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Aida's Reply to Kuzin1
By Aida Skripnikova
"For they all made us afraid, saying, Their hands shall be weakened from the work, and it shall not be done; but I strengthened my hands the more" (Nehemiah 6:9).
Let us talk about your article, Valen Ivanovich. Let us imagine that you and I have decided to compete against each other in a race. And suddenly you tie my legs together and rush toward the finishing post. "Hurray! I've won!" you cry triumphantly. "Untie my legs! Set me free! Then we'll see who'll win," I say. "Untie your legs? Set you free? But that would be an encroachment upon my freedom!" you answer.
What do you think an impartial judge would say, looking at this kind of competition?
It is perhaps fear of defeat that makes you and those who think like you resort to dishonest methods, crude force . . . . If, according to you, people do not believe in God solely on account of their thought and their knowledge, why are you afraid that I, an ignoramus, should talk to clear-thinking people? Why put me in prison? Surely even our distant ancestors did not act in this way: their thinking, your words, was so primitive that "unable to
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1. There are a few cuts in the present text at points where the original is illegible.
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explain the laws of nature and society, they created Heaven and hell" . . . .
If you suddenly feel like spending some time amongst your close friends you do not have to be afraid that by doing this you will break the law. You can meet together at any time and do whatever you like: talk, read, or sing. Why, then, can we not visit one another? What law forbids this? Why can we not pray or read the Bible whenever we want? We are allowed to speak about God only in church. You would certainly not accept it if you were allowed to talk about plays only in a theater or about books only in a library. In the same way we cannot be silent about the whole meaning of our life — about Christ.
Wherever it is we meet, whether in church or in a private flat, we talk about Christ everywhere. You call our small friendly meetings illegal, but Christ sanctioned the right to meet; He said: "Where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst.
"Call upon the Lord in all places." Christ did not say: pray only where you are allowed to. No! "In all places," and this means "pray even where it is not permitted"!
You organize large congresses, conferences, meetings, you have a great army of activists, and yet you are afraid when a few people meet to pray to God. "No one forbids you to believe in God," you say today. I am sure that you will say the same tomorrow. Perhaps in a short time, to pray will be considered a terrible crime. Where is the guarantee that tomorrow you will not shut a church? Of course you can shut a church, but this cannot destroy the Church of Christ. "For ye are the temple of the living God," says the Bible (II Corinthians 6:16).
"No one forbids you to believe in God." We believe, not because you generously give us permission; we would go on believing even if you were to forbid it. We are Christians not because "religious liberty" is inscribed in
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the Constitution of the USSR, but because Christ died on Golgotha.
From the history of past centuries we know about the times of the Roman Caesars, when Christians were persecuted and destroyed; we know about the Inquisition, when the living Church of Christ was persecuted — a time when people were burned at the stake and tortured. But now it is the twentieth century and we see how little it differs from past centuries: it is a century of prisons and deportations. Has the experience of history really not convinced you that there is no power which can wipe Christianity from the face of the earth? God said: "Behold, they shall arm themselves against thee, but not at my bidding: Whosoever shall arm himself against thee shall fall. No weapon that is formed against thee shall prosper" (Isaiah 54:15, 17).
You do not like it when we speak to people about God, about salvation. Why do we do this? Only so that you should not perish. The coming of Christ will certainly be soon, but many will pass into eternal life before Christ comes. We must not look on calmly as people choose the path which leads to destruction. Our duty is to show these people the true path.
With reference to your statement, "The more sinners you save, the wider you think the gates of heaven will open for you," I would like to ask you: where did you find such a statement in the Bible? Did Christ, when sending out His disciples to spread the good news, say to them: "The more sinners you save, the wider will the gates of Heaven open for you"? And did the thief, crucified on the cross, save any sinners? He nonetheless heard the wonderful words: "Today shalt thou be with me in paradise" . . . .
Something else is needed for personal salvation. What is it? The Bible gives a clear, comprehensive answer to this question: "He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life" (John 3:36). "For by grace are ye saved through
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faith; and not thanks to your own efforts: it is the gift of God" (Ephesians 2:8). Thus life is eternal, salvation is a gift, and it is freely given to man . . . .
And then you do not like us distributing religious letters. Imagine that a fire has started and that you must warn people of the danger, wake them up. You would sound the alarm. But if there should be no alarm bell near at hand, you would grab hold of any old bucket, even one full of holes, and would begin hitting it. No one would blame you for using an old, useless bucket in those circumstances.
Allow us to publish a mass-circulation newspaper which could be bought in a kiosk, and I assure you we would not need to distribute religious letters.
If you do not like us holding prayer meetings in private flats, then allow us to study the Bible in church, allow us to hold small meetings of young people in church, allow us to meet in our church whenever we want to.
You are mistaken when you say that we have "recently been seized by an insatiable desire for prayer meetings organized in private flats." It is incorrect to say "recently."
When I was very small, people very often met in our flat to read the Bible and pray. They met despite the cruel persecution that could result (1947). They went on meeting even after the night when several people were arrested (1946-47). After spending eight to ten years in prison, these people again began meeting to read the Bible and pray. We also meet now, and you can do nothing about it.
No doubt you are now smiling to yourselves: "Ah, but we've already done something!"
Maybe. But this was only because of our weakness.
When people spend the night in a forest, they light a great bonfire, not only in order to keep themselves warm, but also to protect themselves from wolves. Wolves will not approach a bonfire. They stand very close, viciously
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grinding their teeth, but will not approach the bonfire. But the flames burn lower and lower . . . the ring of people draws closer and closer together . . . they're already very close to it! Quick, throw on some wood. The fire blazes up with renewed strength and the wolves move away. Beside a bright flame they are not to be feared.
"What! Stand by the flames?! In view of the whole pack?! Terrifying! I'm going to hide in the bushes!"
"Friend! In the bushes the wolves are far more dangerous. Go to the fire! Quickly to the fire!"
One feels like saying to those who are afraid today: "To the fire, friends! Quickly to the fire!"
You state that we demand "the banning of antireligious propaganda produced by atheist journalists." We have never demanded this. On the contrary, we would not agree if we were given complete freedom and you were forbidden to carry on antireligious propaganda. We would be against this, firstly because it would be dishonest, secondly because when antireligious propaganda is being carried on, it is easier for us to show up the hollowness of your arguments.
Indeed, what can you set against reality, the truth? At the moment you have recourse to lies and slander, you distort and juggle the facts (this by itself is clear proof that the truth cannot be on your side). It is therefore quite understandable that you are afraid of giving us freedom.
It is absurd to announce that if believers were to be given freedom, then this would be "an infringement on the workers' freedom of conscience." How could it constitute such an infringement if a Christian periodical, such as The Young Christian or Joyful News, were to lie beside Komsomol Truth in a kiosk? Only those who wished to would buy our periodicals. People could read the article, "Don't Be a Corpse Among the Living!" in Smena, and in The Young Christian they could read the answer to it.
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This is no more than justice, and only in this way can one interpret freedom.
As for antireligious propaganda, we do not fear it. Do you really think that your lies would attract a man who has recognized the truth, who has accepted Christ into his heart? People think very little, and this is one of the reasons for disbelief, but there is another reason — lack of will to accept the truth, because "it does not suit their desires," nor does it "flatter their ears."
"For the time will come when they will not accept sound teaching; but after their desires shall they choose for themselves teachers who shall flatter their ears" (II Timothy 4:3).
Men who have not accepted the truth will "believe a lie" (II Thessalonians 2:11). Only those who have not accepted the truth, who have not received Christ, will believe a lie. So for a Christian antireligious propaganda is not dangerous.
You write: "We atheists are not against eternal life, but it must exist here, on earth, not in a world beyond. Immortality consists for us not, as religion promises, in sitting idly in some sort of Elysian field, munching sticky buns and unconcernedly watching the larger part of humanity suffer agony in fiery Gehenna."
I do not know what "religion promises," but the Word of God says this: "For the kingdom of God is not meat and drink; but righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost" (Romans 14:17).
You write: "Man achieves immortality through his work."
Even the very fact that you talk about immortality shows that despite your atheism, you find it hard to conceive that you will disappear forever. From your point of view, we can do no more than talk, firstly, about the immortality of great men such as Pushkin, Lomonosov, Beethoven, and if you wish, Gagarin; and secondly, about
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that of men who create material things. Take, for example, militant atheists whose lives have been dedicated to fighting religion: what will they leave behind them? What works of genius?
Perhaps such brilliant lines as these:
Priest Naum knocked someSense into a peasant woman;
And so she sold a sucking-pig
And to the priest her gains did give
No doubt humanity, filled with gratitude, will immortalize the author's name.
In general it must be said that up to now very little glory has fallen to the lot of atheists. Over the last 20 centuries there have been a great many cruel persecutors and derogators of Christ's name, but for some reason people have forgotten their names, except for Herod, Caiaphas, and Nero. Even those who persecute Christians today do not pronounce these names with respect.
Yes, there have been many derogators of Christ's name over the last 20 centuries, but they have died and the world has forgotten their names, whilst before the name of Christ millions of people all over the world have bowed . . .
"Baptists see the meaning of life in getting themselves well prepared for the afterlife," you state.
Here is what Oswald Smith has to say on this subject: "You can work away at perfecting your character even until the Day of Judgment, but nevertheless you will meet with utter and complete defeat. Every birth is a crisis, and spiritual birth is no exception. New life is gained not by the growth, development, or evolution of one's previous life but by means of a spiritual revolution. When Christ enters your heart you become his child, his property. If he has gained possession of you, then all the rest is no longer difficult. Christ creates his own image in you, he dwells in you, transforms you from within."
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The goal of our life is "to build Communism and live under it."
One feels like saying to you: "Is not life more than meat, and the body than raiment?" (Matthew 6:25).
In your opinion, there is no nobler, brighter, or more beautiful goal in the world than that of building Communism and living under it. And you ask me whether I am prepared to work for this goal.
No, I do not want to work for this goal because I consider it neither bright nor noble. The society which you will build will never be just, because you yourselves are unjust. I am deeply convinced that where there is no truth, there can be no happiness either.
The goal of my life is to serve the truth.
My father refused to kill people. You call this a crime. He refused to kill people, and for this he lost his own life. He died in order not to kill. If everyone were prepared to die rather than to kill, then there would be no wars. Christ said, "Do not kill." You jeer at this Commandment. If only people would remember it! But today some have forgotten it, others jeer at it, and that is the only reason why today the threat of war hangs over the world.
This is the only reason — there are no others!
Are we threatened with war because many other people refuse to take up arms?
"Your father," you say, "refused to take up arms to defend you." You say "defend." I know Baptists who did take up arms to defend their children, their homeland. But today in this country, in the country which they defended, they are rejected; they are not trusted, they are forbidden to meet freely for prayer, a whole stream of crude lies pours down upon them, and they are told, "There is no room for you in our beautiful world!" "You're getting in our way!" "We'll isolate you!" "We'll punish you!"
What advice for defending their children would you
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give those Baptists today who took up arms to defend their children from the Fascists? You say that the question is not one of physical punishment for believers but of an ideological struggle. But why then are our best brothers in prison?
You say: "Innumerable are the crimes of all religions, including the Baptist faith, before humanity and particularly before science."
"All religions," you say.
We are not concerned with religion per se. There are many religions, some with difficult and complex rituals, some thought up by men. The Christian religion without the living Christ is powerless: such a religion does not save; it is dead and cannot enable a man to be born again. We are not religious people — we are Christians.
May we remind you that in so-called Christian Russia those who preached Christ's Gospel were thrown into prison and sent to Siberia. One would have thought that in a Christian country there would have been freedom to preach the Gospel. But they were arrested for preaching the Gospel, and those who met to read it and pray were dispersed.
At the moment our country no longer calls itself Christian. It is an atheist country. In our day, too, men are imprisoned for preaching the Gospel, and also those who meet to read the Bible and pray are dispersed.
Formerly "Christians" banned the preaching of the Gospel — now it is the atheists who ban it.
What is the difference between the one and the other? Perhaps it is only in name that they differ. Do not let such a comparison outrage you. Believe me, it is of no importance to us by what name our persecutors call themselves. You are very proud of your atheism, you discuss cybernetics and atomic energy but threaten all those who care to talk about Christ, exactly as though you were some little country priest of days gone by. You have taken
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the baton from those who masqueraded in cassocks and fiercely persecuted Christians.
Jan Hus was burned by men who called themselves Christians. He said:
"O, Lord Jesus Christ, I am ready to bear with joy a cruel and terrible death for the sake of your shining Gospel and for preaching your Holy Word. Forgive, I beseech thee, all my enemies. For the main goal of all my preaching, teaching, writing, and other works has been to save men from sin. And now I am called before the Roman Curia to answer for preaching the Gospel."
Today you do not want to admit that Jan Hus was burned as a preacher of the Gospel. And this is quite understandable. You, after all, are also persecuting men for preaching the Gospel. And if you were to admit that Jan Hus was executed for preaching it, you would by this very admission condemn yourselves.
If Jan Hus had lived in our time, in our country, he would have been thrown into prison.
"During the Inquisition more than five million people were burned and tortured in prison," you write, and you look amongst the burned and tortured for atheists; but atheists were among those who did the torturing and burning. And there were Christians who protested against the witch hunts, murders, plunder, and violence. God's true children boldly went forth into battle armed with a formidable weapon. Before this weapon the transgressors trembled. This weapon was the Word of God, the teaching of Christ.
"It now behooves true and fearless martyrs for Christ, armed with the Gospel and with sword in hand — which is the Word of God — to fight against the evil designs of the Anti-Christ," said Jan Hus.
Why is it that during the almost 2,000 years of its existence the Christian religion has not raised society's moral
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standards, you ask, and then give the following advice: "Don't trouble yourselves; you've got no answer." And yet it is not at all difficult to give you an answer. Society's moral standards have not risen because, as Christ said, "Men loved darkness rather than light" (John 3:19). Only very few followed Christ. The majority did not accept the Christian religion. Religion without Christ is dead, and consequently, it cannot enable a man to be born again, nor can it destroy evil.
You are deeply convinced (or try to convince yourselves and others) that religion "cripples a man morally," that religion represents "social stagnation" — in a word, religion is an evil and it should be fought "with tenacity and persistence." To fight evil is, of course, an admirable desire, but one should not forget Christ's remarkable words in the Gospel:
"And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother's eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye? Or how wilt thou say to thy brother, let me pull out the mote from thine eye; and, behold, a beam is in thine own eye? Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam from thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote in thy brother's eye." (Matthew 7:3-5).
Here is the last point to which I would like to draw your attention. You are shocked that God destroyed all men save Noah's family. The ark was built 120 years; for 120 years men heard the words: "Come in!" "Receive salvation" "Repent!" "Repent!" At last the ark was ready — and even then its doors remained open for six days. Anyone who wished could go in. But people did not want to. They perished — and it was simply because they did not wish to be saved. You have many times already heard God's call: "Repent before it is too late! Repent and inherit eternal life! Come to Christ!"
Just as in the past men were offered the ark as a means
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of salvation, so we have been given Christ. But you do not wish to receive Christ, you do not wish to receive eternal life. God offers you this life, but you do not wish to receive it. God offers you this life, but you reject the opportunity. Whom will you blame on the Day of Judgment? Who will bear the guilt for your downfall? Will it not be you yourselves? You were offered salvation so many times, but you did not want to "enter the ark."
But today you can still change your fate. Before it is too late,
COME TO CHRIST!
September 19622
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2. Russian text: Possev, Frankfurt, No. 9, 1968, pp. 59-62.
Chapter Six || Table of Contents
