I want to tell a story that hopefully you’ll find interesting. The story is of a young Christian man who, way back in 1982, decided to go on a summer missions project with his church. He had two choices, the Philippines or Eastern Europe. As a wanna-be Cold Warrior, and with the rumblings of the Solidarity movement beginning in Poland at the time, Eastern Europe was his choice. So with visions of freeing the Communist world for Christ in his head, off he went with his Pastor and a group of like-minded friends. They joined up with a large ministry that at the time was sending thousands of Bibles and tracts, as well as young Christians, into many of the then-Soviet dominated Eastern European countries. Many of the tracts and Bibles were confiscated, and some of the young people even went to jail, but the Gospel was getting through, and the intrepid young man wanted in on the action. He finally got his chance in mid-summer, traveling through what was then Yugoslavia with a plan to smuggle Bibles into Romania, which in many ways was the darkest and worst of all the Communist countries. After an adventurous three day journey in a special van equipped with secret compartments full of outlawed Bibles and Christian literature, they finally arrived at the Romanian border. While waiting for their turn in line for inspection, our hero had an urgent need for a restroom. Now I mention this only because it was while he was returning to the van after taking care of this urgent need (in the foulest restroom he’d ever seen, even by Eastern European standards) his heart sank in fear as he saw Romanian border agents, the dreaded security forces, beginning to dis-mantle the van and discovering it’s illegal cargo. Panicking, his first inclination was to run. But run where? He was in no-man’s land between two communist countries. So, with lump in his throat and a prayer in his heart, realizing that he’d gotten himself into this mess, he walked fearfully back to the van. His traveling companions, a brother and sister who’d been in this situation before, were calmly standing by, watching the security agents rip the van apart. Gradually, the young man’s fears began to ease as he noticed that the security agents, so feared by the oppressed people of the country, seemed to be drunk. He actually had to assist one of them with a screw driver to get a door panel open. The rest were acting pretty silly and even stumbling around. It was then that the young cold warrior realized who it was we were hop against – fallen men, lost men, men too drunk to use a screw driver properly, men who were themselves trapped in a Godless system and world view, bereft of meaning and without hope. Men who could imprison him or possibly harm his body, but men who were no match for an all-powerful God who was intent on freeing Eastern Europe from them and their evil system. As you might guess, they found all the Bibles and tracts, taking them inside the security building. The head security agent was pleased. No doubt this would be a feather in his cap professionally, and maybe financially as well. Contra-banned Bibles were in big demand on the Romanian black market, after all. After the haul was safely brought inside, the agents assigned a young soldier with a rifle to guard the three smugglers on a bench outside, while an English speaking interrogator was being sought. The soldier was a mere teenager, seventeen or eighteen maybe. After watching all the security agents go inside, he immediately turned to the three young Christians he was guarding, lowered his rifle, pointed at himself and said “Biblia? Biblia?”. He wanted a Bible. Now, maybe he wanted a piece of the black market action, but our once-fearful young hero understood something completely different. With all the military and political might brought to bear against it, the faith of Eastern European Christians could not be defeated. The God of the universe does not succumb to Communism or Socialism. Try as they might to kill Him, or even the idea of Him, God was still God. There will always be a remnant of His people in this Godless world. His side will always win, and His Kingdom will always prevail. It was a transformative event in the life of the young summer missionary who went to Europe craving adventure and a fight, but who came back knowing that the fight was already won, and who was very happy to be on the winning side – God’s side. And in case you haven’t guessed by now, that young wanna-be Cold Warrior, who found himself in no-man’s land between two worlds, was me, your humble podcaster. It’s why I do this podcast, folks. Because in The Big Picture, no matter how bad things look, we know the King, and if we stay faithful and obedient to Him, we’re on the winning side.