Tag: WWII

Five Favorite Books from 2016

Leave a comment

Here are five favorite books from 2016. If you haven’t read these yet, perhaps you can check them out in 2017. Happy New Year and happy reading! 

Children’s Picture Book: Tea with Lady Sapphire by Carl R. Sams II & Jean Stoick              A children’s picture book full of beautiful photographs and a whimsical yet educational story. Introduce little ones to the feathered friends and other critters of the winter forest with this delightful book. Just the thing for a parent (or grandparent) to share with their wee loved ones!

Middle Reader: The Discovery (Book #1 in the Santa Fe Years) by Nancy Rue                           Will Hutchinson’s world is reeling. Since his father has been fighting in the Pacific theater of WWII, Will and his mom move to Santa Fe. There Will is the only “Anglo” kid in his class at school, meets a Native American girl named Fawn…and discovers something that threatens everything he believed about himself. An engaging way to learn about WWII and Native American life in New Mexico. 

Biography: Jungle Pilot by Russell T. Hitt                                                                                               January 8, 2016, marked the 50th anniversary of the death of five missionaries in the Ecuadorian jungle. Nate Saint was one of those five. Within the pages of this book, you will find his life story, including excerpts from his own letters and journals. You can read more thoughts on Jungle Pilot here.

Novel: As Waters Gone By Cynthia Ruchtia                                                                                         Emmalyn knows her husband will soon be free to come back…from prison. The problem is, she isn’t sure he’ll be coming back to her. With dwindling savings and evaporating hope, Emmalyn heads to Madeline Island where she intends to renovate their hunting cabin into her – or possibly their – new home. What she discovers on this island in Lake Superior will change her life in more ways than she ever expected.

Audiobook: Come Rain or Come Shine by Jan Karon, read by John McDonough                  The tale of the beloved Mitford characters continues with Come Rain or Come Shine. The main attraction? Dooley and Lace are tying the knot! They’re doing everything they can to have what they really want – a simple country wedding – but has planning a wedding ever been simple? Full of the heart, hope and hometown feel that Mitford fans love. The voice of John McDonough brings the story and characters to life. 

What were your favorite books from 2016? Leave a comment with your thoughts! 

Once Upon a Town: The Miracle of the North Platte Canteen (Revisited)

Leave a comment

Ten minutes was all they had. Ten minutes to share a kind word and some home-cooking. Ten minutes to send off the American boys who might never come home.

So out came the sandwiches, out came the angel food cakes, on came the jukebox and on went the coffee. After all, ten minutes was all they had.

Can you picture it? The troop train clangs to a stop and young soldiers pour off. Mothers and daughters hand out plates of food as if serving their own sons and brothers. What would the hospitality and kind words mean to you if you were heading off to war? How would angel food cake taste when you knew it would be the last you would have in a long time or when you’d been eating military food? What would you do with the pen-pal address hidden in your popcorn ball?

This is the story of the North Platte Canteen. During WWII, the North Platte Canteen was a hopping place as troop trains stopped in that small Nebraska town on their way across the country. North Platte’s people saw this as an opportunity. Why not seize those ten-minute stops to encourage those American soldiers?

So the homemakers got together. Soon the husbands and children joined in to whisk egg whites with forks, serve sandwiches, form sticky popcorn balls, and chip in their pocket money. My own Grandpa Dan who grew up in Nebraska remembers that his mother sent money to support the Canteen. I’ve wondered if my Grandpa Ken who served in the Air Force during WWII ever stopped in North Platte.

A special thank-you to my Grandpa Dan and Grandma Ruth for sharing Once Upon a Town with me and for Grandpa's service in the US Navy.

A special thank-you to my Grandpa Dan and Grandma Ruth for sharing Once Upon a Town with me and for Grandpa’s service in the US Navy.

And what was the impact of those ten minutes? Well, within the pages of Once Upon a Town: The Miracle of the North Platte Canteen by journalist Bob Greene, I discovered that North Platte became famous among American soldiers, families pulled together to serve, a little boy sold his shirt to raise money, a lifelong marriage began with a popcorn-ball connection, and decades later many of those involved teared up as they shared their Canteen stories. One soldier even took his children on a post-war road trip to show them the Canteen where they found his name in the guest book. These are the true stories of sacrifice, community, hard work and love that capture life on the homefront and show how mere minutes of kindness can leave a permanent impression and change many lives.

I found myself intrigued by the fact that serving especially scrumptious homemade food out of the Canteen to the soldiers was a private idea. It wasn’t a government project. It didn’t take a bureaucratic committee. It did take a host of volunteering homemakers, farmers and country children. What a great example of charity that is “relational, local and voluntary”!

While I don’t endorse the entire book – please read with discretion/some sections are not suitable for children – particular stories are definitely worthwhile. For me, Once Upon a Town: The Miracle of the North Platte Canteen was a productive read and a challenge. Could we be as dedicated as Mr. Greene to collecting the stories of those who have gone before us but with a focus on God’s glory? Would we be willing to give of our time and resources with such gusto if given an opportunity like the women, children and men at North Platte? Could they have used those ten-minute intervals more fruitfully for Christ’s Kingdom? Are similar opportunities waiting for us today? Hmmm. Food for thought.

May you all have a very blessed Memorial Day weekend. As we take time to relax with family and friends and eat something yummy like angel food cake, may we also take time to remember and be grateful for those who paid the ultimate sacrifice and for those who sacrifice in small and big ways on a daily basis to defend liberty for us. 

Timeless: Thoughts on Moving Forward Well in 2016

Leave a comment

Looming uncertainty. Unwanted pain. Doubting of truths once trusted. Struggling world economies. Promised but paling world peace.  Questions tumbling around in minds unsure where to look for answers.

Does that sound familiar? Well, I think it sounds like our time, but, interestingly enough, I’m discovering all of those statements could be said about England seventy-some years ago as it entered World War II. 

Perhaps we like to think our struggles are unique to us. Some of us might even like to feel sorry for ourselves. It seems sometimes Christians (of various backgrounds) especially like to think that the “badness” of their time is the worst it’s ever been because that might mean Jesus is going to come again soon and sweep His people into heaven – and away from pain, sorrow and loss – with Him.

While I think looking forward to the return of Christ is a wonderful (and good!) thing, for anyone who has studied history there’s a problem with thinking the timing is based on present problems: Life has been downright horrible time and again. If anyone had a right to think life couldn’t get any worse, it would be the people getting bombed in London or the people living in Germany during Hitler’s reign…and many thousands throughout the centuries before them. And did the world end? Apparently not.

The upside to there having been struggles in the past is that Christians can learn from how the Church faced those challenges. Take the religious branch of the BBC during WWII for example. They faced a question not unlike the church faces today.

How can the church meet a hurting people where they are and show that Christianity is for real life including all the pain?[1]

Enter Clive Staples Lewis or C.S. Lewis or even Jack as his friends would call him.

He was a man acquainted with pain, having lost his mother at a young age and having served in WWI. He had once been a skilled skeptic of Christianity but became one of its greatest advocates. And although he was a university professor, he managed to reach the British people via the “wireless” in a way that common people could appreciate even as they managed ration cards, hid in bomb shelters, wrestled with ideologies like nationalism and Communism and heard that their loved ones were never coming home.

But it didn’t all come easy to him.

In fact, his first attempt at speaking to a group of British soldiers on Christianity was decidedly disappointing.[2]

 However, thanks to some encouragement, he didn’t give up there. And from his labors grew a modern classic called Mere Christianity.

I haven’t finished the book C.S. Lewis & Mere Christianity: The Crisis That Created a Classic yet, but I have listened to the companion radio threatre drama C.S. at War, and I think there are several tips we can all gain from the life of C.S. Lewis. 

  1. He kept learning, even from his own failures. 
  2. He had the humility to let his radio talks be edited and revised. 
  3. He sought counsel. 
  4. He genuinely cared for people. 
  5. And it was the Lord Who made his efforts successful.

Maybe if we want to move forward well in 2016 – both looking forward to Christ’s return and living well in the meantime – we need to take some time to look backward. After all, on this earth, some things could very well be timeless.  

1 1Paul McCusker, C.S. Lewis & Mere Christianity: The Crisis That Created a Classic. Focus on the Family (Colorado Springs, 2014), pgs. 30-31.

2Ibid., pg. 105.

 

Groceries & Gratitude

Leave a comment

Over a year later, I still think of it often when I’m grocery shopping. Standing amidst long aisles packed with food items that I can just take off the shelves and pay for myself, I remember them.

Lines of mothers and children waiting to get their one loaf of bread with their ration cards.

This was not a pivotal scene in Liz Tolsma’s novel Snow on the Tulips. The story follows Cornelia, a young widow engulfed in the pains and predicaments of life during the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands near the end of WWII and focuses on her struggle for courage as the Resistance movement seeps into her life.

But this one scene stands among my strongest memories.  Like I said, it’s been over a year and I still think of it.

It has changed a little part of my life.

Perhaps it’s guilt, you ask? I mean, there certainly are starving people in the world today while I stand in that grocery store overflowing with such excess. True, I could feel guilty sometimes.

But mostly I just feel…grateful.

I feel grateful for the plenty and the opportunities to share it. I feel grateful for the ability to choose what to place on our table. I feel grateful that, of all the uncertainties in life right now, I don’t have to wonder if we’ll have bread for our next meal.

Yet, maybe someday, I will be wondering if there will be anything to eat for the next meal.

When I think of that, I’m grateful for the stories of the past because they remind me of two truths: 1) people can get by on very little and 2) God provides. Certainly, we prefer variety and plenty in our food, but when push comes to shove, one really can be sustained on bread and broth or like the pioneers on bacon and hardtack. Then the Lord provides. Sometimes He provides by multiplying the 3 fish and 5 loaves. Other times He supplies by taking starving souls to feast with Him in heaven.

This is one of the blessings of history. We can prepare to face struggles courageously if we take time to study the past. And so, I am also grateful for authors like Liz Tolsma who take time to tell the life-like (albeit fictionalized) stories of those who have gone before us through times of plenty and times of poverty and watched God provide in His own ways.

He is, after all, the God Who makes the tulips grow through the snow.

Once Upon a Town: The Miracle of the North Platte Canteen

Leave a comment

Ten minutes was all they had. Ten minutes to share a kind word and some home-cooking. Ten minutes to send off the American boys who might never come home.

So out came the sandwiches, out came the angel food cakes, on came the jukebox and on went the coffee. After all, ten minutes was all they had.

Can you picture it? The troop train clangs to a stop and young soldiers pour off. Mothers and daughters hand out plates of food as if serving their own sons and brothers. What would the hospitality and kind words mean to you if you were heading off to war? How would angel food cake taste when you knew it would be the last you would have in a long time or when you’d been eating military food? What would you do with the pen-pal address hidden in your popcorn ball?

This is the story of the North Platte Canteen. During WWII, the North Platte Canteen was a hopping place as troop trains stopped in that small Nebraska town on their way across the country. North Platte’s people saw this as an opportunity. Why not seize those ten-minute stops to encourage those American soldiers?

So the homemakers got together. Soon the husbands and children joined in to whisk egg whites with forks, serve sandwiches, form sticky popcorn balls, and chip in their pocket money. My own Grandpa Dan who grew up in Nebraska remembers that his mother sent money to support the Canteen. I’ve wondered if my Grandpa Ken who served in the Air Force during WWII ever stopped in North Platte.

A special thank-you to my Grandpa Dan and Grandma Ruth for sharing Once Upon a Town with me and for Grandpa's service in the US Navy.

A special thank-you to my Grandpa Dan and Grandma Ruth for sharing Once Upon a Town with me and for Grandpa’s service in the US Navy.

And what was the impact of those ten minutes? Well, within the pages of Once Upon a Town: The Miracle of the North Platte Canteen by journalist Bob Greene, I discovered that North Platte became famous among American soldiers, families pulled together to serve, a little boy sold his shirt to raise money, a lifelong marriage began with a popcorn-ball connection, and decades later many of those involved teared up as they shared their Canteen stories. One soldier even took his children on a post-war road trip to show them the Canteen where they found his name in the guest book. These are the true stories of sacrifice, community, hard work and love that capture life on the homefront and show how mere minutes of kindness can leave a permanent impression and change many lives.

I found myself intrigued by the fact that serving especially scrumptious homemade food out of the Canteen to the soldiers was a private idea. It wasn’t a government project. It didn’t take a bureaucratic committee. It did take a host of volunteering and kind homemakers, farmers and country children. What a great example of charity that is “relational, local and voluntary”!

While I don’t endorse the entire book – please read with discretion/some sections are not suitable for children – particular stories are definitely worthwhile. For me, Once Upon a Town: The Miracle of the North Platte Canteen was a productive read and a challenge. Could we be as dedicated as Mr. Greene to collecting the stories of those who have gone before us but with a focus on God’s glory? Would we be willing to give of our time and resources with such gusto if given an opportunity like the women, children and men at North Platte? Could they have used those ten-minute intervals more fruitfully for Christ’s Kingdom? Are similar opportunities waiting for us today? Hmmm. Food for thought.

May you all have a very blessed Memorial Day weekend. As we take time to relax with family and friends and eat something yummy like angel food cake, may we also take time to remember and be grateful for those who paid the ultimate sacrifice for our liberty.

Wooden Shoes and Rescues (in honor of King’s Day)

1 Comment

Come!

It’s an invitation to a land where you can watch windmills, trip through tulip fields and patter in painted wooden shoes. It’s an open door to a journey with two friends, Summer and Noelle, as they learn not only new things about each other but also new things about themselves. It’s a beckoning to the realization of the importance of both forgiveness and trust in God for the future. Come! 

Sisterchicks in Wooden Shoes by Robin Jones Gunn has stayed on my “favorites” list for a while, and, with the Dutch holiday King’s Day coming up on April 27th, this is the perfect time to share it with you!

In this volume of the Sisterchicks series, Summer is compelled by certain circumstances to leap across the Atlantic Ocean and visit her long-time pen-pal Noelle in that land of windmills, tulips, and wooden shoes: the Netherlands. The two friends meet face to face for the first time. During her visit, Summer experiences various aspects of Dutch culture mixed with her own embarrassing moments and hilarious escapades (like floating down a canal in a giant wooden shoe)! On a more serious note, she visits the home of her heroine, Corrie ten Boom, and is reminded of Psalm 91’s promises and the value of living beyond fear – of living abundantly.

As a letter-loving girl, I was hooked right away by the fact that these two friends formed their sisterly bond with pens, paper and envelopes. However, for the first couple of chapters I still had a hard time getting into the story. Then things started to happen, and I was into it – all the way from my wooden-shoe-longing toes to my Dutch-descendant blue eyes!

One part of the story that especially grabbed me was the visit to Corrie ten Boom’s home. (You can learn more at the Ten Boom Museum website here, if you’d like.) As many of you probably know from the movie The Hiding Place or various books, Corrie ten Boom and her family used this little building as a headquarters for rescuing Jews during the WWII Nazi occupation of Holland. Through their efforts, approximately 800 Jews were spared. Before the war ended, however, the Ten Booms were betrayed and sent to prison camps. Corrie was fifty-three years old when she became a Nazi prisoner. While both her father and sister died in the camps, Corrie, in God’s providence, survived. She spent the rest of her life sharing the Gospel.

Corrie’s story got me thinking in several directions. First of all, I hadn’t known that she was “so old” (in her fifties!) when she was protecting innocent lives while risking her own. That fact is a good reminder that God still uses us when we are “older” and that my usefulness to God or the adventures I could have aren’t going to end just because I hit a certain age. Secondly, I was inspired by this family’s use of their home. The Ten Booms, by God’s grace, used their petite house mightily. It was a secret weapon against the evil of their day. Their home became a haven of hope and a passage to freedom. Even today it is still serving in those ways as people from the world over visit and learn about the healing power of forgiveness and the hope-filled freedom found in Jesus Christ. How am I using the resources God has given me? I wonder. What legacy will I leave? Lastly, I was filled with a simple awe over Corrie’s living-out of Proverbs 24:11 in her own day. (“Rescue those who are being taken away to death; hold back those who are stumbling to the slaughter.” ESV) For me, her example begs the questions, “Who are the people in need of rescuing in my day?”  and “How would God have me help them?”

Today, or sometime this coming week, might you have time to make yourself a good cup of tea or coffee – whichever you prefer – and settle in to pen a snail-mail letter to a friend or read an encouraging book? You may find – like Summer and Noelle – that such an action brings grand adventures your way!

A beautiful painting by Wisconsin artist Nic Lenz

A beautiful painting by Wisconsin artist Nic Lenz