{"id":411,"date":"2020-10-25T10:20:00","date_gmt":"2020-10-25T17:20:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/peoriapresbyterianchurch.org\/wordpress\/?p=411"},"modified":"2020-10-27T10:22:51","modified_gmt":"2020-10-27T17:22:51","slug":"sermon-october-25-2020","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/peoriapresbyterianchurch.org\/wordpress\/weekly-sermon\/sermon-october-25-2020\/","title":{"rendered":"Sermon October 25, 2020"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Hanging On<\/strong>
Romans 5:1-5<\/strong>
October 25, 2020    <\/strong> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The reason the numbers are spiking everywhere is due to two new words in our vocabulary: Covid Fatigue. \u00a0 \u00a0We\u2019ve been, more or less, shut in and shut out of our normal routine since early March. \u00a0Save a weekly trip to Albertson\u2019s, a doctor\u2019s visit, or a small gathering with our family, most of us have stayed close to home. \u00a0And it\u2019s hard, isn\u2019t it? \u00a0Really hard. \u00a0We want to get out and get going!

I want to tell you the story of Mary Previte. \u00a0She was born of missionary parents in Shandong, China in 1932. \u00a0She had just turned nine when the Japanese stormed her boarding school. \u00a0She became, along with every other westerner there, a Prisoner of War.

For a year the Japanese allowed Mary and her school mates to live peacefully on the campus of their boarding school. But then they decided it would become a naval base. \u00a0The Japanese herded up students and teachers and moved them to a nearby concentration camp. \u00a0The camp was crowded, the people hungry, bed bugs and lice crawling about everywhere. \u00a0

Three of her teachers decided to do something to battle concentration camp fatigue. \u00a0They created boy and girl scout troops. \u00a0The children had to work to earn merit badges. \u00a0

The teachers decided to operate these youth units as if they were the same as in peace time. \u00a0Concentration camp or not, every student was expected to be orderly, cheerful, and polite.

\u201cWe were to have manners as if we were princesses in Buckingham Place,\u201d Previte said. \u00a0\u201cYou could be on a wooden bench, eating out of a soap dish or an empty tuna can, and you might be eating boiled animal brains or what the Chinese would feed their animals and the teachers would come up behind you and say, \u2018Mary, do not talk with your mouth full\u2019.\u201d

It got worse. \u00a0The teachers and children were shipped to an even larger concentration camp, where there were 1200 other POW\u2019s, mainly from Europe and Britain. \u00a0The prisoners ate weeds growing in the camp to ward off starvation. \u00a0 Death and disease were rampant. \u00a0

Mary\u2019s days were marked by arduous work: mopping floors, cooking, \u00a0swabbing latrine, pumping water, and carrying burning trash.

Even as Hong Kong, Singapore and Malaysia fell to the Japanese and the Philippines were \u00a0invaded the teachers kept their students from succumbing to dread. \u00a0\u201cI did not see my parents for five years, so the teachers became our substitute parents. \u00a0They never let the students forget that God was watching over them, and that the teachers would take care of them.\u201d

As the years dragged \u00a0by, the teachers kept on teaching, kept on working with the girls to earn their merit badges, kept on having fun contests such as having the girls grow out their fingernails, the best way to catch bed bugs. \u00a0

The war ended in August 1945. \u00a0 \u00a0Mary Previte was reunited with her parents and returned to the states.

In 1985, 40 years after her camp was liberated, Mary Previte tracked down some of her teachers to thank them. \u00a0She asked Ailsa Carr what it was like to bear the heavy burden in the face of the brutal Japanese occupation.

Mary\u2019s former teacher told her that she knew the Japanese were digging mass graves just outside the compound walls. \u00a0Carr added, \u201cI would pray to God every night that He would let me be one of the first when they lined us by the death trench and began shooting.\u201d

Mary Previte could only say, \u201cMiss Carr, I had no idea.\u201d

Today Mary Previte\u00a0 served as a representative of the sixth legislative district in N.J. from 1998 to 2006.\u00a0 \u00a0She passed away last year.\u00a0\u00a0

It has been almost 80 years since those teachers shielded her from hopelessness. \u00a0The teachers\u2019 gifts to Mary Previte and her classmates was their ability to find joy in a desperate situation. \u00a0All the teachers were Christians, and as such, they never failed to remind the girls that \u201cGod is our refuge and strength, a very present help in the time of trouble.\u201d \u00a0(Psalm 46:1)

In 1 Peter 5:7 followers of Christ are instructed with these words: \u201cCast all your cares upon God, for He cares for you.\u201d \u00a0\u00a0

So, the next time you are having a bad day, think of Mary Previte, think of the rat-infested barracks where she slept for four years. \u00a0Think of scouring the field for weeds to eat. \u00a0Think of those who didn\u2019t make it out of the concentration camps in Asia and Europe during WWII. \u00a0\u00a0

In so doing it won\u2019t be a magical cure for Covid Fatigue. \u00a0But it will give you a little perspective.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dr. Terry Swicegood<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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