December 2005
Greetings to all from the land of the frozen north, winter has finally arrived with a vengeance. We have had 16.5” of snow already and we only had about 15” all of last year. Things are looking up for the Big Red as they are back in a bowl game this month after missing last year. Well I have carried on long enough, on to the article.
I realize this is not a traditional theme for this Christmas ‘Corner’, not being about the birth of Christ. This event is not less important, but we will view why Christ condescended and came to earth to deliver sinful man from his sin. The miracle is not the birth anyway, it is the fact that God clothed himself in human flesh and came down here for us.
It was a late October day and I had rushed home from work trying to take advantage of one of the last beautiful warm sunny days of the fall to finish the vinyl siding on my house. As I was preparing to go out to work, there was a knock at the front door. It turned out to be good friends of ours from when we lived in Bloomfield, NE. Cindy and her father-in-law Charlie Schaller had been in town for a doctor appointment and decided to take a few minutes to visit. I hadn’t seen Charlie for several years, since his wife’s funeral. You must know that time has not been kind to Charlie as his old body is betraying him, and his mind is beginning to drift, trapped deeply in the throws of dementia. But the exciting thing was, he remembered me. He cried and hugged my neck. We talked of old times, and as I watched the shadows of the afternoon sun begin forming, I forgot about the work that I had to do, and sat down to spend what may be the last conversation I will have with Charlie on this side of heaven.
Charlie was very instrumental in my early Christian life. I had only been saved for a short time when we moved to Knox County for employment. That was almost 30 years ago. Charlie was in his fifties then, and we struck up an immediate friendship, as you see, he was a WW II vet, so I was drawn through our military connection and our love for the Lord. Charlie and his wife, Charlotte, ran the local Kent feed store in town and did short run trucking too. Theirs was a simple life of hard work and worship.
We spent a lot of time together as Charlie helped me deal with ghosts that had haunted me from my time in Vietnam as Charlie had had to come to grips with them as well. In the following narrative I will attempt to relay some facts of Charlie’s life.
Charlie was born on a ranch out by Long Pine, NE. They grew up very poor in those days with a very austere life. As a young man, Charlie’s father died and being the oldest boy he took on the responsibility of taking care of his family. He worked their ranch, as well as helping neighbors when he could to earn extra money. You see, back then there was no government entitlements to take care of ones family like there are today.
Charlie also had a very unique way of earning extra cash. On Saturday nights he would saddle his horse for the ride into Long Pine. He carried with him a pair of boxing gloves tied to the saddle horn. Charlie would fight for money, money that would assist in feeding his family. He had fists like sledgehammers and although he was not over 5’9”, he had a powerful chest and arms that had been developed through years of hard work. Few men could withstand the young man’s fists. It was during this time that war clouds were developing in Europe. Hitler’s war machine was becoming an increasing world threat.
It was during the winter of 1941 and the family was without food. Charlie took it upon himself to provide. He found a neighbor’s steer in the heavy snow, killed it and took the meat home. This was in a time prior to situational ethics, and the neighbor who owned the steer reluctantly had to contact the sheriff. The evidence was obvious, Charlie was found guilty, and sentenced to three years in the state penitentiary in Lincoln, Nebraska. His was a date with destiny, for there he met a man who completely changed his life. That man was the God/man Jesus Christ. Charlie accepted Christ as his personal Saviour there in the state pen. What man had meant for evil, God had turned into good.
Shortly thereafter, he was offered a chance to get out of prison early if he would join the Army. As all red blooded American men, he jumped at the chance. By the time he would finish his training and deploy it was in the days after D Day. He fought through Europe and on to Germany. He was one of the first troops to enter Auschwitz. He told me of this experience one Saturday afternoon when I worked with him unloading a truck load of bagged feed for his store. He told me that he could still smell the awful stench of the death camp and would never forget the gory scene, one of disgusting proportions. He could not forget the eyes of the starved prisoners. Skin stretched over the skeletons. They tried to feed and care for the living, but many had already resigned themselves to the death angel. He told of picking up the living and carrying them to the trucks to take them to medical care and it was as if carrying a feather, of German guards who hid in the furnaces and were summarily hunted down and killed like the vermin they were. He told this with tears running down his weathered tan face.
As we sat in there in my home in the waning afternoon light, Cindy asked about Caleb, our youngest son who is in the Army. Charlie quietly told me with that distant look in his eyes, “I never wanted to kill anyone, but it was kill or be killed. Many times he would be able to get enemy soldiers to surrender but when they wouldn’t comply, they had to be killed. As a SGT it was his responsibility to take care of his men.” Charlie’s mind has a tough time remembering and dealing with the reality of today, but he surely was transported back 60 years that afternoon. He quietly talked of these times with tears in his eyes and that look that any of us who have been there can readily recognize.
I wrote this to illustrate how common men in times of incredible turmoil will perform as heroes. This man is one of my heroes. He loves his family, he loves his country and told me he was ready to go fight again if he had to, and he loves his Lord Jesus Christ and will one day hear those fateful words, “enter into your reward, you kind and faithful servant”. Not because of his fighting in WW II, or being good, but because of the finished work on Calvary of our blessed Lord.
Maybe you have experienced similar things back down the road of life. Maybe you have bought into the saying, “when I die I will go to heaven, because I have spent my time in hell.” Well my friend, if that were true, then God would have to be a liar. The bible says in John 14:6 Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the father, but by me. He is not the way of many ways, he is the only way. If we could earn our way to heaven, then Jesus died in vain.
There is a check deposited in your heavenly account. It was written in the pure spotless blood of Jesus Christ. It has been stamped paid in full. It was a check written on the cross of Calvary by the Son of God, in his own blood to cover YOUR sins; every one of them. The tragedy is, unless you accept that gift you will likewise perish. Jesus is waiting for you to accept this payment. Payment has been made, what will you do with it. It would be like winning the Powerball lottery and just leaving the ticket lay on your desk. You would have the potential for millions, but until you receive payment you will not have the prize.
The season is almost upon us, Christmas, which we as a nation celebrates the birth of the Christ. From the Breece household, please accept our holiday greetings for a merry Christmas and a most prosperous New Year. May it be a year in which you would meet the God/man Jesus and be born again.
As I normally do, please write or call if you have any questions of anything I have posed here.