Ordinary Women, Extraordinary God, Part 2

This episode contains portions from the following programs:

Sabina Wurmbrand: Radical Faithfulness, Beautiful Forgiveness"

"Pandita Ramabai: Scholar, Reformer, Truth Seeker"

"The Privilege of Suffering for Christ"

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Dannah Gresh: Three ordinary women. One extraordinary God.

Sabina Wurmbrand: Jesus Him would lift the veil for a fraction of a second and show us His beauty.

Pandita Ramabai: My life is full of joy, for the Lord Yahweh is my strength and my song.” 

Helen Roseveare: God was saying, “Can you thank Me for trusting you with this experience even if I never tell you why?”

Last weekend, we learned about the stories of Susanna Wesley, Phillis Wheatley, and Elisabeth Elliot. Today, we’re diving into three more stories—those of Sabina Wurmbrand, Pandita Ramabai, and Helen Roseveare.

First up, Sabina—a Romanian pastor’s wife who suffered greatly for the cause of Christ.

She is featured in our book (Un)Remarkable: Ten Ordinary Women Who Impacted Their World for Christ. If you haven’t already added this resource to your collection, you might want to visit the Revive Our Hearts store to do that. It’s at ReviveOurHearts.com. 

Before Sabina was a pastor’s wife, she and her husband were atheists—but then God saved them and called them to proclaim Christ. Ministering in Romania at the start of World War II was very challenging. Richard and Sabina both came from Jewish families, and anti-Semitism was on the rise.

Soon, Richard and Sabina were not only proclaiming the truth of God’s Word; they were also living it out by helping Jews escape the Nazis. Eventually, it got both Richard and Sabina captured.

John Grooters: The very first time they got picked up by the Nazis, it’s the first time either of them have been arrested. It’s certainly the first time either of them had been beaten. They don’t start out as experts in this field. They don’t start out like, “Yes, we suffer for Jesus.”

They have like the rest of us, fear. The very first time they meet in the prison she says, looking at the scar on his face, “Was it horrible?”

He says to her, “There was pain. I will not lie to you.”

But later in that same scene he says, “I am grateful to be among the beaten by His grace rather than to be among those who beat.”

This is the beginning of that deeper understanding that they begin to live out—of what it means to be Christ followers, understanding Jesus’ call. This is so radical, to turn the other cheek. If the enemy strikes you on one cheek . . . If someone says carry my pack a mile and I carry it two miles.

This kind of radical thing that we hear about in Sunday school, that we read about in the Bible, it becomes the Word made flesh once you are put in that situation. No one I know wants to be put in that situation. At that point, you start to live out the words of Christ. Then, we are actually becoming transformed in His image—which really is the goal of all Christians.

Dannah: As World War II drew toward an end, Romania was released from Nazi control only to be taken over by Communists influenced by the Soviet Union.

John Grooters begins the movie Sabina in this time period. He describes the scene.

John: There are these three German Nazis who are on the run in the city they used to terrorize, Bucharest. They are on the run because the Soviets have come. There are some Nazi soldiers who haven’t escaped the country and they are in hiding. So the tables have turned, or as we say, “The hunters have become the hunted.”

These three Nazi soldiers are told of one house that may give them some help—food and shelter. The address is the home of Richard and Sabina Wurmbrand. They knock on the door, and Sabina sits down and offers some assistance to this enemy of hers. It is an enemy of unbelievable depth. This is an enemy who has imprisoned her husband three times and her twice and has beaten them. Worse than that, it is an enemy who has exterminated her beloved family and all of her relatives.

Yet, when faced with that enemy, she gives them shelter. The Germans say, “Why would you do this? I would never do this for you when the Reich recaptures Bucharest, which we surely will do.

She says, “I’ll protect you from the Russians. I can’t protect you from the wrath of God.”

Dannah: The Reich did not recapture Bucharest. As the cold war began, Romania was ruled by an oppressive Communist regime.

In 1945, the Romanian Communist Party convened religious leaders from across the country. They called the meeting the Congress of the Cults. One by one, religious leaders stood up and praised the new government.

John: What’s happening on stage is the church is capitulating to the Communists who have committed to increasing their pay. The church has really been compromised by the Communist Party, which is atheist to its core.

Richard and Sabina are sitting in the audience getting frustrated. “This isn’t how it should be.” She says, “You should speak.”

He says, “If I say, you know you will lose a husband.”

Then one of Sabina’s famous lines is, “I don’t need a coward for a husband.”

Dannah: Richard did get up, and he did share the truth of the Bible, and he did denounce Communism. And as Richard predicted, Sabina “lost” her husband in a sense. He was arrested in 1948. 

Sabina didn’t know what happened to her husband. More than once, government spokespeople told her Richard had died. 

Richard was actually in prison, facing beatings, torture, and solitary confinement. He preached to himself sermons and recited Scripture until his captors started drugging him. Even when he couldn’t think straight because of the drugs, his heart cried out to God. Richard spent a total of fourteen years in prison for his faith in Christ. 

Sabina was arrested in 1950 and spent three years in a forced labor camp. Here’s Sabina, reminding herself—and us—of truths we can stand on in the middle of trials. In the prison camp, she filled her mind with truth like this.

Sabina: I have a famous God. The God of Israel and Abraham and Isaac and Jacob. I have a heavenly Father, a very famous God. Then I have a Lord—the Lord Jesus Christ—the Savior of Israel. He is my Savior, my Teacher, my Lord, and my Friend.

Then I have a very famous Book, the Bible. In prison cells where we didn’t have any book, neither the Bible nor any bit of paper, the Word which we kept in our hearts, a Word from this famous Book, the Bible, could give new life and new hope to those in despair.

Dannah: In the prison work camp, Sabina faced beatings and hard labor. She was hungry and even would eat grass to survive. In the middle of all that suffering, she went through periods of doubt when it felt like she was far from God. But she also experienced His presence in a whole new way. 

Sabina: The prison was a very hard place. The days could not be counted in years. I say my husband has made fourteen years in prison. Every day is twenty-four hours. And every hour has sixty minutes. For this reason, minute by minute and day by day, it is a very hard time. The human heart so very quickly loses our vision of God. It very quickly sees a dark prison cell. The longings, the hunger, the mockery of the Communists. But God knows how we are. 

He knows every one in a dark prison cell. The humans could not reach the Christians. Jesus Himself would know us and let us know He is Lord. Sometimes when it was very, very heavy—hungry, beaten, mocked, and forsaken by all men—Jesus Him would lift the veil for a fraction of a second and show us His beauty, the beauty of Paradise. So we would get new strength.

Even those who did not know God saw the glory of God shining over the faces of God's children. Those in despair who didn’t know God got strength from the children of God who were comforted by their own Savior.

Dannah: When you and I walk through difficulties, I hope we will remember Sabina in that prison camp. She experienced a closeness to the Lord she hadn’t felt before, and her legacy reminds us we can have joy even in the most terrible circumstances. 

In 1965, the Wurmbrands escaped Romania. They came to the United States and began a new season of life, but they didn’t forget their fellow prisoners behind the Iron Curtain and all around the world. They started a ministry called Voice of the Martyrs and spoke everywhere they could, living out what we read in Hebrews 13: “Remember those in prison, as though you were in prison with them, and the mistreated, as though you yourselves were suffering bodily.” A huge thank you to Voice of the Martyrs for helping us share Sabina’s story today!

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Dannah Gresh here. You’re listening to Revive Our Hearts Weekend. We’ve been talking about ordinary women who’ve entrusted their lives to an extraordinary God.

Next up, we’ve got Pandita Ramabai, a Hindu girl born into a culture that treated women very poorly. Most of them were married off between the ages of five and eleven. They weren’t allowed to read or write, and when their husbands died, they bore the blame. In Hindu culture, widowhood was considered a punishment for crimes committed in a former existence upon the earth. The worst part was, nearly every woman was widowed due to how much older their husbands were, so they lived in misery—shut up in their houses and vilified. 

Enter Pandita Ramabai. When her husband died, she managed to escape to England. That’s a part of her story you can read about in (Un)remarkable. It’s super fascinating, but on today’s episode, we want to get to her salvation and subsequent ministry. Here’s Erin Davis to tell you about that time in her life.

Erin Davis: Now, England had its own social problems. But Ramabai noticed how believers in Jesus were taking action to address the needs of the poor and the hurting.

Pandita Ramabai (actress reading from one of Pandita's books): “I began to think that there was a real difference between Hinduism and Christianity.”

Erin: She was especially moved to see former prostitutes receive new life in Christ. One of the Christians told her Jesus loved women—even women society had rejected.

Pandita: “She spoke of the infinite love of Christ for sinners. He did not despise them but came to save them. I had never read or heard anything like this in the religious books of the Hindus. I realized, after reading the fourth chapter of St. John's Gospel, that Christ was truly the Divine Savior He claimed to be. No one but He could transform and uplift the downtrodden womanhood of India and of every land. Thus, my heart was drawn to the religion of Christ.” 

Erin: Pandita Ramabai was baptized in the Church of England in 1883. She lived in England and then moved to the United States. 

She raised her daughter. And continued her studies in English, in math, in biblical Hebrew and Greek. But she never forgot about hurting women of India. 

Pandita: “The one thing needful for the general diffusion of education among women in India is a body of persons from among themselves who shall make it their life work to teach by precept and example their fellow-countrywomen.”

Erin: And so she returned. In 1889, Pandita Ramabai went back to India and started a school for girls. It was six years since she had left.

Pandita: “I felt as if I were going to a strange country and to a strange people. Everything seemed quite dark before me. I fell on my knees, committed myself to the care of our loving heavenly Father, and sailed.”

Erin: As she left, some doubts plagued her mind.

Pandita:“My religious belief was so weak at the time that I was not certain whether I would go to heaven or hell after my death. I was not prepared to meet my God.”

Erin: Helen Dyer was a British missionary who watched a new school take shape. 

Helen Dyer (Actress): “It was not long before pupils began to come in . . . including a specially bright group of little girls from ten to twelve years of age. It was difficult to believe that the latter rested under the cruel ban of widowhood—genuine Hindu widows with shaven heads, plain brick-red garments, and no jewelry.”

Pandita (quoted in Dyer): “They come from homes where they have been treated as outcasts; no love bestowed upon them, and no comforts provided for them. I wish them to learn what the outside world is like from pictures and books, and to enjoy the wonderful works of God as they ramble in the garden, and study with the microscope, or view the heavens from the veranda on the roof.

Erin: Ramabai wanted these hurting young women to experience the genuine love of Jesus.

And three years after this school opened its doors, Ramabai herself experienced that same love.

Pandita:“I have come to know the Lord Jesus Christ as my personal Savior, and have the joy of sweet communion with Him. My life is full of joy, for the Lord Yahweh is my strength and my song; He also is become my salvation.” 

Erin: She realized Jesus became a man and lived a perfect life. He was the only one to deserve merit for his actions, yet He became an outcast. He was punished for our sin, dying on a cross. 

Dannah: When we come to faith in Him, we receive His righteousness and we don’t need to earn any merit on our own. He rose again, giving us the hope for eternal life with a loving Father.

Erin: Ramabai could stop striving. Instead, she could lean entirely on the righteousness of Christ.

Pandita:“I can scarcely contain the joy and keep it to myself. I feel like the Samaritan woman who left her waterpot, and went her way into the city, and saith to the men, ‘Come, see a man, which told me all things that ever I did: is not this the Christ?’” 

Erin: Some parents of the school didn’t like Ramabai’s new passion for Jesus and removed their students. But many other students also found hope in Christ.

Pandita:“I feel I must tell my fellow-creatures what great things the Lord Jesus has done for me. I feel sure, as it was possible for Him to save such a great sinner as I am, He is quite able to save others. The only thing that must be done by me is to tell people of Him and of His love for sinners and His great power to save them.”

Erin: In fact, some American financial supporters of the school threatened to cut off funds. These donors claimed to be Christians but were uncomfortable with Ramabai’s excitement to share the gospel, but that didn’t stop her.

Pandita: “Because a necessity is laid upon me; yea, woe is unto me if I preach not the gospel! I am bound to tell as many men and women as possible that Christ Jesus came to save sinners like me.”

Erin: Ramabai imagined a place where students could not only learn to read, but would also learn the Bible and build God’s kingdom.

Pandita:“I wished very much that there were some missions founded in this country which would be a testimony to the Lord's faithfulness to His people and the truthfulness of what the Bible says in a practical way. I questioned in my mind over and over again why some missionaries did not come forward to found faith-missions in India. Then the Lord said to me, ‘Why don't you begin to do this yourself, instead of wishing for others to do it?’”

Erin: Pandita Ramabai bought 100 acres of land and founded the Mukti Mission. Students there could learn farming, and the ministry could sustain itself. Her daughter served alongside her and would one day run the whole mission.

Dannah: Wow, God gave her the ability to do something about the lack of education for girls, especially in her culture.

Pandita: “They have had their eyes opened by reading the Word of God, and many of them have been truly converted and saved to the praise and glory of God. I thank God for letting me see several hundred of my sisters, the children of my love and prayer, gloriously saved.”

Dannah: What a joy to dig into this story with Erin Davis. Guess what? The Mukti Mission Pandita founded all those years ago is still running strong! They’ve offered shelter and education to 100,000 Indian women and counting. Praise God!

Don’t you love learning about these missions-minded women. So inspiring! We’re closing today with one more. I’ll let Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth introduce her. 

Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth: Since I was a little girl, I have loved reading Christian biographies. And this is one of the biggest takeaways for me as I’ve read the stories of men and women who have walked through difficult things, through trials, through challenges, who’ve served the Lord in hard places and yet have found the grace to persevere.

One of the most inspirational people I’ve read about over those years is a woman named Dr. Helen Roseveare. She served for twenty years as a missionary doctor in the Congo. I’ve been deeply impacted by a number of books written about this woman as well as by her. She experienced a lot of trauma and suffering in the course of following and serving Jesus, and yet here’s what she had to say as she reflected on some of those hardships:

“I’ve looked back and tried to count the cost, but I find it all swallowed up in the privilege. The cost suddenly seems very small and transient in the greatness and permanence of privilege.”

Wow! When she went to count the cost of following Jesus, she said it all added up to a great privilege.

Dannah: Just incredible! Dr. Roseveare went home to be with Jesus in 2016, but today we’re going to listen to part of an interview that she gave in 2009 with television host Moira Brown. 

Now, I do want to mention that some of what she said in that interview might be hard for sensitive little ones to hear. She did understate her descriptions of the violence she experienced, but I just wanted to let parents of little ones know it’s coming in case younger ears are close by.

We’re picking up in the Congo. Helen had just helped build a hospital and found a training school for nurses. But then civil war began. Suffering was on the horizon for Helen.

Helen: Chaos broke. I mean, the European pale skins (we were called) left. Sadly, a lot of missionaries left because over the radios we heard that the African army had gone on the rampage, and they’d gone into a mission station and raped one of the missionaries. Fear took hold of the community. Most of the pale skin people fled and got out of the country.

We had four years of really frightening anarchy. Shops emptied. There was no food. There was nothing. There were no medicines. It was very difficult. You worked with what you got left to work with until that ran out, too.

And then in 1964, September, as far as I’m concerned, with no warning, we suddenly found ourselves at war. Saturday afternoon, early August, a truck load of these wicked soldiers drove into my village with a wounded man. They said it was a wounded civilian. The word they used in Swahili was a word you would only use if you were at war, which we didn’t know we were at war.

Moira Brown: You were so cut off from world news?

Helen: Totally cut off from everything. That was the beginning of five months of really horrific . . . Initially, they didn’t touch us. They told us to keep out of things, but what we watched between dark skin and dark skin was terrible.

And then . . .

Moira: Ultimately, twenty-seven missionaries were murdered?

Helen: Twenty-seven of our missionaries were murdered. Over 200 pale skin nuns were murdered and countless priests. The murder figures were . . .

At the same time, a quarter of a million Africans lost their lives. We tended to harbor on what we pale skins got, but really, our African brothers . . . and any of our Africans who had loved us and cared for us and looked after us . . . When we were eventually rescued, they turned on them. It was very horrific.

And halfway through, about ten weeks, they actually came to my house one night. I don’t know what time. By then they had taken our watches and trucks and everything else that was takeable. It was a horrific night. They came into the house, and they said they were looking for . . . whatever. They smashed everything. They ransacked the house. They didn’t find what they were looking for. I didn’t happen to possess a radio or anything like this.

And then they turned on me. It was a moment . . . I was out on the veranda of the house at one moment, and this little—I don’t know what—sergeant/major of the rebel soldiers stood there with a gun pointed, pressed against my forehead. I don’t know if it was loaded or not, but I presumed it was. 

And he said, “Say that LaMumbo” (that was their patron saint), “Say that LaMumbo is the savior of the world.”

I wasn’t praying. I wasn’t thinking. I just knew that wasn’t true. I knew the only one Savior of the world, and that was Jesus. So I just said, “No! Never! Jesus is the only Savior of the world.” I think in my heart I was actually praying he would shoot. It’d be quick. Clean. Finished.

But out on the courtyard was one of my junior students from the college. He was being held by these men. He broke loose, and he threw himself between me and this soldier. He said, “You don’t touch her over my dead body!” And they turned on him, and they beat him up so savagely. I didn’t know for two years later he was not killed actually. He survived. But it was terrible, terrible.

Then they drove me down the corridor of my home. And somehow in that moment, I think I was saying, “God! Where are You? Whatever is going on?”

And there was suddenly a tremendous—what can I say—consciousness. God was there.

Moira: There was a moment when you thought you’d been abandoned.

Helen: Well, I don’t think I ever lost my faith in God, but I just felt He wasn’t looking after me.

Moira: Exactly.

Helen: But I suddenly knew He was, and He was in charge, and that these rebel soldiers were very small compared to the mightiness of God. As they drove me down the corridor, I think He spoke to me. I didn’t hear words, but after looking back, I had to ask the Lord, “What did You actually say? Put it into words for me.” I think what He said was, “Can You thank Me?”

And my heart was saying, “No. This has gone too far.” I knew what lay ahead. I could see the whole thing, and it was horrible.

And He said, “Can you thank Me for trusting you?”

And I thought, This is unbelievable. I know I trust Him, but I never thought of Him trusting me. It was revolutionary to think that He trusted me! And in this second, I could see what He was saying. “I thought I could trust you. I thought you wouldn’t bite Me.”

And God was saying, “Can you thank Me for trusting you with this experience even if I never tell you why?”

And even in the midst of the darkness, it was, “Dear Lord, I don’t know what You’re saying. I don’t know why You’re saying it. I don’t know who will ever be blessed by this. But if this is part of Your plan, yes. Thank You for trusting me.”

And immediately, I was flooded with a sense of enormous peace—the peace of God. It was wonderful. I just knew. It was like He said, “All I want of you is the loan of your body.” And it was Jesus in me. They weren’t fighting me. They were fighting Jesus. All I had to do was say, “Yes, Jesus, I’m Yours. You’re in me. Do just as You want.”

It didn’t stop the pain, the humiliation, the cruelty. It didn’t take that away. It was all there. But suddenly it was with Him and for Him. And it just revolutionized everything. It was wonderful.

Later years when we came home on furlough (we were rescued by mercenary soldiers, and we were sent home), I talked all over the United Kingdom. Every now and again, a woman would come up to me at the end of a woman’s meeting and would say, “But why did God allow . . . ” And then they’d just pour. . . “Why would a God of love allow such suffering?”

Really, they were saying to me, “Why would God allow you to suffer? You were a missionary. You were out there serving Him.”

I thought, We never asked that question, so I didn’t have an answer, because we never asked the question.” I just thought, Lord, You’re just so wonderful, and You’re so marvelous.” It’s such a privilege that He is our Master, our Friend, our Savior, our Lord, our King. He has the right to do anything. I’d given my life to Him. So, why not?

Moira: Well, that’s one of your teachings—a living sacrifice. Romans 12:1, “Submit your body as a living sacrifice.”

Helen: Yes.

Moira: God was calling in a way you would never have anticipated. And that night prior to your teeth being kicked out by a rebel boot, prior to being brutally raped twice, were you aware that He wasn’t abandoning you, that He was there, and He was going to do something through this darkest, most evil experience that you couldn’t at that moment see?

Helen: Yes. It really was as though He wrote one word, and I could almost read it in the sky: privilege. Like in the night I was converted, the leader of the conference where I was gave me a Bible. I’d never owned a Bible before. He wrote in my Bible Philippians 3:10, “That I may know Christ and the power of His resurrection and the privilege of the fellowship of His sufferings.” I’d been a Christian about a half hour, and he was saying to me it could be a privilege to suffer for Jesus.

And right from that day, the word privilege has really underlined everything in my Christian life. It was a privilege. He asked me for something. He said, “I want the loan of your body.” And I’m amazed! The Almighty God, the Great Creator, heavenly Father, and it was something I had to respond to, and it was privilege.

Dannah: Wow, that’s Dr. Helen Roseveare sharing with interviewer Moira Brown. Her story is a powerful one. You can listen to the full interview at ReviveOurHearts.com/weekend. Praise God for using this ordinary woman in extraordinary ways.

If Revive Our Hearts episodes like the one you heard today have inspired you to live on mission, would you consider giving to support this ministry? We’re only able to share content like this because listeners donate to make it possible.

This month when you donate any amount, we’ll send you a copy of Mary Kassian’s newly released book titled What Is a Woman? This resource courageously answers that question, walking phrase by phrase through a biblical definition. It’s such a timely and beautiful resource in a day when true womanhood is under attack. To donate and request your copy, visit ReviveOurHearts.com. Thank you for helping make this ministry possible.

Next weekend is our last ordinary women, extraordinary God episode. We’ll hear three more powerful stories you won’t want to miss! Thanks for listening today. I’m Dannah Gresh. We’ll see you next time, for Revive Our Hearts Weekend.

This program is a listener-supported production of Revive Our Hearts in Niles, Michigan, calling women to freedom, fullness, and fruitfulness in Christ.

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