Tortured for Christ in Atheist Romania - Richard Wurmbrand (3 of 3)

Atheism per se creates a moral vacuum where everyone can behave like Satan himself.

The most oppressive and human-killing regime's have been when Atheists have taken over governments. Nevertheless, atheists claim that people of faith are to blame for mass amounts of people's lives being taken. This is not based on facts. In the past century, Atheism forced its beliefs on people of faith or simply slaughtered hundreds of millions of them.

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Pastor Richard Wurmbrand (March 24, 1909 - February 17, 2001)

Many people called him the "Voice of the Underground Church" and others referred to him as the "Iron Curtain St. Paul." This humble man who began the ministry of The Voice of the Martyrs was the Rev. Richard Wurmbrand. Richards life was a partnership with the equally amazing Sabina, whom he married on October 26, 1936.
Richard Wurmbrand was born the youngest of four boys in a Jewish family on March 24, 1909, in Bucharest, Romania. Gifted intellectually and fluent in nine languages, Richard was active in politics and worked as a stockbroker.
During World War II, Richard and Sabina saw an opportunity for evangelism among the occupying German forces. They preached in the bomb shelters and rescued Jewish children out of the ghettos. Richard and Sabina were repeatedly arrested and beaten and, at least once, nearly executed. Sabina lost her Jewish family in Nazi concentration camps.
In 1945 Romanian Communists seized power and a million "invited" Russian troops poured into the country. Pastor Wurmbrand ministered to his oppressed countrymen and engaged in bold evangelism to the Russian soldiers.

On February 29, 1948, the secret police arrested Richard while on his way to church and took him to their headquarters. He was locked in a solitary cell and labeled 'Prisoner Number 1.'
In 1950, his wife Sabina was also imprisoned. She was forced to serve as a laborer on the Danube Canal project, leaving their nine-year-old son, Mihai, alone and homeless. Following her release in 1953, the Romanian authorities informed her that Richard had died in prison.
A Christian doctor masquerading as a Communist Party member discovered Richard alive in prison. In a general amnesty, Richard was released in 1956 after serving eight-and-a-half years in prison. He was warned never to preach again. While in prison, he went through horrific tortures at the hands of the brutal secret police. Despite the treatments and the warnings he received from his persecutors, Richard resumed his work with the "underground" churches after his release.
He was re-arrested in 1959 through the conspiracy of an associate, and sentenced to 25 years. Due to increased political pressure from Western countries, Richard was granted another amnesty and released in 1964.
In December 1965, the Norwegian Mission to the Jews and the Hebrew Christian Alliance paid $10,000 in ransom to the Communist government to allow the Wurmbrand family to leave Romania. Reluctant to leave his homeland, Richard was convinced by other underground church leaders to leave and become a "voice" to the world for the underground church. Richard, Sabina, and their son Mihai left Romania for Norway and then traveled on to England.
Richard began his ministry of being a voice for persecuted Christians in England with Rev. Stuart Harris, where he also wrote his testimony of persecution, Tortured for Christ. Later, Richard moved on to the United States, and in 1966 he appeared before a U.S. Senate Internal Security Subcommittee, where he stripped to the waist and revealed 18 deep torture wounds on his body. His story spread rapidly, leading to more and more speaking engagements.
In 1967, the Wurmbrands officially began a ministry committed to serving the persecuted church, called Jesus to the Communist World (later renamed The Voice of the Martyrs). In the same year, Richard released his book, Tortured for Christ.
In October, 1967, the first monthly issue of The Voice of the Martyrs newsletter was published in the U.S. By the mid-1980s his work was established in 80 restricted nations with offices in 30 countries around the world.
In 1990, after the fall of Nicolae Ceausescu in December 1989, Richard and Sabina returned to Romania after 25 years in exile and were warmly received. A printing facility and bookstore were opened in Bucharest, and the officials of the city offered to store Christian books in a room below the palace of Ceausescu, the very site where Richard had been held in solitary confinement.

For additional information, please visit:
http://www.persecution.com/