The Man of Sorrows in Ravensbrück

In all their affliction he was afflicted, and the angel of his presence saved them. ISAIAH 63:9

Corrie ten Boom did not teach a theology of suffering in the way a scholar might. She had no theory of why God permits evil, and she was suspicious of people who seemed to have one. What she had instead was an experience, repeated in many forms, of finding Christ present at the very point where suffering was worst. She told these experiences over and over, and together they make a teaching: the Christian who suffers is not abandoned, because the Lord has been there first.

Stripped

In three of the recorded addresses now on Ochorus — How to Forgive, Total Surrender and Tribulation — Corrie returns to the same memory. At Ravensbrück the prisoners were made, again and again, to strip and stand naked for inspection, sometimes for hours. She says the first time was the worst. She had never felt so cold, so ashamed or so miserable, and she told Betsie she could not bear it. Then, she says, it was as though she saw Jesus on the cross, and remembered that the soldiers had taken His garments and that He had hung there naked, for her.

Then the soldiers, when they had crucified Jesus, took his garments, and made four parts, to every soldier a part. JOHN 19:23

By her own suffering, she says, she understood a fraction of His. And the thought did not deepen her misery. It lifted it. She was so moved by the love that had endured such shame for her that she found she could bear her own. She liked to finish the story by recalling the words of an old hymn about love so amazing that it demands the whole of a life.

Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God. HEBREWS 12:2

It is worth noticing what she did not say. She did not say that her shame was redemptive, or that she was suffering as Christ suffered. His sufferings were for sin, once for all; hers were not. What she said was that His sufferings made hers bearable, because they showed her that the Lord of glory had gone lower than she was going, and had gone there out of love.

Not burden-bearers

In Total Surrender she tells of another morning in the camp, when a great crowd of new prisoners arrived and she could hardly bear to think of what awaited them. She opened her Bible and read the fifty-third chapter of Isaiah.

He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from him; he was despised, and we esteemed him not. Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows. ISAIAH 53:3–4

She saw, she says, that at the cross Christ had carried not only our sins but our sorrows. The lesson she drew from it became one of her sayings: that Christians are not called to be bearers of burdens, but bearers of light and of the cross — casting the burdens on the Lord and leaving them there. We will return to that when we come to worry. Here the point is simpler. The sorrows of Ravensbrück were not outside the reach of the cross. He had carried them too.

For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin. HEBREWS 4:15

The fellowship of His sufferings

Corrie took seriously what Paul says about sharing in the sufferings of Christ, and she was unusually aware of the persecuted church. In How to Forgive she tells of standing in a church in Burundi, in the days when believers there were being killed, and being given a passage from Peter to read to a frightened congregation. She says a joy came into the room as they heard it, and that one man began to sing of heaven. Later she learned that many of those she had spoken to had been murdered. A woman from that church, seeing her grief, told her they had simply gone on ahead.

Beloved, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you, as though some strange thing happened unto you: but rejoice, inasmuch as ye are partakers of Christ’s sufferings; that, when his glory shall be revealed, ye may be glad also with exceeding joy. 1 PETER 4:12–13

She added a line from Paul’s letter to the Philippians, which she read in Tribulation from a modern paraphrase: that Paul, writing in chains, counted everything loss compared with knowing Christ. And she added her own witness. She had always believed, she said, but in Ravensbrück she learned to know Jesus better than ever before, while her sister starved in front of her.

That I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable unto his death. PHILIPPIANS 3:10

Presence, not explanation

The Ochorus biography records a moment from the camp that shows how this presence came to her. Walking back through the fog after being turned away from Betsie’s sickbed, Corrie felt rebellion rise in her. Why did God leave them there? Why must Betsie suffer? Then, she said, she heard three words in French, filled with tenderness, and there was no one near her. She took it as God speaking to her, not in rebuke but in love, and she was ashamed and comforted at once.

Readers will weigh that experience as they weigh such things. But notice its shape. Her question was why. The answer she received was not a reason. It was a presence. That is the pattern of Scripture too. Job asked why and was answered with God Himself. The disciples in the storm asked whether the Lord cared, and He stood up in the boat. The promise God gives His suffering people is almost never an explanation. It is almost always Himself.

Let your conversation be without covetousness; and be content with such things as ye have: for he hath said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee. HEBREWS 13:5

On one of the worst mornings at roll call, the biography records, Betsie whispered to Corrie that this was hell, and Corrie whispered back that very promise.

A caution

It would be easy to take the wrong lesson from all this. Corrie never taught that suffering is to be sought, or that the more a Christian suffers the holier he is, or that pain is good in itself. She fought to keep Betsie alive, carried her to the sick roll call, and shared out her little bottle of vitamins, drop by drop, among the women around her. She did not despise the relief of suffering; she practised it. What she taught was that when suffering comes, as it will, the Christian is not alone in it, and that the cross is the proof.

For even hereunto were ye called: because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that ye should follow his steps. 1 PETER 2:21

The steps are His. We follow; we do not lead. And He is not only ahead of us on the road. He walks beside us on it.

FOR REFLECTION AND ACTION

1. Read the account of the crucifixion in John 19 slowly, and note every detail of the shame the Lord endured.

2. Name one suffering you are carrying now. Bring it to the cross in prayer and tell Christ that He has carried it too.

3. Learn Hebrews 13:5 by heart and say it to yourself each morning this week.

4. Find out about one part of the world where Christians are suffering for their faith today. Pray for them by name.

5. Ask yourself whether you are relieving any suffering near you, or only admiring those who endure it. Do one concrete thing.

A PRAYER

Lord Jesus, Man of sorrows, You were stripped and shamed and hung upon the cross for me.

When I suffer, let me see You there before me, and let Your love make my pain bearable.

I do not ask You to explain what I cannot understand. I ask You not to leave me, as You have promised.

Strengthen Your suffering people everywhere, and let me know You better in the fellowship of Your sufferings. Amen.