A Focus OF THE SOVIET ATTACK - How the Witnesses Survived

In contrast, Jesus Christ revealed how his true followers would be known, saying;  "By this all will know that you are my disciples, If you have love among yourselves."  (John 13: 35)  This love was a key factor in the survival of the Witnesses in the former Soviet Union, as indicated by the following report in The Sword and the Shield.   Jehovah's Witnesses extend  assistance of all kind to their co-coreligionists who are in the labor camps or in internal exile, supplying them with money, food, and clothing.

Included in the "food" provided for those in prison camps was that of a spiritual kind-Bibles and Bible literature. The Bible contains 'utterances of God,' which Jesus said we need in order to sustain our spiritual lives.  (Matthew 4:4)  The literature was smuggled into the camps at great personal risk, since anyone found doing his was severely punished.

Helene Celmina, a Latvian, was imprisoned in the Potma penal camp in Russia from 1962 to 1966. She wrote Women In Soviet Prisons, a book in which she explained:  "Many Jehovah's Witnesses received ten years of hard labor merely for having a few issues of the magazine Watchtower  in their apartments.  Since people are arrested for possession of these writings, the anxiety over the presence of this literature in camp is understandable.  

Sure, risking personal freedom and safety to provide spiritual help was an evidence of Christian love!  But while this was an important  factor in the survival of the Witnesses, there was an even more important one.  "No one could understand," Helene Celmina noted, "how this land of barbed wire and limited human contact could be penetrated by forbidden literature."  It seemed impossible, since everyone entering the prison  was thoroughly searched.  "It was if angels at night flew over and dropped it,"  this author  wrote. 

Indeed God promised that he would not leave, or desert, his people.  So Jehovah's Witnesses in the former Soviet Union readily acknowledged , as did the Bible psalmist:  "Look! God is my helper."  (Psalm 54:4; Joshua 1:5)  Indeed, his help was important to the survival of the Jehovah's Witnesses in the former Soviet Union! 

Next time: A Focus OF THE SOVIET ATTACK -Reaching Those in the Camps 

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