper and Tante Corrie took care of some items on her desk, I looked at the many items on the walls of her room. I had seen them briefly on a previous visit to this room, but now I could inspect them more closely. Tante Corrie obviously loved these objects and had hung many of them as closely as space permitted. Some were original oil or watercolor paintings, somehow kept safe in the War. Oth¬ ers were reproductions of works by old Dutch masters, including Rembrandt with his enchanting use of light. Other items on the wall included plaques on which were written Scripture texts of special meaning to her. Some were framed, and most were small. I read them all and was struck by one in particular. It was not particularly pretty, but it did stand out. It was a rectangular plaque without a frame. Its background was reddish pink with the words Mijn tijden zijn in Uw hand— "My times are in your hands"—written boldly in black. Underneath was the Scripture reference—Psalm 31:15.
Ellen produced a good meal in a short time, and after some more planning I took leave of them, turning the small, lightgreen car toward Harderwijk and home. As daylight dissolved to dusk I reached the last half of my journey where the lighter traffic allowed me to think about the events of the day. It looked as though I would be returning soon to Haarlem to accompany Corrie ten Boom on her journeys for seven months. Yet I did not feel as though I had been pushed into accepting her invitation to go with her. Although she had been quite sure that it was right for me to be her new companion and I was not so sure, I knew
LIFE LESSONS foam tke HIDING PLACE her well enough to know that she would not act presumptuously or force a decision on me.
What remarkable faith and trust in God Corrie has, I thought.
She is so sure about the work God has given her and how to carry it out. She lives close to Him, and her decisions have been proven right on countless occasions. She believes it is rightfor me to join her. Although I did not share her certainty, I did feel a kind of peace about it. There was comfort in the fact that God always seemed to honor Tante Corrie's decisions.
I decided to leave things as they were for now and see what happened in seven months' time. In the meantime, perhaps I would gain insights into what made her the woman she was. What kinds of things had influenced the peaceful and purposeful life she was living? How could I learn to live like that?
A few weeks later, with Brother Andrew's blessing, I arrived again at Tante Corrie's front door, with two suitcases. We began our work together on April 1,1976. Several days before our depar¬ ture on April 6, Tante Corrie began packing for the long journey. Here I caught a glimpse of her very pragmatic side. We were in her bedroom and placed the suitcases on her low bed. For the first time I saw some of the things that the long years of traveling had taught her. It was of real importance to her that we be ready in plenty of time to prevent a last-minute rush. Between us we had seven pieces of luggage, including small and large cases. She asked me to count the luggage carefully as it was loaded at the airport and again upon arrival. We began by packing her items, and I noticed that she worked methodically, never pausing to ponder or worry that she might forget something important. Last of all, she packed a copy of the New Testament translation by J. B. Phillips right at the top t>f a small bag for easy access. Judging by its ra'ther worn black cover, it looked as if it had accompanied her on many journeys.
At one point Tante Corrie packed a folded piece of shiny blue material with yellow threads hanging from it. I asked if it was some embroidery she was working on.
MEETINQ TANTE CORRIE
"No, child," she replied, her blue eyes alive with some secret, "this is what I call 'the crown.' You will see how I use it later." Saying no more, she slipped it into a cloth bag.
And so I left the Netherlands, the land I had grown to love so deeply, with its straightforward people, its language, poetry, history, the flat green lowlands on which the wind always blew and the mysterious light from the huge dome of a sky. And that short assignment, which I originally thought would last seven months, turned into seven years—time spent mainly in the United States.
From Travel to Rest
Tante Corrie traveled, wrote books, spoke at gatherings large and small and in February 1977 moved into a rented house in Placentia in Orange County, California. Her heart needed rest, but Tante Corrie disliked rest. It seemed to me she worked as hard as ever, although she did not travel as much as in previous years. She wrote several books, conducted telephone and letter correspondence, gave interviews and received many guests.
Eighteen months later, on August 23,1978,1 took tea to her room as I always did early in the morning. I knew I would find Tante Corrie propped up on her pillows, her J. B. Phillips transla¬ tion of the New Testament open on her chest. The thick curtain on the big picture window facing east, which had shut out light during the night and early morning, would have been determinedly drawn back and Tante Corrie would be planning her day.
Teatime together was a time of quiet fellowship and prayer before each busy day began. We talked about the day before and the day lying ahead. The talks were always about people—ones she had worked with decades before, others she had met on her world journeys who were passing through Los Angeles, our neighbors and the children down the road, and the many unknown people who did not yet know the Lord Jesus. And we read the Scriptures together and prayed for those we discussed. It was perhaps the LIFE LESSONS rfrww HIDING PLACE one part of the day when I could expect things to be the same as they had been the morning before.
But this day was different. For one thing, as I carried the tea tray along the corridor leading to her bedroom, I saw that all was dark inside. This was unusual, but I was glad she was sleeping in. She had complained of bad headaches in previous days.
I felt my way into the darkened room, put the tray down and extended my right hand to draw the heavy curtain. It pulled slowly back. Then I pulled on the rope that drew back the light green, filmy sheer.
I turned around and faced a completely different Tante Corrie from the one I had bid good night the evening before. She was conscious but looked very confused. I was so shocked that it seemed I froze in place for a few seconds. I greeted her, but there was no response. I ran to her and took her right hand. "Let's pray, Tante Corrie," I said. She immediately closed her eyes, and I asked the Lord to help her. Then I summoned an ambulance, and she was taken to the local hospital, where a stroke was diagnosed.
After a few weeks, Tante Corrie came home, but her brain was permanendy damaged. She could not do the normal things we do with language—she was unable to speak, write or comprehend as she had before. Sometimes, but rarely, she managed a few words appropriate to the occasion. She never learned to write again. Those of us who helped her during the next five years became sure that there were times when she could comprehend, but we were unsure as to what degree and when.
It was a different Tante Corrie with whom I lived for the next five years, yet in spite of some pain and much discour¬ agement, not a less resolute or consistent one. During what I call the five silent years that followed, in what seemed to be a very slow movement of time, I watched closely and I saw that Christianity really works. On April 15,1983, her 91st birthday, Corrie .ten Boom passed away at her rented home in Placentia, California.
MEETING TANTE CORRIE
Discovering the Heart of Tante Corrie
Corrie ten Boom's speaking and writing ministry reached hun¬ dreds of thousands of people, and in the years since her death the impact of her story has remained strong. She frequently told her audiences, "We are living in one of the darkest times of the history of the whole world." I wonder what she would think now. More than two decades after her death, the times appointed to you and me seem even darker. What can we discover about the heart of Corrie ten Boom that will help us to persevere with a better understanding of our own times—and with less fear and real victory?
I invite you to come with me on a journey into her story in which we will see afresh the kinds of things that influenced the peaceful and purposeful life Corrie lived.
We can learn from her how to put into practice the how-tos of faith that are essential to real Christian living in our times. We will discover things like:
• Learning to tell our own story
• How to maintain strong family relationships
• How to develop strong community relationships
• How to live a single life
• How to forgive our enemies
• How to get along with less
• The secret of simplicity
Corrie ten Boom told her story many times. And it was in the telling of that story that lives were changed. Deep within each human being is an ancient, profound desire for a good story. You and I have a story, too, without which every other Christian is the poorer. Perhaps in learning how Corrie told her story, we will learn how to tell our own stories as well—and in so doing we will affect our world in ways that only eternity will tell.
It was 1892 when Corrie's story began.
Corrie's Early Life
and Influences
1892-1910
ten Boom was thoroughly Dutch, in large part a product of her time and her nation. As with each of us, the history, environment, spiritual, physical and social conditions of the country of her birth had indelible effects on her and on the story she told us.
The Holland into which she was born in Amsterdam on April 15,1892, had enjoyed peace for decades—longer than most people could remember. This followed centuries of conquests, control, invasions, wars and raids by, for example, the Romans, Germanic tribes, Vikings, Hapsburgs, Spaniards, English and French. As a result of Napoleon's march across Europe, little Holland (14,103 square miles in area—the size of Massachusetts, Connecticut and Rhode Island combined) was incorporated into the French empire in 1810 and was ruled by Napoleon's followers.
CORRIE'S EARLY,LIFE AND INFLUENCES
Corrie's great-grandfather Gerrit ten Boom, a staunch Calvinist, lived in Napoleonic times. A master gardener on an estate, he lived and worked in the outskirts of Haarlem. Gerrit stood up to the Napoleonic government several times. On at least one occasion, after he had rallied the members of his Dutch Reformed Church to remember their true freedom as Dutch citizens and Christians, he was brought before the authorities. Had his influential employer not intervened he would probably have been sentenced to prison. Corrie's father, Casper, was proud of his grandfather Gerrit and told Corrie, "I am glad he was a real man."
Gerrit's influence on his grandson was evident more than one hundred years later. When people warned Casper, "Stop having Jews in your house—you will be sent to prison," he answered, "I am too old for prison life, but if that should happen, I would be honored to give my life for God's ancient people, the Jews."
And great-grandfather Gerrit's son Willem (Corrie's grandfa¬ ther) also made a large contribution to the coming generations of Ten Booms. In 1844, while in his late twenties, he began a weekly prayer meeting for Israel, to "pray for the peace of Jerusalem." He had become part of a revival movement in the middle of the nineteenth century started by Willem Bilderdijk and Isaac Da Costa, a Jew of Portuguese descent who converted to Christianity. The influence of both these men on the Ten Boom family was profound. Father Casper ten Boom told Corrie that a picture of Da Costa always hung in the family home while he was grow¬ ing up. (appendix 1 to this book further explains the influence of Isaac Da Costa on Corrie's grandfather Willem in regard to the Jewish people, for whose sake several of the Ten Booms would later lose their lives.)
Jewish people had found a refuge in Holland ever since the first Prince of Orange (of the Dutch royal family's House of Or¬ ange) delivered the country from Spanish rule in the seventeenth century. Holland became a land of freedom and security for op¬ pressed people from many countries. The Jews settled mainly in Amsterdam and even called that city "the New Jerusalem."
LIFE LESSONS Me HIDING PLACE
Years later Corrie told her audiences: "We never know how God will answer our prayers, but we can expect that He will get us involved in His plan for the answers. If we are true interces¬ sors, we must be ready to take part in God's work on behalf of the people for whom we pray."
"A Very Little, Weak Baby"
Corrie's mother, Cor ten Boom, kept a diary of sorts. Her entries were made once or twice a year, from 1887 until 1909. Her purpose was to keep notes about her children: "It seems to me it might be so nice for them, when they are grown up (the Lord sparing them) to read some things about themselves when they were small."
This is part of her entry on December 31, 1892: What an eventful year we have had. At times it was so dark and difficult, but the Lord spared us for one another and we also received a very small baby, which we had been expecting in May, but which arrived a month early, on Good Friday. We will never forget the happenings of that day, the awful fear in those dark hours, our crying out to the Lord to spare me. The Lord heard and gave us a very little, weak baby, Corrie.
Oh, what a poor little thing it was. It was nearly dead and looked bluish-white at birth. I never saw anything so pitiful. Nobody thought it would live.
Child of a Godly, Loving Marriage
Corrie was the fifth and youngest child of Casper and Cornelia ten Boom, known to each other and to their friends as Cas and Cor. Born in 1858, Cor was the seventh of the eight children of Arent Luitingh and his wife, Cornelia Frings. Shortly after the birth of the couple's eighth child, Anna, at the end of 1860, father Arent died at about fifty years of age, leaving his 42-year-old wife
CORRIE'S EARLY LIFE AND INFLUENCES
with a small store to manage in Amsterdam. As soon as they were old enough all the children worked to support the family.
When Cor was in her late teens, she and her youngest sister, Anna, taught in a kindergarten started byjans, their resolute older sister. Jans then added a Sunday school, and it was here that Cor Luitingh met Casper ten Boom. The two of them found they had much in common, including the same birthday, May 18.
Their friendship grew, and one day when Cor decided to visit her grandmother in Harderwijk, Casper missed her so much that he followed her there the next day. In view of the limited means of transport, Cor must have realized there was more to Casper's being there than just a visit. Indeed, the next day he made a proposal of marriage to Cor. Their wedding took place on October 16,1884.
About fifty years later, Corrie and her father visited Harderwijk, a fishing village on the Zuider Zee, Holland's inland sea, now reclaimed polder land. I can still hear Corrie tell the story: As we walked along the Bruggestraat, Father said: "This is where I proposed to your mother. There were cobblestones instead of pavement at that time, but many of the old houses and the sea gate are still the same." I asked him if Mother had said yes immediately. "No, not until the next day," he answered, "and I spent a very restless night waiting for that decision!"1
When Corrie asked him if he had ever regretted his decision to marry Mother his voice was firm. "Never! Until the last day of her life, I was just as much in love with your mother as I was on that day in Harderwijk. We did not have an easy life—we had many sorrows—but God led us by His extraordinary providence."2
The Watchmaker Ten Booms
Casper ten Boom was the eldest child of the second mar¬ riage of Willem ten Boom, whose first wife Geertruida died