In this sermon, a young man shares his personal testimony of being freed from prison and his desire for forgiveness from his father. He believes that if he sees white bags hanging on the cherry tree in front of his parents' house, it will signify his father's forgiveness. As the train approaches his parents' house, he is filled with anxiety about whether or not the white bags will be there. The sermon then transitions to a discussion about the seriousness of sin and the consequences of being an enemy of the Gospel. The speaker emphasizes the need for repentance and keeping the door open for those who want to turn to God. The sermon concludes with a story about a father who reassures a restless young man that his house is filled with white kitchenware, symbolizing his father's love and acceptance. The sermon encourages listeners to take sin seriously and to seek forgiveness and reconciliation with God.

Before I speak to you, from Galatians 5, verse 12, a very wonderful verse. Paul writes about the enemies of the church, about false teachers. God wanted them to be disturbed. Have you ever heard a preacher speak like this in Germany? God wanted those who disturb you to be exterminated. Have you ever heard such a preaching? A preacher should be gentle, always say beautiful, good words. Paul knew nothing about this. He knew that you can say very harsh words in the name of God and even express the desire that the enemies of God outside the church and the false teachers in the church are exterminated. These words are very brutal, insulting, sarcastic, mocking. But without knowing it, we say all such words. We ask God to grant your will. Now, what is his will? It is written in John's Gospel, chapter 15, verse 6, that he wants that all those who do not bear fruit should be cut off and burned. And when I say, let your will be done, then I want all those who do not bear fruit for God and do not repent to be burned. That's what Jesus said. And I say that as often as I recite the will of our Father, let your will be done. The enemies of the Gospel should be exterminated. Not only Paul speaks like this. Peter, in his second letter, chapter 2, verse 22, also had to do with bad Christians who disturbed the church a lot. And he says they are like dogs that eat again what they have played and they are like sows that roll back into the herd after the swarming. Could he not have found a more polite expression? And if he had said dogs, maybe that would have been enough. But Peter read what he wrote and said to himself, I only called them dogs, that's not enough. I should also add that they are like the sows. And Jesus himself spoke about the enemies of his Gospel in this way. He called these enemies the herdsmen. He had to pay a heavy price for it. And David, in his psalms, also spoke like this. Luther also spoke like this. I wonder if you can speak differently. Do you have the divine truth? Then you want it to triumph. And if someone does not turn to the end and fights again and again for your truth, the truth of God, then you can say this word, may God have them exterminated. In this sense, I will speak tonight. Who can afford to speak like this? May the enemies be exterminated. You can only speak like this if you also join yourself. Paul says in Galatians 1, verse 8, if I, myself, would proclaim another gospel, then I myself should also be exterminated. It is not against others, it is against the enmity that the gospel causes. And if I should become an enemy of the gospel , then I myself should also be exterminated. If you think like this, then you have the right to exterminate. And there is another condition. You have the right to exterminate if you keep the doors open at the same time for those who want to turn around. They should know that you love them to the last hour and always keep the door open for them to turn around. I once heard a priest in a train. The train was full, you could hardly move. And there was a young man who disturbed everyone. He always went out of the compartment, then back in, then back in, then back in. Everyone was angry. The priest asked the young man, why are you so restless? You can see that you are disturbing others. Can't you sit still? And the young man said, I have to tell you the truth. I come from a very good family, but I have come to a bad end. I became a thief and was released from prison today. And now I'm going home. I wrote to my mother from prison, please forgive me, father. And if father forgives me, we have a church tree in front of our house, then I hang a few white handkerchiefs on the branches of the church tree. And if I see these white handkerchiefs, then I know, father has forgiven me and I can come home. And now the train is approaching our parents' house. The parents' house is right next to the church tree. And I don't dare to look through the window. I ask myself, what will I do if the white handkerchiefs are not there? Then I have no choice but to remain a thief, even worse than before. And I am so upset. I have a question in my heart. Will there be a priest in our house? And I said, yes, there will be a priest in our house. And the priest said, go out to the corridor, just tell me beforehand what your house looks like, how I will see it. And I will tell you if there are white handkerchiefs in the tree or not. So I went out. The priest looked through the young man in the corridor, young man, young man, there is not a single white handkerchief on the church tree. The whole church tree is full of white, big tissues. This is how your father expects you to come back. We tell people that it is very serious to be an enemy of the gospel, that you put yourself under the curse of God, that you are once again exterminated. And our prayer is that the will of God may take place. And he has decided that sinners will be in hell forever. May God exterminate the enemies of God. But at the same time we give you a friendly hand and tell you, we love you and God loves you. He expects your return. Return from your evil ways. In this sense, we are talking about communism. It must be very clear. The Merterer-Kirche charity differs from other Eastern missions. Other Eastern missions say, look, there are no Bibles and no Christian books in communist countries. Don't you want to give a few marks so that they have a Bible? In the end, even if I don't read the Bible. But someone else should have this freedom. Here you have ten marks, buy them a Bible. Another Eastern mission says, there are prisoners in communist countries. Do you want to help them? So no one should be in prison for their faith. Even if I am an Eastern missioner, I can't help a family of such prisoners. Our mission goes on. We help with Bibles. We help families of Christian martyrs. We fight against communism and want it to be exterminated together with all the enemies that we have within the church and that are also influenced by communism. Are these words not hard? These words are not hard. Hard is the fate of the believers in communist countries. Many of you may know the name of the priest Dutko, Demetrius Dutko. This is a Russian Orthodox priest who spoke very beautiful books about Christ. He was a tremendous preacher. In Orthodox circles, he was looked at as we would look at Billy Graham. And he had published that two priests were killed in Russia. In the West, no one knew about it. He reported that the priest Nicholas was killed. Six men broke into his house during the night and then his body was found. His hair was pulled out. His eyes were ejected. They went over his body with a hot iron . The body was cut up and then they shot him with two bullets. That was on December 5th. The 6th of December is the day of St. Nicholas among the Orthodox. And his name was Nikolai Nikolaus. And they wanted to shame the saint by shaming him. And he also reported about Bishop Methodius, Archbishop of Omsk, that he was also killed under such circumstances. Shortly afterwards, the priest Dutko was arrested. And he was put in a cell with criminals. And he was threatened. Don't you take everything you said back? Are you being raped homosexually? We take a picture. We spread the picture in your family and among the believers, who have placed their trust in you, ridicule you and then condemn you not for your faith, but for homosexuality. You have to choose. Either you deny everything you have said, or you have to suffer this. And the priest Dutko chose the worst. He chose to deny everything he said. He appeared on television in Russia, in all of Russia, and said that everything he had so far claimed was wrong. This led to a chain reaction in Russia. Imagine how it would be if you knew in Germany and in America that Billy Graham had denied everything he had so far preached. Many would collapse. And so there was a chain reaction in Russia. Regelson and Captain Chuck and other important Orthodox prisoners also said everything they had so far claimed was wrong. Then to make it even more ridiculous, they arranged that Dutko would send abroad a denial of his denial. And after he sent a denial of his denial, he sent a denial of the denial of his denial. So it is as I said there, that this whole thing is not true. There were all these murders and there were not all these crimes. So if you murder a priest like that, and if you make another priest so ridiculous, my answer is that communism should be eradicated. From the Baptists is our brother Hailo, the father of eleven children, who was recently put in a psychiatric institution, and now he is also coming to court. Together with him are 22 others, only because they are religious, declared as crazy. The communists themselves publicize that the sign of their craziness is that they pray for a long time. Long prayer is the sign of craziness. Once the communists take over West Germany, which is very well possible, once they take over West Germany, the West German Christians can be sure that they will not come to the madhouse because they do not pray for a long time. Only those who pray for a long time go to the madhouse. Here you have to look at the clock during the prayer, not to pray for more than five minutes during the service of God, or the service of God should not be longer than an hour. There they pray for a long time, just as every girl wants to talk to her groom for a long time. So the believers there speak for a long time with their heavenly groom. 22 were recently sent to psychiatric institutions. We have some names, Baptist Anatolij Runov, three times. His fault was that he publicly preached the gospel on the street. German Christians have the freedom to do it, but they don't. In the madhouse is also the Baptist Alexander Jankovic and Anatolij Ponomarev, the Orthodox nun Makaeva. Recently, the Catholic priest Tamkevicius was imprisoned. Ukrainian Baptists Ivan Kirilluk, Vyacheslav Salas, Viktor Litovchenko and Viktor Draga were imprisoned for three to twelve years, but not for their faith. The communists never say that they put someone in prison for their faith. They invent something else, some kind of lie, and they have accused him of being a thief, and our brothers are under such a false accusation as thieves in prison, just like Joseph in the Old Testament was in prison as a whore, just because he was pure. Such crimes happen in Russia. I could tell you about such crimes all night long, and if Paulus were here and I told him about all these crimes, he would say again what he said in Galatians 5, verse 12. They should be executed. This is the evangelical point of view. If you don't like it, please cut out this verse from the Bible. There is also a hardness of the Bible. There is gentleness, there is love, there is kindness, there is forgiveness, and there is also an end to forgiveness. When Peter asked Jesus, is it enough if we forgive seven times? Jesus said, no, not at all. It has to be seven times seventy. Seven times seventy is 490. So I have to forgive 490 times. But the communists killed 66 million people in Russia alone. The number is from Solzhenitsyn, Archbishop Gulag. And they killed 60 million people in China. And they killed 3 million people in Cambodia. And they killed them in Romania, and in Albania, and in Bulgaria, and now in Ethiopia, and in Mozambique, and in Angola. And the Savior did not say, you should forgive 66 million times. He said 490 times. I can add 10 more times, 20 more times, 500 more times. But here it was about millions, tens of millions. If Paul would hear the whole story of Russia today, he would say exactly like in Galatians 5.12. They should be exterminated. He had to do with the enemies of the gospel at that time. And he knew, if they win, hundreds of millions of people, who knows how many generations, will lose their souls. He saw it with his own eyes. And that's why he was so harsh, so sharp. You can find that with Luther, with all the reformers. You can find that with all the believers whose truth is really at the heart. We cannot act there. There we are very sharp. Sharp also against ourselves, when we sin. Leaving the door open for every sinner, for every criminal, to come back. And then he will be received with great love. But if they behave, then we have very harsh words for them, which they should warn. That a harsh judgment comes from God. I cannot say to anyone, you know my dear, there is also a little hell there. With a little fire, but don't take it too seriously, don't get too angry. And there was a priest. A priest once preached about hell. And some in the congregation began to cry. And that he saw them crying, he said, but dear brothers, don't take it so seriously. I didn't mean it seriously. But God meant it very seriously, when he speaks about hell and extermination. What happened in Russia is a small thing compared to what happened in Red China. Here I quote only a few things that have now occurred in China. Now the communists themselves recognize that it has occurred. And they now direct five of the communist leaders for these crimes. But they continue these crimes. And those who direct, they were also with criminals. Hua Guofeng and Deng Xiaoping, and what are their names, they were here together with Zhao Qing and the others who are directing today. Just like they got rid of Stalin in Russia. And those who got rid of Stalin, they committed the same crimes as Stalin. And they got rid of Stalin. And then Khrushchev put even more believers in prison, like Stalin did. Listen to this from Red China. 24 people who refused to send their children to communist schools were publicly executed by stabbing them in the eye. Other victims were stabbed in the arms and legs by four horses and were simply torn apart. Some horses were more merciful than the Red liberators and did not want to dress. But the Chinese helped with massive whip lifts. So really the methods of the Nazis in Auschwitz are clumsy and childish compared to this. The thighs were cut open. Then the prisoners poured salt into the wounds and then sewed them up. In order to extend the torture, the prisoners did not let the prisoners die, but gave them injections from time to time to keep the life of the victims for a while. Some were put heavy stones on the heads, which let the eyes come out of the caves. Others were torn apart by trucks. A horse can do it or not. A horse can be stubborn, but a truck cannot be stubborn. This comes from an explanation of the American Senate, which interrogated Chinese and Tibetans and then published these things. In Germany they were published under the title, »Uns, Herr, wirst du Freude schaffen.« This was in Tibet. In Afghanistan, they heard that Afghanistan had been taken over by the communists. And there was a big alarm in the German press. Afghanistan was taken over. What followed? Probably Iran or maybe Iraq. And then we lose the oil. Germany has lived without oil for thousands of years. You can live without oil. I am not so interested in oil. I wonder what happened to my Afghan brothers and sisters. Have you seen any article about it? Have you heard a word about it in any church or free community? What are my Afghan brothers and sisters doing? Afghanistan is a Muslim country, but there was a church there. There was a community. It was not big, but there was a community. The Christian Church in Afghanistan. Where is it? This is a much more important question than the question of oil. I can tell you what happened to them. The church in Afghanistan disappeared from the earth's surface. It does not exist anymore. Just as the church in North Korea does not exist anymore. We have the church in North Korea. We, the help section of the Martyrs' Church, are very much in need. We would have liked to help. We have not managed to find a single believer. The last of whom we know were burned alive. There are no more believers in North Korea today. Or maybe some are hidden, of whom we do not know. We know about the Christians and many Muslim believers in Afghanistan that they were bound with strong ropes. They were hung upside down over graves with fur and urine. Just like our brother from Cuba. He was also put in such a barrel with fur and urine. This also happened in Romania. They were hung upside down. They were asked to renounce their faith, their Christian or Muslim faith. When they refused, the rope was lowered and lowered. They continued to refuse. It was lowered and lowered. And in the end, the saints of God, the brothers and sisters of Jesus, the children of God, were drowned in fur and urine. The Communism that did this should be exterminated. This is not my opinion. This is the opinion of Paul. Do you not like it? Cut out this verse from the Bible. It is in the Bible. And we believe that the whole Bible is inspired by God. And I cannot choose from the Bible, I do not like this verse, I do not like that verse. In his time, the Bible was written by hand. Once there was a king in France. He called a monk and said to him, Write me a beautiful Bible. And just as God gave it to him, leave out the verse where it says, You shall not whore. I do not like these verses. I love that. You can not exclude something from the Bible. And you can not exclude these sharp words of the apostle Paul. And what heroes were our Russian brothers in Afghanistan? Six brothers from the Soviet army. They were sent to Afghanistan with the army. And when they were asked to shoot the Afghans, they refused and even died a heroic death. These are the things that happened in communist countries. We have repeatedly been accused of the murder of the church. You see everything white and black. Communism is black. And Western democracy is white. And atheism is black. And Christian faith is white. But there is not only a white and black. I ask all those who say that you should not paint white and black, they should show me the word gray in the New Testament. There is no such thing. Either white or black. Either you are a child of God and then you are white. Are you not a child of God? Are you a child of the devil and you are black? I leave the door open to you. I love you. You can become a child of God from a child of the devil. If I should once deny God, then I will come under the same curse that I speak about others. If I would once destroy the Word of God, then the curse that I speak about others will come upon me. This is what Paul says. But there is a sharp separation here. And now comes the question of the church. I mean the Evangelical Church, the Catholic Church and the various free communities. I was recently with my brother David Klasen. He is a Soviet brother, a Russian immigrant. I think he was in prison in Russia for ten years. And he said that when he prayed once, the criminals wanted to attack him and do him a bad deed. And then a murderer came and took his defense and said, if he touches him, I have killed my own uncle. I will also kill those who touch this saint. A murderer took the defense of a Christian in prison. Yes, we do not have to be at least as good as that murderer. We do not have to defend our fellow brothers. Many of you probably belong to the Evangelical Church of Germany. The Evangelical Church of Germany, that is what it is called. In my eyes, it is not evangelical. And if it is not evangelical, it is not a church. And it is not German, because it does not speak German. But that is what it is called, the German Evangelical Church. And the German Evangelical Church gives money to murderers, to communist guerrillas in Africa. In Rhodesia, in Angola, now in South-West Africa, communists fight with weapons in their hands in order to kill the white people, in order to claim the dominion, and to kill there as well as in Russia, as in Tibet and as in China. And the church gives them money Under various pretexts, we give money to murderers. We turned to the World Council of Churches and told them, you give money to the communist murderers in Africa. That is what you think, that is what you do. You have the freedom to do so. But do not think that it would be good if you would also give money to the families of Christian murderers. And then we received the answer of the General Secretary of the World Council of Churches. He said, the demand that we should support families of Christian murderers in communist countries is pointless. Giving money to the communist guerrillas makes sense. And giving money to the families of Christian murderers is pointless. The churches of Germany were silent when they killed millions of Jews. They were silent when they killed gypsies. By the way, they also killed Germans back then, and so many others, and Poles. And they are silent even now about what is happening in the world. Very rarely, here and there, a very gentle word. Why do I need these gentle words? Paul says, they should be exterminated. That is the Christian word. That is the word of the Gospel. A sharp separation between us and the children of the devil. We have a very interesting document, which has just come out of Russia. The letter of a murderer, a Ryabushin. He was a communist murderer. He took part in the murder of 10,000 Polish officers in Khatyn. A crime that was committed against the Germans. He took part in the murder of 10,000 Poles. He took part in the murder of Christians. This Ryabushin. He killed Christians with his own hands. And then he turned around, and now he is a Baptist in Russia. We changed his name, because he is still a Baptist in Russia. But that is the person. That is how he looks. And he writes to the church. He does not know anything about politeness. The word politeness does not appear in the Bible. Truth appears in the Bible. And passionate love appears in the Bible. Like a flame. A love like a flame. And he writes, O church, I am ashamed of you just as I am ashamed of my past. He was a murderer. And he says, I am ashamed of you just as I am ashamed of my past, O church. As I fear my past, so I fear your future. You are a miserable puppet in the hands of Marxists. And let yourself be abused by them in our country, that is, in Russia, and abroad. You make this murder and bloodshed so that the church is obliged to prevent any discrimination. So in Africa there is discrimination. A black man is not treated as well as a white man. And therefore the church supports the murderers, the black murderers in Africa. I am also against discrimination, he says. I also say yes and amen to the fight against discrimination. It is our duty to address injustice, as Jesus Christ did. But where were you, church, when I shot the innocent people? Why did you remain silent then? This man had killed Christians. And the church had remained silent. And why are you silent now? Why do you condemn the Soviet people who demand freedom of thought or urge them to proclaim their God freely and label them at international congresses abroad? They say about them, these are undisciplined elements, these are people who somehow create unrest. They are useless. You have become a slave, my church, a slave of the rulers of this world. Oh, how I am ashamed of you. You have become a shameless liar, an instigator of murder. There is no justification for you as there is no justification for my murder. This is the condition. You can blame others for the murder if you blame your own murder. Future generations will call us an example of shame. You too. You are bloodthirsty and do not want to accept purification. In our country, that is, in Russia, you have fallen so deep into slavery that you can no longer free yourself. If I were not convinced of the existence of God, I would burn you on the pile of ashes. Isn't that too harsh a word? I would burn these false churches on the pile of ashes. If that is wrong, the Bible is also wrong. The Bible writes in Galatians 5, verse 12, God wanted them to be exterminated. The Church of Christ has all the truth. Whoever is outside the Church of Christ has all the lies. There is only this one truth, the truth of Christ. And this truth of Christ must triumph. No one should disturb it. And whoever disturbs it will be punished by God. We all warn. And I hope that this warning reaches the ears of the church leaders. If you agree with me, I would recommend to send the tape of this evening to your priests, your bishops, to the president of the federation, to whom you belong, so that they can listen to it. And maybe also to your chancellor and your president. And as they are all called, they should know that you cannot be a comrade of these communist criminals. We are going a completely different way. We are going the way of Christ, the way of self-sacrifice. I want to conclude, because I want to give you the opportunity to ask me a few questions. In 1912, maybe you have read about it, a very large ship sank. The Titanic. It is famous, hundreds died when the Titanic sank in the ocean. There was a writer on this Titanic. The man had written many books. Nobody wanted to publish them. They were not good. But he wanted to continue writing. He was convinced that he was writing well. And on the ship he wrote another book. And he was sure, this book is good, and through this book I will become famous. I had hoped for all my other books, that they would make me famous. I did not succeed. Through this book I will become famous. And suddenly the ship sank. He took the manuscript with him into the water. He could swim well. I can swim with one hand. In this manuscript is my whole life. This makes me famous. And then he saw a child. A child swam next to him. He could not swim. It will sink. And now he has to decide what to do. Either I save this child, or I lose my manuscript, my book that makes me famous. Or I want to become famous. The child should die. And then he threw the manuscript away. He wanted to save the child, but it was already dead. And then he went on and found another child. He saved this child and wanted to bring it in a boat. It was a lifeboat. But the lifeboat was full. You could not pick up anyone. And then he grabbed a hook, which was sticking out of the lifeboat. It was such a big hook. It was pointed. He tore his hand with it. But with bleeding hands, he held on to this big hook together with the child. And in the end he saved the child. This man became famous. Not through the books he wrote, but through the love he showed. Love is what really makes you famous. The fames of this world. Who can tell me? There are so many Germans here. Who was chancellor in Germany in 1880? He was a famous man. And who was chancellor in 1780? And who was king of Germany in 1676? All these fames. And who was tsar in Russia in 1676? All these fames are worthless. But who becomes famous before God? And before Him, you become famous only through faith, through faith, through love to the end. That you allow the nail to pierce your hands as Jesus' hands were pierced. Only then will you become famous before God. And then you will live forever. We go this way of love, of self-sacrifice. The way that Jesus showed us and through which people were redeemed. We were redeemed on this way. And we were called to go this way ourselves. With all love, we warn all the enemies of the gospel. There is also a breeding ground of God. And there will be moments when God will rot out. And there will be an eternal hell. Be careful not to get there. You can be an enemy of the gospel outside and inside the church. And we offer everyone the redemption. And we also warn with sharp words all those who do not accept this redemption. This is how sharply the Helping Section of the Church of Martyrs speaks. This is how we speak here. This is how we speak about our radio broadcasts in communist countries. This is how we speak in the literature that we spread behind the Iron Curtain. There people go to prison to be tortured and to death for their faith. And we help them. Should you also help? How much should you help? There are so many organizations. Which of them should I help? Should I give a few marks? Should I give a bill of 10 or 20 marks? Or maybe a 100 mark bill? Or a 1000 mark bill? Should I give a big check? What should I do? What should I give and how much should I give? Shame on you that you have to give something. A Christian should not have anything. The word have does not exist in Hebrew. The Old Testament is written in Hebrew. And the word have does not exist in Hebrew. Even in modern Hebrew, which is now spoken in Israel, in Hebrew you cannot say, I have a car, I have a house, I have furniture. You have nothing. Only God has everything. And you are the manager. Don't think about what you have and what you should give of what you have. Give up having. Everything that is with you should belong to God and God should manage it himself. Our brothers in communist prisons have given up everything. Freezing in the cold in Siberia and hungry and without Bibles and without family, they sacrifice their lives for Jesus because they remember that he sacrificed his life for us. Let us accept this sacrifice and follow their example and sacrifice ourselves to the kingdom of God. Amen.