Sacrifice

I took the following story from the Sunday School lesson manual for the 12 and 13 year old kids (the class that Ryan and I now teach). I have heard it before, but every time I read it I am filled with awe.

I am grateful for all of the individuals who have sacrificed so much so that I could be where I am today!

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The following is a true story of an LDS woman President Benson met following one meeting with members who had suffered through the war.

The sister had “burlap sacks wrapped around her feet and legs in place of shoes. Even these were now in shreds. Her clothing was patched and tattered. … This good sister had lived in East Prussia. During the final days of the frightful battles in that area, her husband had been killed. She was left with four small children, one of them a babe in arms. Under the agreements of the occupying powers, she was one of 11 million Germans who was required to leave her homeland and all her basic possessions, and go to Western Germany to seek a new home. She was permitted only to take such bare necessities, bedding, etc. as she could load into her small wooden-wheeled wagon—about sixty-five pounds in all—which she pulled across this desolate wasteland of war. Her smallest child she carried in her arms while the other small children did their best to walk beside her during this trek of over a thousand miles on foot.

“She started her journey in late summer. Having neither food nor money among her few possessions, she was forced to gather subsistence from the fields and forests along the way. Constantly she was also faced with dangers from panicky refugees and marauding troops.

“Soon the snows came and temperatures dropped to about 40° below zero. One by one her children died, either frozen to death or the victims of starvation, or both. She buried them in shallow graves by the roadside, using a tablespoon as a shovel. Finally, as she was reaching the end of her journey, her last little child died in her arms. Her spoon was gone now, so she dug a grave in the frozen earth with her bare fingers.

“As she was recalling these and other difficulties at a testimony meeting, she explained that her grief at that moment became unbearable. Here she was kneeling in the snow at the graveside of her last child. She had now lost her husband and all her children. She had given up all her earthly goods, her home, and even her homeland. She found herself among people whose condition resembled her own wretched state of affairs.

“In this moment of deep sorrow and bewilderment, she felt her heart would break. In despair she contemplated how she might end her own life as so many of her fellow countrymen were doing. How easy it would be to jump off a nearby bridge, she thought, or to throw herself in front of an oncoming train!

“Then she testified that as these thoughts assailed her, something within her said, ‘Get down on your knees and pray.’ And she then rapturously explained how she prayed more fervently than she had ever prayed before.

“In conclusion, she bore a glorious testimony, stating that of all ailing people in her saddened land she was one of the happiest because she knew that God lived, that Jesus is the Christ, and that if she continued faithful and true to the end she would be saved in the celestial kingdom of God” (Frederick W. Babbel, On Wings of Faith, pp. 41–42).