The book this episode is based on comes from an international high school library, tucked away in the back and completely unknown. Judith's story of coming to the faith as a Jewish girl in the midst of WW1 and the Russian Civil War is a little-known perspective that is both powerful and inspiring.
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00:00 --> 00:07 [SPEAKER_00]: You're listening to martyrs and missionaries, I'm Elise and in every episode I'll bring you a new martyr and or missionary, the cold and the brave.
00:07 --> 00:11 [SPEAKER_00]: In this episode we're talking about Judith Weinberg, missionary of N2, Russia.
00:31 --> 00:32 [SPEAKER_00]: Hello, and welcome to another episode.
00:32 --> 00:43 [SPEAKER_00]: I'm really excited about this one, but before we get into that, I wanted to kind of give some reviews that you guys have sent in because I realized, I read them, but I don't wanna share them with you guys.
00:43 --> 00:47 [SPEAKER_00]: So I'm gonna read a few that I've received recently here.
00:47 --> 00:55 [SPEAKER_00]: We have from Aquila Daniels, says, can I please have the theme song of this podcast?
00:55 --> 00:55 [SPEAKER_00]: I love it.
00:56 --> 00:58 [SPEAKER_00]: And unfortunately, I failed her because I forgotten what the theme song
01:00 --> 01:08 [SPEAKER_00]: This next one is from Walter Kirk or Wally, who might actually know, so for full disclosure here, he says about the Eric Little episode.
01:08 --> 01:10 [SPEAKER_00]: Just listen, I think this is one of your best.
01:10 --> 01:12 [SPEAKER_00]: I never really knew about his ministry life.
01:13 --> 01:16 [SPEAKER_00]: The only part I know about his life is the chariots of fire apart.
01:16 --> 01:18 [SPEAKER_00]: Well, this is a new inspiration.
01:18 --> 01:19 [SPEAKER_00]: Thank you, Wally.
01:20 --> 01:25 [SPEAKER_00]: And now I want to tell you a little bit about how this episode came to be because as I said, I'm really excited about it.
01:26 --> 01:32 [SPEAKER_00]: But it came about really randomly because I was just kind of exploring this school library in like the secondary area.
01:32 --> 01:36 [SPEAKER_00]: And I was like, you know what, there's some like some biographies, let me go, look at some of these.
01:37 --> 01:44 [SPEAKER_00]: And I came across this one and this book is really old because it still has the original name of the school stamped upon it.
01:44 --> 01:46 [SPEAKER_00]: It's gone through like three name changes since then.
01:47 --> 01:59 [SPEAKER_00]: So we know it was acquired between some time between 1981 and 2001 and in the entire time that it has been in the library, it has never once been checked out until now.
02:00 --> 02:07 [SPEAKER_00]: And this book is a little bit unique because it's originally written and published in Russian in 1941 during the time of Stalin.
02:07 --> 02:15 [SPEAKER_00]: So a lot of names and city names have also been changed, but because of this, we actually have no idea if her name is even Judith Weinberg.
02:15 --> 02:20 [SPEAKER_00]: But thanks to this author, who himself is a little bit mysterious, uh, we know her story.
02:20 --> 02:22 [SPEAKER_00]: So let's go ahead and dive into it here.
02:24 --> 02:26 [SPEAKER_00]: Judith was born into a wealthy Jewish Russian family.
02:26 --> 02:29 [SPEAKER_00]: Her family had a proud heritage of multiple rabbis.
02:30 --> 02:32 [SPEAKER_00]: Her parents only had three daughters, though.
02:32 --> 02:34 [SPEAKER_00]: So there was no one to carry forward that legacy.
02:35 --> 02:41 [SPEAKER_00]: Judith was the oldest of the three, and she took a great deal of interest in all things ceremonial, rabbinical, and the Torah, et cetera.
02:42 --> 02:48 [SPEAKER_00]: and she was especially fascinated with and bothered by the fact that an innocent lamb had to die for Passover.
02:48 --> 02:50 [SPEAKER_00]: And she would ask her parents about this.
02:50 --> 02:51 [SPEAKER_00]: Why does this have to happen?
02:51 --> 02:52 [SPEAKER_00]: I don't understand.
02:52 --> 02:55 [SPEAKER_00]: And her parents were just really never interested in discussing it with her.
02:55 --> 02:59 [SPEAKER_00]: They're like, ah, maybe you should ask your grandfather at some point.
02:59 --> 02:59 [SPEAKER_00]: I don't know.
02:59 --> 03:00 [SPEAKER_00]: Don't fully understand.
03:01 --> 03:03 [SPEAKER_00]: Stop bothering us, basically.
03:04 --> 03:14 [SPEAKER_00]: Do this story really picks up a few years before a World War I, as she and her sisters would spend summers with her mom's father who was this rabbi, as a timber merchant and a rabbi.
03:15 --> 03:20 [SPEAKER_00]: And one evening while she's there, she overhears her grandpa and two other rabbi's arguing in this study.
03:20 --> 03:22 [SPEAKER_00]: This is a private conversation.
03:22 --> 03:23 [SPEAKER_00]: but she's kind of eavesdropping.
03:24 --> 03:38 [SPEAKER_00]: She said they were discussing somebody called Yeshua, and one rabbi argued that he was the Messiah that the Jewish people had been waiting for, and from the book it says, her grandfather and the other rabbi were eager to prove that he had just been a clever imposter and deceiver.
03:38 --> 03:43 [SPEAKER_00]: The one side as well as the other referred to the prophecies of Moses and the other Jewish prophets.
03:43 --> 03:45 [SPEAKER_00]: At times, their arguments became very heated.
03:46 --> 03:56 [SPEAKER_00]: Judith soon found out that her grandfather and the rabbi who agreed with him, not knowing what to answer, commenced to argue into shout while their opponent called them to calmness and sound reasoning.
03:56 --> 04:00 [SPEAKER_00]: He urged them to search the scriptures most seriously and without prejudice.
04:00 --> 04:14 [SPEAKER_00]: Perhaps one day we will have to realize and confess the fatal mistakes of our fathers, and then repenting we shall have to accept Yeshua as the promised Messiah who has come, but who through ignorance has been rejected and despised this rabbi said.
04:15 --> 04:42 [SPEAKER_00]: And as she used up on their conversation, Judith felt that the Jews had truly rejected this Messiah, and she made the connection between the Passover Lamb and Jesus, this innocent blood being shed, and the next morning she asked her grandpa, who is Yeshua, and her grandfather told her that he was a deceptive criminal whom the wise rabbis had decided to kill for the good of the faith and that he and his deceitful followers pretended he had risen from the grave.
04:42 --> 04:52 [SPEAKER_00]: And she asked her for her grandfather if he might still be the innocent lamb who was sacrificed and her grandfather stood up got really angry and began yelling at her for her herheracy.
04:52 --> 04:55 [SPEAKER_00]: And then he calmed down realizing she's like a 13-year-old girl.
04:56 --> 05:03 [SPEAKER_00]: and your reasoned with her, that if Yeshua had been the Messiah, he would have called his followers to love the Jewish people, but they don't.
05:04 --> 05:05 [SPEAKER_00]: They don't even love each other.
05:05 --> 05:11 [SPEAKER_00]: They cause bloody wars or recite this agreement, burning each other at the stake, and curse each other with the most horrible things.
05:12 --> 05:16 [SPEAKER_00]: And then he goes on to talk about how these Christian nations are treating the Jews, and he uses the example,
05:17 --> 05:41 [SPEAKER_00]: of the protocols of the elders of Zion, which is a really popular book that was published a few years before this, and it kind of has this whole thing about how this is elaborate Jewish world conspiracy, where the Jews run the world, and then this book called for the mask killing of Jews, and it tells us a little bit about a case that's currently ongoing, which I had not heard about, but it's called the, I think it's a bailis case from 1913.
05:42 --> 05:49 [SPEAKER_00]: And how this case happened and kind of became this circus is that this young man was found.
05:49 --> 05:56 [SPEAKER_00]: I think he was like in high school, he was found in a very ritualistically murdery way.
05:56 --> 06:03 [SPEAKER_00]: I'm not going to go and describe it, but they ended up pinning it on this Jewish boy whom they said had killed him.
06:03 --> 06:06 [SPEAKER_00]: for a as a blood sacrifice for the Passover.
06:06 --> 06:10 [SPEAKER_00]: And so this boy ended up being imprisoned for two years before he was finally released.
06:10 --> 06:12 [SPEAKER_00]: There's a whole political stuff that happened all that.
06:13 --> 06:21 [SPEAKER_00]: But her grandfather used this to justify that Jesus could not truly be the Messiah because if he were, then they would not be acting like this.
06:22 --> 06:27 [SPEAKER_00]: And so with these arguments, Judith was fully convinced that Yeshua could not be the Messiah.
06:28 --> 06:29 [SPEAKER_00]: And now we fast forward a little bit here.
06:29 --> 06:34 [SPEAKER_00]: The year is 1914 and the outbreak of the first World War is just it's just happened.
06:34 --> 06:43 [SPEAKER_00]: And so Judith and her family are fleeing from the border of Germany, along with thousands of other Russians, and they were not able to contact her grandparents.
06:43 --> 06:45 [SPEAKER_00]: And so they never learned what happened to them.
06:45 --> 06:49 [SPEAKER_00]: They'll know if they died if they were just kind of rerouted and no idea.
06:50 --> 06:59 [SPEAKER_00]: Judas family settled in the city of G and this name is redacted that happens throughout this book where there's not really you don't know who's named who and where they lived.
07:00 --> 07:14 [SPEAKER_00]: So this is the city of G and this is a city where many other Jews lived and they decided to wait out the war here and they had some connections who helped them open a dry goods store and soon they were very comfortable although not as wealthy as they had been before.
07:15 --> 07:21 [SPEAKER_00]: And as the war dragged on, they became quite settled in, and it's how to disay in this city even after the war ended.
07:22 --> 07:28 [SPEAKER_00]: Judith graduated from her high school top of her class, and she should have gone on to university but it was just too expensive.
07:29 --> 07:34 [SPEAKER_00]: Instead, she fell in love with Solomon Bernstein, and this is the son of a well-to-do merchant.
07:34 --> 07:44 [SPEAKER_00]: I believe this might actually be the son of the family who kind of helped them settle in and open this drag-good store, and they were soon betrothed and were to be married the next spring, so about a year's time.
07:45 --> 07:50 [SPEAKER_00]: and despite her very temporal happiness, Judith was deeply bothered by the mystery of life and death.
07:51 --> 07:52 [SPEAKER_00]: What happened after you died?
07:52 --> 07:54 [SPEAKER_00]: What happened to Grandpa?
07:54 --> 08:03 [SPEAKER_00]: And she'd been learning that many Christians believed that Yeshua had risen from the dead and that His followers would also rise from the dead and live with Him forever.
08:04 --> 08:07 [SPEAKER_00]: and she had a lot of questions, so she decided to talk these things over with Solomon.
08:08 --> 08:23 [SPEAKER_00]: And Solomon listened to her and he was very patient, but he's an atheist, so he really didn't understand he really didn't care, he didn't see what the big deal was, but she did have hope that he was not so hardened, that he wouldn't make his way back to Judaism at some point in the future.
08:24 --> 08:40 [SPEAKER_00]: But as she's wrestling with all these different things, feeling very unsettled, she also feels that Senna Gogg was just kind of empty and meaningless, and she wanted to explore some other religions, but she wondered if God will be angry at her, or if he would understand, and maybe even commend her searching.
08:41 --> 09:02 [SPEAKER_00]: and she had this sort of friend whose name is Elizabeth and it's kind of a sort of situation because Elizabeth is the daughter of her Protestant pastor and she told Judith that she was praying for her and had faith that God would answer her prayer and that Judith would become her beloved sister in Christ and Judith is a little bit offended by this but she realizes that Elizabeth really means well
09:03 --> 09:08 [SPEAKER_00]: But this also kind of messed with the thoughts that Judith had heard about how all Christians hated Jews.
09:08 --> 09:11 [SPEAKER_00]: She's like, well, evidently, that's not entirely true.
09:11 --> 09:16 [SPEAKER_00]: And Elizabeth even tells her a little bit further on kind of debunking some more myths.
09:16 --> 09:21 [SPEAKER_00]: She had heard that there were some Christians in Russia who were being conscripted into the army.
09:21 --> 09:25 [SPEAKER_00]: And they refused to fight because they didn't want to take up arms against their fellow men.
09:25 --> 09:28 [SPEAKER_00]: So a lot of things she's kind of wrestling through.
09:30 --> 09:41 [SPEAKER_00]: And she wanted to know more about Christianity, but she knew she had to tread very carefully because if she was to open about her searching, she could be called a heretic or apostate and really get in some hot water in the Jewish community.
09:43 --> 10:07 [SPEAKER_00]: And one evening she pulled Solomon aside to tell him everything she'd been feeling and thinking and his facial expressions kind of alarmed her because he held his hands, his head and his hands and he was just kind of like, he just didn't, it was a little bit disconcerting where she felt like he was a little bit angry but she couldn't understand why and she asked him if she had bothered him and something that she had said,
10:08 --> 10:13 [SPEAKER_00]: He said, it only sounded so unnatural as you spoke of attending services and churches alien to the Jews.
10:14 --> 10:15 [SPEAKER_00]: Why these feelings came over me?
10:15 --> 10:17 [SPEAKER_00]: I cannot understand myself.
10:17 --> 10:24 [SPEAKER_00]: Probably it is the result of the influence of those views and opinions under which I was brought up before I commenced the thing for myself.
10:24 --> 10:25 [SPEAKER_00]: He sounds very young, doesn't he?
10:25 --> 10:33 [SPEAKER_00]: As far as we too are concerned, I think it would be interesting to go some data with some of these churches and cathedrals and see in here what's going on there.
10:33 --> 10:42 [SPEAKER_00]: I've never been interested in such things, and therefore I had never been anywhere except in our synagogues, and they were I went only because I did not want to hurt the feelings of dad and mother.
10:43 --> 10:58 [SPEAKER_00]: out of their conversation due to his lying awake and she thought once again that maybe this sign of Solomon's kind of his own kind of wrestling was a sign that maybe he wasn't as hardened as as she had previously thought or as he kind of claimed to be.
10:59 --> 11:09 [SPEAKER_00]: But she was a little bit worried by his emphasis on things that were alien to the Jewish faith and she was just a smudgeon worried that maybe he might become a bit of a fanatic but she really hoped not.
11:11 --> 11:18 [SPEAKER_00]: About three weeks go by and there's an evangelical conference that is aimed at Jews that is led by the Russian evangelical Church.
11:19 --> 11:30 [SPEAKER_00]: Many of the posters have been torn down by Jews or by who I think must be like Bolshevik sympathizers because we're in that time period, but she kind of calls them enemies of the faith or the author does.
11:31 --> 11:42 [SPEAKER_00]: And they happened to walk by some of those posters that had not been disturbed, and Judith turns to Solomon, and she says, there we are, Solomon looking up to him with a smile after she had read the poster.
11:43 --> 11:49 [SPEAKER_00]: Recently, we spoke of going to some of the Christian churches and seeing how they worship, and now they even invite us to come.
11:49 --> 11:57 [SPEAKER_00]: There is a Russian saying that an uninvited guest is worse than a tartar, and I reckon it's just as bad if one of us is invited and we do not go.
11:57 --> 12:02 [SPEAKER_00]: I suppose many of our Jews will go to these meetings and naturally no one will be surprised to see us there.
12:02 --> 12:06 [SPEAKER_00]: Even if our parents should learn about it, it would not excite them that much.
12:06 --> 12:08 [SPEAKER_00]: This is a wonderful opportunity, wouldn't you say?
12:09 --> 12:12 [SPEAKER_00]: And so Solomon agrees of their and decides to pick her up and they're going to walk over to the church.
12:14 --> 12:21 [SPEAKER_00]: And as they walk in there, two people that rose from some pews kind of on the back, and then they give them their seats and aside to stand in the back.
12:22 --> 12:26 [SPEAKER_00]: So they're sitting down and this small choir begins to sing.
12:26 --> 12:33 [SPEAKER_00]: And Judith is really struck by this simplicity and the reverence of the hymn that she's listening to because when she's in synagogue, everything just has a very,
12:34 --> 12:38 [SPEAKER_00]: kind of ornate very elaborate way of being.
12:38 --> 12:40 [SPEAKER_00]: And this is not what's going on here.
12:41 --> 12:43 [SPEAKER_00]: Even with the prayer, she said, it's very childlike.
12:43 --> 12:44 [SPEAKER_00]: It's very simple.
12:44 --> 12:47 [SPEAKER_00]: It's much different from the prayers that she would hear in synagogue.
12:48 --> 12:54 [SPEAKER_00]: And as the pastor gave the message, he walked through the history of Israel and her hope in her Redeemer.
12:54 --> 12:59 [SPEAKER_00]: And then he goes to Isaiah 53 and he walked through how Jesus was the fulfillment of this passage.
12:59 --> 13:00 [SPEAKER_00]: And then he goes on to Zach
13:03 --> 13:08 [SPEAKER_00]: And he said, whom had the Jews pierced in all their history, who will come again.
13:08 --> 13:11 [SPEAKER_00]: And he invited them to see the hope of the Redeemer that had already come.
13:11 --> 13:12 [SPEAKER_00]: And many Jews got up.
13:12 --> 13:13 [SPEAKER_00]: They got angry.
13:13 --> 13:14 [SPEAKER_00]: They left.
13:14 --> 13:15 [SPEAKER_00]: The pastor continued on.
13:16 --> 13:19 [SPEAKER_00]: He talked about how Jesus disciples went out to the Jews to tell them of their Savior.
13:20 --> 13:24 [SPEAKER_00]: How much he loves the Jews and implored them to no longer be stubborn.
13:25 --> 13:30 [SPEAKER_00]: He gave an invitation at the end of this message to trust in Jesus and has due to listen to this message.
13:30 --> 13:34 [SPEAKER_00]: She had tears in her eyes and she seemed to hear an inner voice whispered to her.
13:34 --> 13:37 [SPEAKER_00]: This is the immutable truth you have to accept.
13:37 --> 13:42 [SPEAKER_00]: He is the Messiah, the Lamb of God, who died died for the Jews for the whole world and for you.
13:44 --> 13:47 [SPEAKER_00]: Solomon is not feeling the same kind of way.
13:47 --> 13:48 [SPEAKER_00]: He's very embarrassed.
13:48 --> 13:50 [SPEAKER_00]: He's very uncomfortable.
13:50 --> 13:53 [SPEAKER_00]: He's actually trying to ask her to leave three different times.
13:53 --> 13:55 [SPEAKER_00]: But then she was always like, it's just a little bit longer.
13:55 --> 13:56 [SPEAKER_00]: He was like, okay, okay, fine.
13:59 --> 14:11 [SPEAKER_00]: But Solomon's atheism is only at surface level, and he knew it now as he listened to that message, but he was still an Orthodox Jew, and his heart was zealously kindled against this message, this man, and this place.
14:12 --> 14:23 [SPEAKER_00]: And as Judith went to her knees and prayed with the congregation, she accepted Jesus as her redeemer, and when the prayer ended, she echoed the amen at the end, and Solomon just cannot take it anymore.
14:24 --> 14:28 [SPEAKER_00]: He wrenched her up from where she was kneeling and dragged her out of the church taking her home.
14:29 --> 14:38 [SPEAKER_00]: He was so angry with her for believing all this nonsense and anger with himself that he allowed them to go and due to realizing how angry that he is, she decided to stay silent.
14:39 --> 14:40 [SPEAKER_00]: She didn't want to provoke her or anything like that.
14:41 --> 14:43 [SPEAKER_00]: And so she allows herself to be dragged home.
14:44 --> 14:48 [SPEAKER_00]: And when they arrive home at her parents' house, he breaks the news of the family.
14:48 --> 14:56 [SPEAKER_00]: And he said, well, here's the thing, every Jew in the city probably knows by now that she's in a post-day, she's disgraced, you, me and our whole Jewish nation.
14:57 --> 15:04 [SPEAKER_00]: And Judith tells them what happened and how she wished that her family and all Jews could experience this knowledge of Jesus the Messiah.
15:05 --> 15:06 [SPEAKER_00]: And she told them that she was a Christian.
15:07 --> 15:08 [SPEAKER_00]: and her father came near her.
15:08 --> 15:17 [SPEAKER_00]: He was trembling with rage and it kind of reaches out our hands almost as if to choke her and the mother kind of combs and down kind of pushes them away gently.
15:18 --> 15:19 [SPEAKER_00]: And she's like, listen, I want to hear.
15:19 --> 15:20 [SPEAKER_00]: I don't understand what's going on.
15:21 --> 15:22 [SPEAKER_00]: Let's hear her out.
15:22 --> 15:30 [SPEAKER_00]: And so Judith tells them she said she'd been struggling with who Yeshua was ever since she was a child and had heard her grandpa with those two other rabbis talking.
15:31 --> 15:40 [SPEAKER_00]: And she knew it was all true as she heard this message tonight, and her father was so enraged that he began pacing the floor and ringing his hands, his face contorted and anger.
15:40 --> 15:50 [SPEAKER_00]: Her mother's sisters and Solomon were crying, and her father told her to get out of his sight and she went off to her room, and she knew deep down that her father would have tried to
15:53 --> 16:01 [SPEAKER_00]: And after they had calmed down, so a few days goodbye, the family devised a plan to try and win her back with time, patience, and a good talking to from a wise rabbi.
16:02 --> 16:04 [SPEAKER_00]: However, Judith would not be persuaded.
16:04 --> 16:05 [SPEAKER_00]: She stood firm.
16:06 --> 16:16 [SPEAKER_00]: She wouldn't even go to the theater or dance anymore because she felt that it would grieve the Lord and I've mentioned this before in a few other episodes, but I am still not sure what this is about.
16:16 --> 16:21 [SPEAKER_00]: There was like a hundred years where Christians felt very strongly about not going to the theater and not going dancing.
16:22 --> 16:27 [SPEAKER_00]: So if anybody has any historical insight as to why that is, please let me know, shoot me a message.
16:27 --> 16:31 [SPEAKER_00]: I would love to hear more about this because I have something I have never really understood.
16:33 --> 16:40 [SPEAKER_00]: But anyway, as the weeks went by, she lost a love of her family and her fiance, Solomon cuts off of their betrothal.
16:41 --> 16:45 [SPEAKER_00]: However, her hardest trial was the pain and tearful pleadings of her mother.
16:45 --> 16:51 [SPEAKER_00]: She told Judith a think of the family, they were being ostracized in the Jewish community because of their apostate daughter.
16:51 --> 16:58 [SPEAKER_00]: People were asking where Judith was, and if the whole family would soon adopt the Christian faith, and this seemed a more of a mocking question than a genuine one.
17:00 --> 17:10 [SPEAKER_00]: And in response to this said, dear mother, I do see and realize this all my heart is aching for you, Solomon, and my nation, but mother, how can I leave God and disregard his commandment?
17:11 --> 17:19 [SPEAKER_00]: Should I take this step now that, indeed, I would be in a positive state in my sin before hand will be great, because it would be a sin knowing committed knowingly and willingly.
17:20 --> 17:24 [SPEAKER_00]: doing this, I would exchange the eternal for the temporary and the heavenly for the earthly.
17:24 --> 17:34 [SPEAKER_00]: I do not love you less now, now I love you all the much more than I ever did before, and I love Solomon very dearly, but I cannot go with him to these places of amusement.
17:35 --> 17:44 [SPEAKER_00]: These places aren't a bombination before my Lord, my heavenly bridegroom, and my desire is to be his true and faithful bride yielded to him more than to anyone else here on earth.
17:44 --> 17:53 [SPEAKER_00]: And after this point, Mrs. Weinberg had listened very patiently, but now she could not restrain herself any longer and trembling with anger and almost choking.
17:53 --> 18:07 [SPEAKER_00]: She shouted, you faithless heritage, you apostate, you have disgraced our name, our old honored family, you are a black spot on our family and our nation, get out of here, I don't want to see you anymore and then with these words she jumped her feet and just ran out of the room.
18:09 --> 18:15 [SPEAKER_00]: After this happened, her family just told people that Judith was unstable, and so she couldn't be seen.
18:15 --> 18:25 [SPEAKER_00]: They brought this rabbi in again to reason with her, and she held firm to her convictions, and he lost patients with her declaring that it was a shame that the even laws of Russia would not allow her to be stoned.
18:26 --> 18:31 [SPEAKER_00]: And her family was told to shut her because she was a heretic, and she would be a snare to them and other Jews.
18:32 --> 18:54 [SPEAKER_00]: Judith went to the Christian meetings with her friend Elizabeth at this they had like a young person's society and then the regular church meetings and so she went to these whenever she could and she also went and witnessed her a Jewish friends whenever she saw them which as you can imagine probably wasn't very frequently because it probably they probably wanted to avoid her even more as they realized she just wanted to kind of witness to them.
18:55 --> 18:57 [SPEAKER_00]: and her family began hiding her way even more.
18:57 --> 19:02 [SPEAKER_00]: When they had guests over, they would tell people that she had delirious fits of rage and wasn't safe to be around.
19:03 --> 19:06 [SPEAKER_00]: And then finally they told her that she needed to get out of their house.
19:06 --> 19:09 [SPEAKER_00]: And she knew that it would be too painful hurt for her to remain in the city.
19:10 --> 19:16 [SPEAKER_00]: But she knew that there was a large Christian population in the city called M. And she hoped she would have an easier time finding employment there.
19:16 --> 19:19 [SPEAKER_00]: So she told her parents her decision.
19:19 --> 19:22 [SPEAKER_00]: leaving out the Christian population of this city in.
19:23 --> 19:26 [SPEAKER_00]: They paid her ticket and then got what she needed for the journey.
19:27 --> 19:45 [SPEAKER_00]: her mother and sister is refused to see her off and their partying was really kind of cold because they saw her as the enemy her mother however did hold out a secret hope that she would come back because she had not yet been baptized and that was the last step of severing so she said if it's not in baptized she can still come back from this.
19:45 --> 19:49 [SPEAKER_00]: It's just kind of a rough patch and it'll all be fine in a few months.
19:50 --> 20:03 [SPEAKER_00]: It was her father who ended up taking her to the station, and when she arrived there, a large group of Christian friends was there to see her off, and her friend Elizabeth gave her this big bouquet of flowers, and they sang a hymn of farewell for her as she left the train station.
20:03 --> 20:13 [SPEAKER_00]: And as the train left the station, she's pulling away from everything that she's known for the last few years, as she felt like Abraham, leaving the land of her father as for something unknown,
20:14 --> 20:20 [SPEAKER_00]: And she thanked God that though her family and friends had left her that he never would and after praying, she sang her favorite him.
20:20 --> 20:24 [SPEAKER_00]: I'd never heard this him before, but I think it's quite lovely so I'll share a little bit of it with you.
20:24 --> 20:25 [SPEAKER_00]: It's called Jesus.
20:26 --> 20:27 [SPEAKER_00]: I, my cross have taken.
20:28 --> 20:36 [SPEAKER_00]: Jesus, I am my cross of taken, all to leave and follow thee, destitute despise forsaken, thou from hence my all-shout be.
20:37 --> 20:44 [SPEAKER_00]: Parish every fond ambition, all I've sought and hoped and known, yet how rich is my condition, God and heaven are still my own.
20:45 --> 20:48 [SPEAKER_00]: Let the world despise and leave me, they have left my Savior too.
20:49 --> 20:52 [SPEAKER_00]: Human hearts and looks deceive me, thou art not like them untrue.
20:53 --> 21:02 [SPEAKER_00]: And while thou shalt smile upon me, God of wisdom, love and might, those may hate and friends may shun me, show thy face, and all is bright.
21:24 --> 21:32 [SPEAKER_00]: When Judith arrived in with letters of introduction given to her by her Christian friends, she soon had a job working in a local government office.
21:32 --> 21:35 [SPEAKER_00]: She joined a church there and then helped with Sunday school.
21:35 --> 21:42 [SPEAKER_00]: She joined the young people's society, worked with a group caring for the poor and needy, and she would share her testimony with any who would listen.
21:44 --> 21:58 [SPEAKER_00]: Now being raised in a Jewish household with Jewish friends and an almost completely separated Jewish social circle, she'd really never mingled very much with the average Russian, and she had been taught that her people reside within a heave and country who had been out against God.
21:58 --> 22:06 [SPEAKER_00]: But as she got to know these people more, she realized that this just wasn't true, and she realized a little bit more than that, reading from the book again, she said,
22:07 --> 22:20 [SPEAKER_00]: Recalling her discourse with her grandfather, who attempted to prove that the Lord Jesus Christ was not the Messiah of Israel, by telling her of the life of the Greek Orthodox, the Roman Catholics and other nominal Christians who lived around them.
22:20 --> 22:29 [SPEAKER_00]: Judith understood now why these so-called Christians hated the Jews and why they strove and quarrel among themselves, having even religious and political wars
22:29 --> 22:37 [SPEAKER_00]: She now realize that the majority of these Christians bear the name of Christ unconsciously, and that they are opposing Christ as did the Jews.
22:37 --> 22:45 [SPEAKER_00]: She saw that these Christians, as well as the Jews, know neither Christ nor his gospel, and therefore did not live a life of love to one another as Christ revealed to us.
22:46 --> 22:52 [SPEAKER_00]: The one, as well as the other, were just as ignorant concerning Christ, Jesus, and his redemption as she had been for many years.
22:52 --> 22:56 [SPEAKER_00]: Knowing this made her more zealous to tell the story wherever she could.
22:58 --> 23:04 [SPEAKER_00]: While many things were going well for Judith, there was one stumbling block left to her, and this was baptism.
23:04 --> 23:07 [SPEAKER_00]: She wrestled with the coming baptized because of what it meant for her.
23:08 --> 23:26 [SPEAKER_00]: She was afraid of basically not being in the faith long enough, and so if she were to stumble, she didn't want to cause duration to come upon the church, and also in kind of an equal weight to this first one was her love for her mother, because what it meant to be baptized was to be cut off.
23:26 --> 23:28 [SPEAKER_00]: from the Jewish people and then from her mother.
23:29 --> 23:31 [SPEAKER_00]: And this would further break her mother's heart.
23:32 --> 23:34 [SPEAKER_00]: She was still writing to her mother and sisters sometimes.
23:35 --> 23:37 [SPEAKER_00]: And so this was really, really hard.
23:38 --> 23:42 [SPEAKER_00]: But in time, she began to realize this was a very important last step.
23:42 --> 23:48 [SPEAKER_00]: She needed to make, because she was already internally separated and now she needed to be outwardly separated.
23:48 --> 23:53 [SPEAKER_00]: So she became baptized, but she did not tell her family.
23:54 --> 24:09 [SPEAKER_00]: And she was still receiving all these letters from her mother and sisters, and especially her mother kept pleading with her to turn back to the faith, and so she decided especially then not to tell them that she had gotten baptized because she was just really worried about what that would do to her mother.
24:10 --> 24:14 [SPEAKER_00]: Her father came to visit her twice and he was always very business-like, very distant.
24:14 --> 24:28 [SPEAKER_00]: I he never wanted to talk about her personal life, what was going on with her, and then he always made an excuse to leave a little bit early, although he did tell her he knew a little bit about what she was up to, you know, through the Jewish grapevine, but he didn't know that she had been baptized either.
24:30 --> 24:35 [SPEAKER_00]: It had been about a year since she had left the family and moved to M and her mother really wanted her to come and visit.
24:36 --> 24:38 [SPEAKER_00]: And so she took a month's leave and went to visit them.
24:38 --> 24:41 [SPEAKER_00]: And for the first few days, everything went really well.
24:41 --> 24:45 [SPEAKER_00]: Her sisters were so happy to see her, but there was just a little bit where it was awkward.
24:45 --> 24:50 [SPEAKER_00]: Her dad is really distant and her mom just really wanted to keep everything's surface level.
24:50 --> 24:53 [SPEAKER_00]: Didn't want to ask her about our religious convictions.
24:54 --> 25:04 [SPEAKER_00]: But when Sunday came and she goes off to church and then after church is over, the rest of the family is preparing to go out to the theaters to go dancing, you know, whatever, and they're like, hey, dude, are you coming with?
25:04 --> 25:07 [SPEAKER_00]: And then she says, no, sorry, I'm not going to come with.
25:08 --> 25:12 [SPEAKER_00]: And so her parents pulled back even more because their questions had been answered.
25:13 --> 25:21 [SPEAKER_00]: And Judith had been praying for an opportunity to talk to her sisters because they really didn't know what was going on, and she didn't realize just how much they didn't know.
25:21 --> 25:24 [SPEAKER_00]: But they both came into her room and asked her what this was all about.
25:24 --> 25:27 [SPEAKER_00]: Why is everything so weird we just don't get it?
25:28 --> 25:31 [SPEAKER_00]: And she was able to share the gospel with them and explain what had happened to her.
25:31 --> 25:41 [SPEAKER_00]: And they told her they're not really interested in this whole god thing or religion, but they had never heard her side of the story, and they were sad that she was being kept from them, they cried, they hugged,
25:41 --> 25:47 [SPEAKER_00]: They promised they would love her and defend her no matter what, and that no matter what came with some strings.
25:47 --> 25:56 [SPEAKER_00]: Her parents, whenever they found out that she had kind of gotten to talk to her sisters without being supervised, they were furious and thought that Judith had corrupted her two sisters.
25:57 --> 26:02 [SPEAKER_00]: They called her into their room and asked her to take a seat on the chair opposite them and her parents.
26:02 --> 26:07 [SPEAKER_00]: We're just exasperated beyond belief, and they asked her to return to the God of her fathers.
26:08 --> 26:15 [SPEAKER_00]: And Judith takes them in it, and she composes herself, and she replied, that she had long ago, and she served him the best that she could.
26:16 --> 26:21 [SPEAKER_00]: And then she went on to talk about Jesus, and that she believes that he is a son of God in her Savior.
26:27 --> 26:33 [SPEAKER_00]: Now reading again from the book, her mother explained, oh, Adenai, what must I hear from my own child?
26:33 --> 26:35 [SPEAKER_00]: She's nervously ringing her hands.
26:35 --> 26:37 [SPEAKER_00]: Why have I given you birth and suddenly?
26:38 --> 26:41 [SPEAKER_00]: She said, I shall strangle you this very minute with my own hands.
26:42 --> 26:47 [SPEAKER_00]: And with this, the furious mother made a mad rush towards Judith, her face is pale and ugly with rage.
26:48 --> 26:53 [SPEAKER_00]: Mr. Weinberg was immediately at her side, seizing both her hands, he stood between mother and daughter.
26:53 --> 26:54 [SPEAKER_00]: Be cursed.
26:54 --> 26:59 [SPEAKER_00]: I am cursing you with the curse of a mother, and I shall not rest until I see you dead at my feet.
27:00 --> 27:03 [SPEAKER_00]: A heart-riding streak pierced the air, and she was unconscious on the floor.
27:04 --> 27:11 [SPEAKER_00]: Judith, though, numb and heartbroken through herself towards her mother, but before she was able to touch her, she was roughly stopped by her father.
27:11 --> 27:19 [SPEAKER_00]: His voice was horse and hissing as he, pushing her aside, and pointing at the door, roared at her, get out, don't you dare touch her?
27:19 --> 27:23 [SPEAKER_00]: You have no right to go near her, get out, do not come under our eyes anymore.
27:24 --> 27:26 [SPEAKER_00]: There is no longer room for you in our house.
27:28 --> 27:29 [SPEAKER_00]: Her sisters heard all this commotion.
27:30 --> 27:32 [SPEAKER_00]: They rushed to her sobbing and she reached out.
27:32 --> 27:37 [SPEAKER_00]: Her hands to hug them but they shrank back because they couldn't touch her because she was now cursed.
27:37 --> 27:43 [SPEAKER_00]: And so she leaves the family home and she never sees or hears from her parents or sisters ever again.
27:46 --> 27:57 [SPEAKER_00]: Some time after this all goes down, she's back and in, she's settled in, and there's an evangelist who came to the church and was asking for missionaries to go to the war-torn regions of Russia, most likely the caucuses.
27:57 --> 28:10 [SPEAKER_00]: And there's really not a timeline throughout this book, but if you follow through the events as they're described, it looks like this is during the Russian Civil War after the October Revolution of 1917 when Lenin's Bolsheviks overthrew the government.
28:11 --> 28:15 [SPEAKER_00]: The evangelist told them that this was not safe work, but it was very much needed.
28:15 --> 28:21 [SPEAKER_00]: And Judith had been wanting to go into full-time ministry for a while, and she really, really loved the country folk.
28:21 --> 28:26 [SPEAKER_00]: And so she volunteered quickly for the work, and it was really, really difficult and taxing.
28:26 --> 28:34 [SPEAKER_00]: And it was also a little bit more taxing on Judith, because she grew up very well to do, and she was relatively new to Toyo, and it was hard on her body.
28:35 --> 28:44 [SPEAKER_00]: In these remote regions they were going to, there was zero medical care if the doctors had all fled, so entire families would get sick and then die at one by one.
28:45 --> 28:47 [SPEAKER_00]: And it would be weeks before anyone would be by to bury them.
28:49 --> 28:57 [SPEAKER_00]: Those who were team met were very hungry for the good news of the gospel, and so they readily accepted it, and they had a lot of success as they went along.
28:58 --> 29:04 [SPEAKER_00]: And now one of these many journeys, Judith ended up contracting Pifis from these three children who's parents have passed away from the disease.
29:05 --> 29:10 [SPEAKER_00]: So like I said, there's nobody that's coming by for weeks, and these children were just kind of left to die with no one to care for them.
29:11 --> 29:20 [SPEAKER_00]: until this group happened to come by, they watched the children, they're bedding, they aired, and scrubbed the house, and all this work weakened Judith, and so she caught the illness.
29:22 --> 29:27 [SPEAKER_00]: And as she's delirious and closer to death than life, she's muttering excitedly in Hebrew for nearly two hours.
29:28 --> 29:34 [SPEAKER_00]: The leader of their party was called Grandpa Ossan and Judith woke up and she immediately grabbed his hand to tell him what she had been dreaming of.
29:35 --> 29:38 [SPEAKER_00]: She said, oh, I saw such a wonderful vision grandpa.
29:38 --> 29:40 [SPEAKER_00]: You and I were somewhere in a gorgeous temple.
29:41 --> 29:42 [SPEAKER_00]: that was crowded the limit with Jews.
29:42 --> 29:46 [SPEAKER_00]: The high priest was there too in his beautiful sumptuous, priestly robes.
29:47 --> 29:49 [SPEAKER_00]: In the middle of the temple was a poorly clad man.
29:49 --> 29:50 [SPEAKER_00]: He stood there silently.
29:51 --> 29:56 [SPEAKER_00]: His eyes were turned towards the eastern part of the building where they rested upon the multitude of people.
29:56 --> 30:04 [SPEAKER_00]: I could not take my eyes from him, somehow I felt that this must be the Lord Jesus Christ, the Messiah of Israel, who had come now to his people.
30:04 --> 30:06 [SPEAKER_00]: You told me too that this was He.
30:07 --> 30:13 [SPEAKER_00]: And I decided then that I would testify before this multitude that He has saved me from my sins and that He was willing and able to save everyone.
30:14 --> 30:16 [SPEAKER_00]: And I began to tell them what Christ had done for me.
30:16 --> 30:18 [SPEAKER_00]: He remained all the while in the same place.
30:19 --> 30:24 [SPEAKER_00]: I pointed to Him telling them that He was there in our midst, but evidently for some reason they could not see Him.
30:24 --> 30:28 [SPEAKER_00]: Nevertheless, many who heard my words commenced a cry and smite their breasts.
30:29 --> 30:41 [SPEAKER_00]: Many of the people and even the high priests threw up their hands and cried for forgiveness weeping and wailing, I was so happy over their repentance, but I had to strain my voice much so they could hear me in spite of the great commotion and noise.
30:41 --> 30:53 [SPEAKER_00]: This was very hard for me, and do you know what grandpa, I felt so good now, I feel so light, I feel so easy, as if I had never been ill, the Lord who I'm whom I just saw must have healed me.
30:53 --> 30:58 [SPEAKER_00]: What a blessed and joyful moment it was to see my nation repenting before the face of Jehovah.
30:58 --> 31:00 [SPEAKER_00]: I should love to see the vision again.
31:00 --> 31:05 [SPEAKER_00]: I believe our blessed Savior will come soon to gather as people out of every land, nation, tribe, and tongue.
31:07 --> 31:10 [SPEAKER_00]: Probably he showed me the majestic temple that will be erected in Jerusalem in the near future.
31:11 --> 31:18 [SPEAKER_00]: Her friend listened quietly to her talk, the sudden change in Judith who had been battling against death for the last few days, puzzled him greatly.
31:18 --> 31:27 [SPEAKER_00]: She had been telling her experience, speaking in her normal, healthy voice and her eyes were looking merrily at him, pulsing temperature were normal too, and after a short silence he spoke to her.
31:28 --> 31:34 [SPEAKER_00]: Yes, Judith, the Lord is coming soon for the world and for Israel, but for you, he has come in this very hour as I see.
31:34 --> 31:36 [SPEAKER_00]: He has touched your sick body and he has healed you.
31:36 --> 31:38 [SPEAKER_00]: Praise and glory be to God.
31:38 --> 31:41 [SPEAKER_00]: Let us thank him for his loving kindness and mercy and for his marvelous help.
31:44 --> 31:55 [SPEAKER_00]: After Judith regained her strength they continued on traveling for about 20-30 miles a day with minimal food, and the weather was vast, letting between pouring rain and blazing heat and carrying everything they own and needed on their backs.
31:56 --> 32:10 [SPEAKER_00]: And increasingly, they were encountering persecution, and once again, the author is not specific about who these enemies of the gospel Jesus Christ are, as he calls them, but I can only imagine it's the communists, and they began arresting this little group harassing them
32:14 --> 32:38 [SPEAKER_00]: On a different note, Judas Illness had changed her, and she often found that her thoughts were turned towards heaven and the second coming, and she talked to Grandpa Ossene about this and told him that she felt the Lord would come and take her soon, and he told her he wasn't sure if God would take her soon, but he told her that they should continue working faithfully so that if God did take any of them or returned, that he would not find them idle, but visually engaged in the work that he had called them to.
32:40 --> 32:48 [SPEAKER_00]: Soon they arrived in another set of villages, and these were beset with many soldiers who were bringing their wounded and typhus infected through when they were looting from the people.
32:48 --> 32:52 [SPEAKER_00]: And many of them met were eager to hear more about Jesus and the gospel.
32:52 --> 32:55 [SPEAKER_00]: So many of them met being both soldiers and also civilians.
32:56 --> 33:01 [SPEAKER_00]: And there was also a very small handful of Christians who were desperately in need of encouragement.
33:02 --> 33:14 [SPEAKER_00]: And as they held their meetings in many different homes, several several soldiers who would come in and sit in on these meetings, and many of these soldiers came to Christ, although there were other soldiers who had a very different reaction.
33:15 --> 33:17 [SPEAKER_00]: One of these reactions is recorded in the book.
33:17 --> 33:20 [SPEAKER_00]: This young man ends up interrupting the meeting and he said,
33:21 --> 33:26 [SPEAKER_00]: You go around everywhere for one purpose of fooling and deceiving the people with your gospel.
33:27 --> 33:33 [SPEAKER_00]: We know you preachers too well, it is high time to chop off your heads, and it will surely happen on one of these days.
33:33 --> 33:34 [SPEAKER_00]: Where were you before?
33:35 --> 33:40 [SPEAKER_00]: I would like to know, why didn't you speak to the capitalists of repentance when they were oppressing the poor working people?
33:40 --> 33:43 [SPEAKER_00]: Why didn't you tell them to repent and stop exploiting the poor?
33:43 --> 33:46 [SPEAKER_00]: Now since we have rebelled against them and are lifting up our guns at them,
33:47 --> 33:55 [SPEAKER_00]: You have appeared in our midst, scaring us with the tortures of hell, telling us of our sin and of the love of your Christ, exhorting us, to love one another.
33:56 --> 33:57 [SPEAKER_00]: This here is our love for you.
33:58 --> 34:01 [SPEAKER_00]: He shouted, brandishing his sword, threateningly, look here.
34:01 --> 34:04 [SPEAKER_00]: This is the best expression of our love for you and all such as you.
34:05 --> 34:13 [SPEAKER_00]: And as violent threats like these became more common, many of the soldiers began to turn against the missionaries who called them to repentance.
34:13 --> 34:17 [SPEAKER_00]: They didn't want to hear about hell, the consequences of sin or the judgment of God.
34:18 --> 34:20 [SPEAKER_00]: And some of them had quietly vowed to kill these missionaries.
34:22 --> 34:27 [SPEAKER_00]: Their desires were soon realized and Judith was dragged out of a house in the middle of a gospel meeting.
34:27 --> 34:32 [SPEAKER_00]: She was brought to a barn and she was hacked to death by a small group of soldiers.
34:32 --> 34:34 [SPEAKER_00]: And they left her there in the barn.
34:34 --> 34:37 [SPEAKER_00]: Her hand still clutching her blood soaked Bible.
34:38 --> 34:42 [SPEAKER_00]: Grandpa Osteen had heard what had happened to Judith and he went to see her body himself.
34:42 --> 34:45 [SPEAKER_00]: And he was unable to bury her for fear of being seen.
34:45 --> 34:47 [SPEAKER_00]: And so he asked some of the townsfolk to bury her.
34:48 --> 34:50 [SPEAKER_00]: And the book ends with this paragraph.
34:51 --> 34:59 [SPEAKER_00]: Now the Earth covers the cold breathless body of Judith until the Trump of God shall sound, and the dead and Christ shall rise on that glorious morning.
34:59 --> 35:07 [SPEAKER_00]: No one will ever see her here on Earth again, but her labor of love will live for a long time yet in the hearts of those who have experienced this love in their lives.
35:08 --> 35:13 [SPEAKER_00]: Many of those who met her here and listened to her will meet her in glory with him whom she so loved.
35:14 --> 35:18 [SPEAKER_00]: Many as star will sparkle in her crown with which her head will be adorned forever.
35:20 --> 35:22 [SPEAKER_00]: At the end of this book, there is an author's note.
35:23 --> 35:25 [SPEAKER_00]: We do not know who wrote this book.
35:25 --> 35:26 [SPEAKER_00]: I'm not sure if it's a pseudonym.
35:26 --> 35:28 [SPEAKER_00]: The name is very Russian and very long.
35:29 --> 35:32 [SPEAKER_00]: There's not really anything known about this person.
35:32 --> 35:40 [SPEAKER_00]: The only thing we know is they wrote a couple of books and that they fled from Russia to the US some time in the early 1920s.
35:40 --> 35:43 [SPEAKER_00]: This is all we know, but there is an author's note.
35:44 --> 35:50 [SPEAKER_00]: And it says, the book Judith is a true narrative of the life of the girl, the daughter of a prominent Jewish family in Russia.
35:51 --> 35:55 [SPEAKER_00]: After accepting the Lord Jesus Christ of Sir Sabir, Judith was compelled to leave her father's home.
35:56 --> 36:00 [SPEAKER_00]: The young man to whom she was engaged and whom she dearly loved, her friends and her people.
36:01 --> 36:09 [SPEAKER_00]: Her life, that henceforth, was fully yielded and consecrated to the service of her Lord, found an end under the deadly blows of the swords of a group of soldiers.
36:10 --> 36:16 [SPEAKER_00]: It was this author's privilege to observe Judith's life in service for Christ and to witness her untimely end.
36:16 --> 36:23 [SPEAKER_00]: The story of her life from childhood to a conversion is based upon the author's recollection of many personal discourses with Judith.
36:24 --> 36:27 [SPEAKER_00]: But names have been changed in this book because of existing conditions in Russia.
36:28 --> 36:35 [SPEAKER_00]: This narrative published originally by the author in the Russian language has brought great blessings to many in Poland, Romania, and other countries.
36:36 --> 36:43 [SPEAKER_00]: With the hope and prayer that it will also bring blessings to many in America, Judith is being sent forth now in the English language.
36:45 --> 36:54 [SPEAKER_00]: Through this show, it is one of my great privileges to be able to tell stories like this of these faithful brothers and sisters in the faith, the time and memory have forgotten.
36:54 --> 37:01 [SPEAKER_00]: And I am so thankful for the author who wrote down her story that enabled me to be able to bring it to you all a hundred years later.
37:02 --> 37:05 [SPEAKER_00]: As always, thank you for listening to Martyrs and Missionaries, I'm Elise.