Freedom

“We are descendants of Abraham and have never been enslaved to anyone.” John 8:33

Most of the survivors of the Holocaust have harrowing stories to tell. Dr. Edith Eva Eger is no different. She arrived in Auschwitz as a young girl in May 1944. She came down from the cattle car with her mom and sister and there was a man with cold eyes pointing to the left and right. He pointed that her mother go left, and Edith and her sister were to go right. She followed her mom, and the man came after her. He looked her in the eye and said her mother was just going to shower. She never saw her mother again. Someone pointed to the smoking chimneys to tell her where her mother had gone. 

She saw the man again and someone told her he was Mengele, the angel of death. He wanted to be entertained and her friends pushed Eva to dance for him because was a ballerina who had danced many times before. After the dance, Mengele gave her a piece of bread which she shared with her friends on the top bed. Many months later, she was in a death march and anyone who was too weak to go on was just shot and left in the ditch. Her friends noticed that Eva was shaking from exhaustion. They formed a chair with their hands and carried her. 

In a book she wrote entitled The Choice, Eva writes: “What happened can never be forgotten and can never be changed. But over time I have learned that I can choose how to respond to the past. I can be miserable or I can be hopeful - I can be depressed or I can be happy. We always have that choice, that opportunity for control... Suffering is universal. Victimhood is optional.” Eva chose not to be bitter, not to be enslaved by unforgiveness and hatred. Is any sin holding us captive? Lent is the perfect time to break free from shackles. There is a grace that God gives us every time we come to Him for healing. Let us choose freedom in Christ and not slavery.