Lessons from the Secret Police

How the success of Christians under Communism can help us develop a 2020s Vision

“The Secret Police built this place. You do realise that?” She was quite wide-eyed. This was personal for her. I felt the hairs rise on the back of my neck as she told her story.
We were at the end of probably the strangest educational conference that I’d ever helped to chair. Our star speaker was the charismatic and witty Director of the Russian Academy of Education. Delegates would sit uncomprehending as he told jokes in Russian. Then part of the room would burst into laughter as he was translated into German; finally the rest of us got to laugh when German was translated into English.

Our conference centre in the eastern part of Berlin was a bit strange too. Only part of the building had been upgraded into a hotel, and if we took a wrong turn we found ourselves in cold tiled corridors – institutional and threatening. Now I could imagine the inmates’ screams.

On the final evening the delegates had left, and as conference organisers we were reviewing the conference with our German-English translator. That was when she shared her story. She and her husband were Christians, who’d been persecuted by the Communists. She explained (among quite a few other things) that her husband had been summoned to this very building for “re-education” by the Stasi, East Germany’s terrifying secret police. The Holy Spirit had intervened: the husband had fallen ill, was unable to attend and then somehow the Stasi had lost track of him until the Berlin Wall had come crashing down.

What’s our 2020 Vision?

The Eastern European Christians not only survived under Communism’s hostile atheism. They thrived. And they were pivotal in ending those very regimes that had seemed all-powerful. So what can we learn from them?

• They didn’t have a victim mentality. A gritty vision and hope shone from our Christian colleague that night. God calls His children to be “the head and not the tail” (Deuteronomy 28:13). He always knows what He is doing! So they prayed — individually, in groups, faithfully and unceasingly. For decades, it seemed as though Jesus wasn’t listening but they never gave up. And at the right time, the Holy Spirit took the secular atheism of eastern European governments and swept it away like a flood.

o    Does your school have a prayer group? If there are 2 or more Christians, it’s time to start one now!  For more details, see https://www.suscotland.org.uk/pray/pray-for-schools-scotland/

o   And have you got involved with the fantastic Prayer Spaces in Schools initiative? I can’t recommend it too highly. For more details see https://www.cve-scotland.org.uk/resource-centre/item/236-prayer-space-in-schools.html

• Secondly, the East German Christians heard, much more loudly than us, the message that they were powerless and, worse still, that God is powerless too. But they knew that “We are not fighting against flesh-and-blood enemies, but against evil rulers and authorities of the unseen world, against mighty powers in this dark world, and against evil spirits in the heavenly places.” (Ephesians 6:12) They understood why their society’s secular message was bankrupt, and how Christ’s invitation to join His Kingdom is the only good news in town. There are striking parallels with 2020s Scotland:

o      Our secular society promises freedom and fulfilment, just as Communism did. Judged by its own standards, is secularism working? Recent authoritative surveys report “a staggering deterioration in young people’s confidence in themselves and in their future”^[1] and “pupils in UK schools are among the unhappiest in the world.”^[2] Secularism has no answers to the cruel pressures our young people face to have a face/body like a celebrity’s or to follow the religion of consumerism……and don’t forget the imminent rise of Artificial Intelligence (challenging everything it means to be human – and valuable).

o      By contrast, remember that there is no shortage of objective evidence that “God is Good for You”^[3] – and the news that God amazingly loves and values you really is the only answer to the pressures our society faces. Let’s develop legitimate classroom resources for children and young people to explore these claims e.g.

Ten Must Know Bible Stories https://www.cve-scotland.org.uk/resource-centre/itemlist/filter.html?fitem_all=Ten+Must+Know&moduleId=241&Itemid=140, or

Introducing the God Question https://www.cve-scotland.org.uk/resource-centre/item/4310-introducing-the-god-question.html

• Thirdly, they knew they were up against a powerful establishment with all its propaganda tools. But they got to the stage where they could see that secularism’s efforts were doomed because “The Lord foils the plans of the nations; he thwarts the purposes of the peoples. But the plans of the Lord stand forever” (Psalm 33:10-11). Those Christians looked for influence – and so must we:

o      They networked — isolated, we feel weak; together we start to realise how much Jesus is already doing. That’s the potential that CVE Scotland is helping to release.

o   Our School Chaplains Network is starting to develop impressively. Is your minister/pastor a school chaplain? If so, please send him/her the links to our website/Facebook page/Twitter feed. There’s a great little film on our website, “Keeping Faith in Schools” that’s a good place to start https://youtu.be/f5YGQD_QHkg

o   Do we also need a deliberate networking strategy for Christian teachers, to enable us to share, to work together effectively as well as simply to encourage each other?

o      If you are a teacher, you are already influential. But have you prayed about seeking promotion? Is God calling you to serve and bless a whole school?

Our Christian conference translator saw God fulfil her hopes for influence in ways she could never have dared imagine. As she pointed out to us, for the last 3 days she’d been working safely and as an equal with a man who’d until recently stood next to her chief persecutor, the East German Dictator, Erich Honecker. Our Russian-German translator, it turned out, had been personal translator to the ruthless dictator himself, a dictator who – in a remarkable reversal – ended up being tried for treason in the country he had so savagely oppressed.

[1] Nick Stace, UK chief executive at The Prince’s Trust, on the 2018 Macquarie Youth Index 2018 Annual Report https://www.princes-trust.org.uk/about-the-trust/news-views/macquarie-youth-index-2018-annual-report

[2] OECD study of well-being among 15-year-olds in 72 countries, 2017: https://schoolsweek.co.uk/pisa-wellbeing-tables-2017-uk-pupils-among-unhappiest-in-the-world/

[3] The title of top Australian journalist Greg Sheridan’s recent book (quote url): see page 26 for just one of many examples he quotes:  “Doubling the rate of religious attendance raises household income by 9.1%, decreases welfare participation by 16% from baseline rates, decreases the odds of being divorced by 4% and increases the odds of being married by 4.4%.” (Source: US National Bureau of Economic Research Report – Is religion good for you? 2017)