The Miracles of God Experienced Today, Part One.
On a small piece of land located on
Route 3 between Heidelberg and Frankfurt in Germany,
you will find the home of the Evangelical
Sisterhood of Mary.
They call their little land Canaan.
Like the biblical Canaan, their land is a
promised land.
It's a place where the reign of Jesus
should be seen.
It is a land where the miracles of
God are experienced today.
Today you'll be hearing the first part of
a series of talks written by Mother Basilea
Schlink, one of the two foundresses and mothers
of the Sisterhood.
The sisters will now share with you themselves
how their Sisterhood came into being in Darmstadt,
Germany, after the frightening events of the Second
World War.
God comes when everything is dark.
An hour of destruction and suffering becomes the
occasion which God uses to pave the way
for His work.
In the dreadful night of September 11 to
12, 1944, our city, Darmstadt, Germany, was almost
completely bombed out in 18 minutes.
Thousands were killed.
In the smoking ruins, we looked for our
dear friends.
We had lost all of our possessions.
The flourishing youth work of Mother Basilea and
Mother Materia, at that time Dr. Clara Schlink
and Erika Madaus, also seemed to lie smoldering
in ashes.
What had happened on this dreadful night to
the 150 girls that had come to the
Bible studies once a week in Mother Basilea's
parent cellar?
Christian work was almost entirely prohibited during these
years, and it was very difficult and dangerous
for us to attend these Bible studies.
Yet we continued to come as we were
so gripped with a hunger for the Word
of God.
But now it seemed as though God said
no to us through that terrible night when
Darmstadt was bombed.
In that night, God had destroyed everything for
us.
In the air raid shelters in our homes,
we were not only physically hurled to the
floor, but also during the explosion of bombs
God placed us before His holiness.
It was as though we were standing before
His judgment seat.
During the attack, we called on Him and
experienced how He laid His hand upon us.
He uncovered our sins and gave us the
grace to repent of our lukewarm Christianity.
So in the midst of the horror of
death, He lifted us out of our spiritual
death and gave us new life.
Many of us had become homeless.
After the attack, we sought shelter in the
outlying areas.
Now we had to travel for hours to
come to Mother Basilea's house, which was still
standing, although it had been badly damaged.
We were driven to confess our sins without
sparing ourselves.
Our lives were to belong to God, no
longer lukewarm, no longer divided.
God had come in this hour of catastrophe,
when it seemed as though everything was all
over, and the forgiveness of our Lord Jesus
Christ, which we experienced in the following days
as never before, became a source of unspeakable
joy and awakened in us a burning love
for Him.
Up until this very day, we cannot stop
telling others about this and singing.
Only those who have had similar experiences can
sense what the following year contained.
No trip was too long or too dangerous.
No bicycle ride was too strenuous.
Our love for Jesus drove us to come
together for Bible study and for prayer.
The scantily furnished room, which still leaked, was
not too primitive for us, and the meals
of that time were not too meager.
The presence of God transformed everything.
The political situation, it was March 1945, became
more and more acute.
Darmstadt was to be occupied at any moment.
Everything was moving in the direction of chaos.
Under the pressure of low-flying aircraft attacks
and a dark future, the inhabitants of the
city were filled with fear and despair and
with a desire to escape.
However, in the midst of this situation, God
gave Mother Basilea and Mother Materia the assurance
that they should take 15 of us to
a place about 70 miles away in the
Oden Forest for a few days of meditation.
They felt that they had the promise of
the Lord that we would safely return home
before the foreign troops were to take over
our city.
Even though our train was under fire, we
felt secure in the fatherly hands of God,
for it was He who was calling us
apart for a few days of quiet meditation.
He intended during these days to lay the
foundation of the sisterhood that was to come
into being two years later.
During this retreat, the Lord worked on the
formation of the Sisterhood of Mary in the
midst of the panic of war without anyone
knowing it.
We could sense His presence so strongly that
the bit of hell around us, created by
the attacks of low-flying aircraft, really became
a bit of heaven.
In the presence of Jesus, all fear and
horror had to fade away.
Instead of asking ourselves what would happen to
us at the end of the war, it
seemed to us as though our Lord Jesus
stood before us as the man of sorrows
and asked us, Who will go the way
of the cross with me?
That is, will you bear the burdens, great
or small, that I lay upon you in
your daily life out of love for me?
In these days, our Lord Jesus spoke to
each one of us very personally.
We sensed that although we were brave enough
to stand up against an anti-Christian regime
and take part in forbidden Bible studies, we
did not have a living relationship to Jesus,
the cross-bearer, in our everyday life.
In spite of following Jesus so bravely, at
least in the eyes of our fellow students,
we were actually leaving Him alone.
We remained spiritually poor, and the suffering that
the bombing brought us made us so unhappy,
because it was so difficult for us to
bear out of love for Jesus the loss
of our homes and possessions.
However, the question of our Lord, Do you
want to go with me?
contained the offer of a precious treasure.
He wanted to take us into the fellowship
of His love, which cannot let suffering remain
suffering, but has to transform hell into heaven.
As soon as we said yes to Jesus,
to go this way with Him, our hearts
were filled with great joy.
And over the past 25 years, this joy
has become greater and greater.
Our greatest yearning was and still is today
that Jesus be loved above all.
How did we get back to Darmstadt?
The Lord had given us the assurance before
we left that we would be able to
return to Darmstadt.
We had already experienced the protection, but we
did not know how we would make it
back to our homes.
Train service was suspended.
There was a long hike ahead of us.
Streams of refugees were going in the opposite
direction.
Everyone said, What?
You want to go back to Darmstadt?
It has already been occupied by military troops.
Had God kept His promise to bring us
safely back to our city?
In faith, we clung to Him.
After midnight, a truck picked us up and
for the first time in years, we sang
in public again.
The great stream of refugees going the other
way heard these songs.
On the morning of the day that Darmstadt
was occupied, we arrived safe and sound.
God had really sent His angels so that
no evil could come upon us.
The next few months were filled with a
great deal of preparation, both inwardly and outwardly,
for the beginning of our communal life in
the Sisterhood of Mary.
We were all eager to see how we
would practice in everyday life what the Lord
had called us to do.
The way to the realization of these goals
led through many narrow paths and difficulties.
The petition to found the Sisterhood of Mary
was first turned down.
That was a hard blow for us, for
we had all our plans ready to begin.
Everything seemed hopeless.
And yet it was God's hour, for through
a conference with one of the leading men
of the city, we saw that God Himself
suddenly took the matter into His own hands
in a way which no one would have
thought of, and we were granted the permission
to begin.
We could only stand in awe and worship.
Indeed, on the 30th of March 1947, in
the house where the girls' Bible studies had
met and grown all those years, the founding
ceremonies of the Sisterhood of Mary took place.
And now there are over a hundred sisters
from many different countries.
Next time we will tell you how God
gave us our land Canaan, together with its
houses.
Again He led us along dark ways, but
they were filled with miracles.
Whenever we think of the ways which led
to the founding of our sisterhood, we have
to proclaim loud, with God, suffering, even during
a terrible air raid, is never the end.
He comes when everything is dark, especially then,
and He turns suffering into joy.
In the midst of hell, He lets us
taste something of heaven.
He carries His plans out to a wonderful
end, for His heart is love.
He cannot bear to see any of His
children in need.
All of His promises are yea and amen.
God made me, He taught me,
He died, He died for me.
The miracles of God experienced today, part two.
He is my Lord, my God and my
King.
Today, part two of a series of talks
written by Mother Basilea Schlink about the work
and founding of the Evangelical Sisterhood of Mary,
Darmstadt, Eberstadt, Germany.
Today, we will be taking a small trip
to the land of Canaan.
When we land at the airport, it's only
about a half hour's drive along the highway
between Frankfurt and Heidelberg to the large entrance
gate of Canaan.
There, we are welcomed by the three angels
on the entrance monument who blow their trumpets
and call out, Repent, for the kingdom of
heaven is at hand.
On the other side of the gate, we
read the word Canaan written in large letters.
Canaan, kingdom of heaven.
Are they only words?
Merely a wish?
Who would not like to taste a bit
of the kingdom of heaven here on this
dark earth?
Canaan, the land where God dwelled and did
His great deeds and wonders in biblical times,
has become a reality today.
It's really true.
The small land of Canaan, where everything testifies
to the great deeds and wonders of God,
is really a ray of the kingdom of
heaven.
It is a land where you can see
happy faces, where people live together in love
and reconciliation.
A land where God dwells.
But now the sisters themselves will share with
us the ways of faith which brought this
land into being.
Of blossoming meadows and gardens, with a small
lake and a fountain of the Father's goodness,
with two chapels and its ten houses, lying
near the mountains of the Odin forest, really
testifies to man.
We have a God who works wonders.
For the houses and chapels were built without
our having any steady income, without any mortgages,
and without financial support from church or state.
We were continually faced with having nothing.
Living by faith and bringing every need to
God in prayer, we experienced God answers prayers.
He gave us everything we needed, and often
in marvelous ways.
For example, our sisters built the mother house
and the chapel with their own hands and
without any money.
How would we ever be able to buy
bricks?
We prayed in groups night after night.
And what happened?
One day as Mother Basilea took the tram
back to her parents' house, where the new
sisterhood was then living, a man who sat
across from her suddenly asked, Who are these
sisters who are digging foundations over there?
Mother Basilea answered his questions.
It was humanly impossible for us to build
without any money.
A few days later, as we were praying
about this and beseeching the Lord for help,
this man who Mother Basilea had met in
the tram called up.
He said that the town officials had decided
to tear down the old army barracks.
During the next day he suddenly had a
wonderful idea.
The sisters could certainly use these bricks.
Immediately he suggested that the town officials donate
the bricks to our sisterhood.
He was calling to say that the town
council had accepted his proposal.
We were overjoyed and filled with thanksgiving.
We could scarcely grasp the goodness of God.
Our hearts simply sang with joy.
God's name is Yea and Amen.
His holy name we laud and praise.
He does whatever he says.
But God
not only gave us bricks.
Later he also gave us the roof, the
doors, the windows.
Yes, everything.
And always in answer to our prayers he
performed his miracles.
Time and again we were faced with having
nothing.
Before we began construction we only had about
seven dollars.
And then, even if it was often just
at the last minute, he gave us exactly
what we needed.
It was incomprehensible how we could testify to
the crowd of guests that had come to
the consecration of the mother house and chapel
that God had proven himself to be the
God who is called Yea and Amen.
The chapel and the mother house had been
completed and there were no debts to pay.
Yes, if we had kept silence, the very
stones would have had to cry out and
proclaim there is a God who does wonders.
Yes, we have a God who lives, who
answers prayers.
We are eyewitnesses.
Not only can the stones of our houses
join us in testifying to this, but even
the water on Canaan calls out, Who is
like God?
For the Lord performed a water miracle.
To be sure, he could only do it
after we had spent years praying for it
and had let our hearts be prepared.
For first he had to remove all inner
obstacles standing in the way of his answering
our prayer.
Because of its sandy soil, Canaan almost became
a desert in the hot summer months.
There would be no sense in drilling for
water, at least so we were told.
Due to the nature of the soil, if
there were any underground water on Canaan, it
would only be enough for four to six
people.
It would never be enough for several hundred.
But what happened?
Our well yielded 22 times as much water
as was expected.
A leading geologist from the city waterworks said,
A miracle has happened here.
You can imagine we couldn't stop singing our
songs of praises.
Yes, he is truly a father of goodness.
Yes, we have a God who performs miracles.
Now the water of the fountain of the
Father's goodness flows day and night.
Now we have a small sea of Galilee
and have even enough water to irrigate our
fields.
When something was humanly impossible, God made it
possible through his fatherly goodness, through his intervention.
When we let our hearts be cleansed more
deeply, he is moved through prayer and faith
to perform his miracles even today.
This is the testimony we give to the
thousands of visitors that come to Canaan during
the course of the year.
We have a God whose name is Yea
and Amen.
He does not only give us promises through
his word, but he also fulfills them.
However, he does not perform his miracles like
a magician, but as a father who loves
his children and who wants to bring them
up correctly.
This we have experienced in many different ways,
great and small.
For example, while we were building the mother
house and the chapel, we had a dump
cart to transport the dirt that we had
dug out.
One morning, six times in a row, the
cart jumped the tracks.
This was not just a matter of coincidence.
Each time it took a great deal of
time and trouble for us to get the
cart back on the tracks.
Finally, we went into our small prayer tent
on the construction site.
Together we prayed, Lord, show us what the
obstacle is.
Show us why you can't bless our work
today.
Then the Lord showed us very clearly that
we had a spirit of criticism towards each
other.
We were judging and criticizing each other in
our thoughts.
There was no longer a unity of love.
After we had asked each other for forgiveness
and when we began to work again, the
dump cart didn't jump the tracks once.
Up until this very day, we have continued
to experience such things.
Only when we let God chastise and punish
us can we give Him the opportunity to
perform His miracles in our lives.
He wants to help us when we are
true children who trust Him and let Him
punish us.
So God is calling to us all, Be
true children who expect everything from the Father's
love, but who also surrender themselves up to
His chastisement.
Such children will experience that God will give
them what He has promised.
He keeps His word.
Not only the residents of Canaan, but also
everyone else who hears this testimony should experience
in all their concerns, large and small, God
lives.
He answers prayers.
All we have to do is to endure
in faith.
We have to let the Father train and
discipline us.
We have to pray with all our heart.
Then we will experience the miracles of God.
God wants to reveal Himself through our lives
and show us what a loving Father He
is.
The miracles of God experienced today Part 3
Jesus, my Lord, my Lord How
often people who come to our little land
of Canaan ask Mother Basilia and Mother Martyria,
Can you tell us why all the sisters
look so happy?
One of the songs written by Mother Basilia
expresses the reason for our joy.
We are happy because we have the privilege
of loving Jesus.
Ever new we cannot understand that Jesus wants
to be loved by sinful men.
Why is that He isn't satisfied with the
homage and reverence of all the angels and
shepherds who worship Him before His throne?
Why does His heart long for personal love
from us sinners?
Jesus yearns for it because He Himself is
love and love can only be satisfied with
love.
And yet, He does not only yearn to
receive something from us, He wants to give
us something also.
He wants to give us His abundant love
which will make us completely happy.
But He can only give it to those
who love Him.
This love is the secret of true happiness.
But this love for Jesus did not suddenly
fall down from heaven as a gift for
us sisters of Mary.
Mother Basilia has often told us about the
sad conversation she had with Mother Materia over
20 years ago.
At this time, they sensed that there was
something missing in the spiritual lives of the
150 girls who attended the Bible studies which
later developed into the Sisterhood of Mary.
Often, when they opened the question box, they
would find such questions as Can you really
love Jesus as much as another human being?
To us, it seemed that this was an
impossibility.
Therefore, in spite of our brave witness for
Jesus in coming to these Bible studies which
at this time were forbidden, we were just
living for ourselves.
We did not have this overflowing love for
Jesus.
Not one of us had any interest in
giving our lives to full-time Christian service.
That is why we were missing this great
joy.
At that time, no one ever asked Mother
Basilia and Mother Materia Why do all of
your girls look so happy?
But then came the hour when God brought
about the great turning point.
It was the hour of His judgment in
the night when Darmstadt was bombed.
At this time, God gave us broken hearts
that could cry over our sin of lukewarmness.
Something wonderful grew out of this godly sorrow.
A great personal love for Jesus.
This became our blessed secret.
It filled our hearts with joy and made
our faces radiant.
And up to this very day, it has
remained the source of the happiness of our
sisterhood.
Again and again, Jesus has given us the
gift of tears of repentance.
Out of this repentance grows the great love
for Jesus.
This is the motivation of our whole life
and ministry.
Many times visitors come to us and cannot
comprehend why the teaching of Canaan has reached
many other parts of the earth.
They want to know how it is possible
that our small Canaan has become such a
world center for believers.
Then we can only answer that all comes
from loving Jesus.
There is a great power in this love.
It works just like atomic energy when it
comes out of a contrite heart.
This love can do nothing else but bear
witness to our Lord Jesus.
The life of our sister Claudia, who had
a ministry for her Lord Jesus in our
Canaan branch in Italy, demonstrated this.
A short time ago, she was a young,
lively sister in the prime of life.
Suddenly, she contracted a serious blood disease and
was called to her eternal home.
After her death, we received letters from all
sides which said, I only remember Sister Claudia
as a sister of joy.
She left behind her a ray of light,
a blaze of joy.
How did this come about?
There was a secret in Sister Claudia's life.
It was love for Jesus.
And when this fatal disease entered her life,
we could see how happy her love for
Jesus made her.
Due to this sickness, she had to fly
back to Germany.
While she was sitting in the plane, waiting
for it to start, she thought, Why do
I have to go to Germany for treatment?
I'm actually quite healthy.
But then, when the plane rose and flew
towards the sun, she suddenly heard the voice
of her Lord Jesus asking her, And if
this disease should lead to death?
Later, she wrote down in her meditation notebook,
Oh, Jesus, you filled my heart with such
an immense longing to see you soon, to
embrace you that I could scarcely constrain my
joy.
The reaction of such a young, happy sister
in such a moment showed what was really
in her heart.
It was her great love for Jesus which
brought out this reaction in her.
What power there is in this love for
Jesus.
Because it contains divine, everlasting life, it can
never die out.
This we saw in Sister Claudia's case.
During the last few agonizing weeks in the
hospital, her face was radiant.
She had a smile that seemed to come
from above.
Doctors and nurses made a point of stopping
by at her bedside to hear about the
secret of her life.
Amazed, they experienced that Sister Claudia's love for
Jesus really made all the bitterness of her
fatal disease sweet.
When Sister Claudia entered the sisterhood several years
ago, she was one of the weaker sisters.
At the beginning of her way, she made
a serious wrong decision.
Yet, this brought her a heart that could
cry over its sin.
She could really lie at the feet of
Jesus, clinging in faith to the Lamb of
God and to His victorious redemption.
By praising the sacrifice of Jesus, she became
an overcomer with a great love for her
Lord.
So in Italy, Sister Claudia could testify to
the victorious power of the love of Jesus.
Many people have written us how they have
experienced a bit of heaven through her testimony
in life.
Yes, how wonderful is this secret of love
for Jesus.
That is born out of a heart that
can cry over its sin.
What happiness it contains!
What power!
It is stronger than suffering.
For we love the One who is the
Son of all sons, who brings heavenly joy
into every sorrow and makes it sweet.
Yes, Sister Claudia's aim in life was to
live only to love Jesus.
Jesus loves to love you only.
I shall live for that alone.
All your suffering...
Countless numbers of visitors have joined us in
singing this song.
Jesus has set their hearts on fire with
His beauty, glory and unspeakable love.
He has drawn them out of their lukewarmness
and given them a burning love for Him.
Now they are impelled to love Jesus where
He has placed them.
This love for Jesus compels all of us
to love our families and relatives with patient,
reconciling love.
We should not work with ambition and self
-satisfaction as our motives, but rather we should
work out of love for Jesus, saying, for
you, for you, Lord Jesus.
Whoever loves Jesus will not avoid sacrifice and
suffering.
Whoever loves Jesus is compelled to come to
Him in prayer, even if it means sacrificing
sleep, even if it means earning less money
and having less social life and comforts.
Yes, whoever loves Jesus experiences that He is
the secret of our happiness, the joy of
our life.
No one and nothing can take it away
from us, not even the dark times which
lie ahead of us.
When we love Jesus, we have the eyes
to behold how He is waiting for our
love in return.
None of us can escape our problems and
burdens.
People who do try to escape only become
more unhappy and create problems for those around
them.
How can we deal with our problems in
a positive way so that they work to
our advantage instead of getting us down?
This meditation, The Cross, The Key to Heaven,
written by Mother Basilea Schlink and in part
spoken by her, will give us the answer.
City of God so fair, For the land's
peace is prepared, Radiant with wondrous light, Love
to all heaven's dreams, Blessed
ones, Walk by the great city's
shine, So power
of His love divine, Brighter than noonday sun,
Transforms the city of God.
A heavenly glory that
really shows God the Father in His whole
love.
That is why He has conceived such a
wonderful thing for us, His children.
When we consider that God the Father has
prepared the City of God, a golden city
with perfect beauty for His chosen ones, then
we comprehend what is in the Father's heart.
The beauty and splendor of the city tells
us this.
I want to make my children happy.
They are to have the most beautiful and
most splendid thing that there is.
Therefore, it's easy to understand why we have
to have a new heart in heaven.
The old earthly heart could not bear the
bliss there.
It would burst to pieces.
For it is too wonderful, too great, too
blissful, what He has prepared for us.
But now this is the great joy.
We do not have to wait until we
are baff.
Heaven begins for us here on earth because
Jesus Himself is the essence of heaven.
And when Jesus is close to us, we
taste heaven.
That is an incomprehensible gift, that we are
completely independent of what is happening here on
earth.
Even when a bit of hell breaks out,
heaven is still around me and in my
heart.
It is really astonishing in which way heaven
comes to us on earth.
It is a way which everyone can go.
Everyone can find heaven here on earth.
A minister, who because of his faith had
been in prison for many years, came to
visit us after his release.
He was our guest for dinner in the
mother house.
When he began to tell us about his
imprisonment, he said that it was like hell.
But strangely enough, as he said this, his
face began to radiate and he continued.
You will hardly believe what I am about
to tell you, but it is true.
This time was the most beautiful time in
my life.
Jesus Christ was so close that I could
taste heaven.
Heaven was literally in my heart.
This is overwhelming.
A bit of hell, a really heavy cross,
is the key which opens the gate to
heaven.
That means if we say yes to our
cross and suffering.
Time and again we sing of this in
our songs about heaven.
The story of the origin of one of
these songs tells us about this truth, the
cross which awakens the joy of heaven.
It is one of the songs which we
sing very often in our sisterhood.
This song has a moving story.
During one summer in the course of the
history of our sisterhood, we experienced the serious
speaking of God in His holiness.
We were judged inwardly very much.
But then there followed a time where we
received one blow of judgment after another externally.
In many cases, we were judged externally.
In May, one of our young sisters died
of cancer.
We had hoped, believed and prayed over and
over again that the Lord would lay His
hand upon her.
It was a great sorrow for us when
she was called home because we loved her
very much.
On this day, which was so filled with
grief, another one of our sisters took to
her sickbed.
This was Sister Angelica, a sculptress.
For years she had been severely ill.
She had become sick while working as an
anti-aircraft spotter during the war.
For years she had lived from a miracle.
Despite great suffering, she could still work artistically.
Now she began to lose her eyesight.
This was a sign that her illness had
reached a very serious stage and that she
only had a few months to live.
Mother Basilea and Mother Marturia's hearts were about
to break for they love us, their spiritual
daughters, as if we were their own daughters.
Now they had to stand by and watch
her suffer in agony.
And at the same time it happened that
still another sister became severely ill and had
to be taken to the hospital.
Mother Basilea was at the end of her
strength because she had stayed up so many
nights to sit at Sister Angelica's bedside.
She writes, Exactly at this time, when such
a heavy cross was lying on us, heaven
came down.
For I said, it is a cross, if
we have accepted it, which is the key
to heaven.
In the cross, if we say, Yes, Father,
we are suddenly united with Jesus Christ, who
is the center of heaven.
One evening, when I was very sad, heaven
began to shine in my heart.
I wrote down one verse after another about
what heaven contains.
Altogether there were 43 verses.
There was no end to my thanksgiving and
my joy in looking forward to heaven.
My heart became more and more joyful by
picturing what is awaiting us in heaven.
And I found that it is true.
With just one thought about heaven, all earthly
sorrow disappears.
In my great joy, I took the song
that I had written down and went to
Sister Angelica, who was so sick.
I sat down at her bedside and sang
her one verse after another.
She, too, became very happy and sang along
as much as she could.
I think the whole room was filled with
angels.
It wasn't so we were in heaven.
What could sorrow do to us?
We boasted of suffering and affliction because they
bring heaven down to us.
I cannot tell you how much we have
to thank God for His goodness.
He does not place us into a veil
of tears on earth without giving us hope
and refreshment.
In times of trouble, He does not leave
us at the mercy of all the tribulations.
No, in the midst of darkness, His heavenly
splendor shines forth.
Yes, heaven begins to sing and rejoice while
here on earth the powers of darkness seem
to be triumphant.
We read about it in the book of
Revelation.
In the times of the most terrible happenings
on earth, the heavenly voices announce, the marriage
of the Lamb has come.
Revelation 19, verse 7.
Our hearts will be able to hear this
singing and rejoicing in heaven as much as
we have allowed ourselves to be prepared in
suffering.
Then we will have an antenna that will
reach up past all earthly suffering.
Therefore, let us sing about heaven and praise
that the cross has opened the gates of
heaven for us.
Yes, heaven is ours.
How can we be sad?