Last Acts: Serve Regardless like Elizabeth Romanov

Last updated on: July 6, 2015 at 2:07 am by John Mark N. Reynolds

Last Acts: Serve Regardless like Elizabeth Romanov 2015-07-06T02:07:12-04:00 John Mark N. Reynolds

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A Princess

Show me a Christian who does good only to do well in the things of this world and I will turn away in sorrow. Show me a Christian who heeds the words of Jesus and sells all she has and gives it to the poor and I will sit and ponder anew what the Almighty can do. I find hope in history because what has been can be again. History shows that even the most privileged can lay down their honors and make a difference. One of the most important examples died tonight.

Tonight a princess was murdered, but only after she had ceased to be a princess and become a saint.

Elizabeth married a Grand Duke and saw her sister made Tsarina of Russia. Elizabeth Romanov loved children, art, and the Christian faith. She never had children of her own and so served as a surrogate mother to others. She did her duty as society described the duties of a Grand Duchess, but then her world went mad.

She loved her troubled husband, and he seems to have loved her, until terrorists murdered him. Elizabeth retreated into prayer and then came out to work with the poor and the orphans of Russia. She served in dangerous areas without fear. She watched the Empire collapse and some of the most evil men ever to hold power seize control of her beloved adopted land of Russia. She was so good that even the vile men who controlled the Kremlin hesitated to murder her, but Lenin understood the evil logic of a terrorist state.

The day after he ordered the slaughter of the Tsar, his wife, servants, and innocent children, Lenin had Elizabeth, nun and social worker, butchered. They were thrown down a mind shaft and when that did not kill them, a grenade was thrown down the shaft. When the victims, led by Elizabeth, began to sing holy hymns, the murderers set a fire at the shaft. Elizabeth still lived. She found the strength to bandage another victim with her head covering. Her body is in Jerusalem and I have stood, head bowed, before a statue raised to her memory in Moscow. The message on the base has haunted my dreams. It says merely: Repentance.

The Saint

The measure of a government’s evil is when they must kill or persecute godly nuns. Bolshevism began in Satanic evil and ended in the grumbling impotence that is the lowest pit of Hell. Elizabeth began in a worldly palace, suffered, and then saw the face of God. She sits in the celestial rose and worships Beauty forever. Elizabeth Romanov learned that His Kingdom is not of this world, but can be brought to this world and that the cost of that miracle is often blood.

Christians in America must not be afraid to stand as witnesses to the full gospel. We must show solidarity with the poor, but refuse to retreat from the city. Like Elizabeth, we must serve until they kill us if kill us they must. Like Elizabeth, we should never lose hope.

We have not begun to suffer yet. We have not begun to serve yet. We have not begun to immigrate from solopsistic republics of our own selfishness to the Kingdom of God. We will begin when our last act would be caring for the wounded and singing God’s song in darkness.

Only when we raise God up and reduce ourselves will all men and women be drawn, because they will only be drawn to Him.

Wisdom. Let us attend.

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