Jesus Is Victor

“He that dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High Shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty. I will say of Jehovah, He is my refuge and my fortress; My God, in whom I trust.” — Psalm 91:1-2 (ASV)

On Monday, 28 February 1944, Corrie was in bed with flu. Downstairs her brother Willem was leading a Bible study, and the house was busier than usual. Then the alarm sounded. Four Jewish guests and two young resistance workers ran past her bed and into the hiding place. Corrie shoved her own records in after them, hid the panel, and was back in bed when the raiders reached the top of the stairs.

The raid was carried out by the German security police with officers of the Haarlem police. Corrie was arrested at once. When she refused to tell them where the secret room was, they said they would simply watch the house until whoever was inside gave up. Everyone who arrived during the day walked into a trap. The officer in charge questioned Corrie in the shop and hit her across the face again and again. When she cried out to Jesus, he threatened to kill her, and then stopped. Betsie was beaten too. Afterwards Betsie said she pitied the man who had done it.

On the fireplace hung a small wooden plaque that said “Jesus is Victor.” Betsie pointed it out to Corrie, and their father said aloud that it was true. It looked as if the Gestapo had won. Corrie didn't understand what was happening, and she knew that believing is not the same as understanding. When a German noticed a Bible and asked the old man what it said about the government, Casper quoted Peter: “Fear God; honour the Queen.” The officer protested that the Bible said no such thing. Casper politely explained that it said “the king,” but in the Netherlands that meant the Queen. Courtesy, and quiet defiance. As he was led out, he remembered the clock in the hall that needed winding.

How many people were arrested that day is uncertain; the records give numbers from twenty-one to thirty-five. At the police station a mattress was put on the floor for the family. The old man lay down with his children around him, Betsie, Corrie, Nollie and Willem, and his grandson Peter. At his request Willem read Psalm 91, the passage at the top of this chapter, and then Casper prayed. It was the last time, Corrie wrote, that she heard her father pray. The next day, as a bus took them away, people of Haarlem stood silently along the street, many in tears.

Meanwhile, behind the false wall, six people stood in the dark from Monday afternoon until Wednesday, with guards in the house waiting for them. On 1 March policemen friendly to the resistance came on duty, and when it was safe they let them out. The Jews left after dark. Corrie later heard that Eusie was so glad to be outside that he raised his arms in the street and chanted a Jewish prayer.

Many retellings stop there, as if all six were saved. They deserve the truth. Mary van Itallie was arrested again within days at her new address, sent to Westerbork, and murdered at Auschwitz on 1 May 1944. Eusie was betrayed later too, but by the time he reached Westerbork in January 1945 the trains east had stopped, and he survived to become a well-known cantor. The sources disagree about the others.

Read Psalm 91 again in that light. That family read it on the night its protection seemed to fail. They weren't naive. The psalm's deepest promise isn't that nothing bad will ever happen to you. It is that God himself is the refuge, and that he will be with you in trouble. That is the promise the rest of this story tests.

One thing to do this week: read Psalm 91 slowly, all of it. Underline every promise that says God will be with you rather than that nothing will go wrong. Then pray it for someone you know who is going through something hard.