Silently Serving
Marcel Marceau, the famed French entertainer of the early 20th century, was best known for his pantomime, bringing his silent character, Bip the Clown, to stages around the world for over 6 decades. He referred to his miming as “the art of silence.”
Few, however, know him for his heroism during the Nazi occupation of France.
Recruited to help the French Resistance by his cousin, Georges Loinger, he became part of the ultra-secret unit called the Oeuvre de Secours aux Enfants (Children's Relief Work), a Jewish relief group that smuggled Jewish children from occupied France to neutral countries. Their mission was to evacuate Jewish children who had been hiding in a French orphanage and get them to the Swiss border.
“But traveling with large groups of children was anything but easy. Marceau had a secret weapon: His training as a mime,” reports History.lcom.
“The kids loved Marcel and felt safe with him,” his cousin, Loinger reminesced to the Jewish Telegraph Agency. “He had already begun doing performances in the orphanage … The kids had to appear like they were simply going on vacation to a home near the Swiss border, and Marcel really put them at ease.” …
"He mimed “to keep children quiet as they were escaping,” remembered another.
At times, he posed as a Boy Scout leader taking groups of boys on nature outings (which just happened to find them hiking near the Swiss border!). On one occasion, he was confronted by German troops, at which time he tapped into his acting talents, pretended to be a French Army commander, and demanded that the German troops surrender to him immediately. And they did! All 30 of them!
In all, Marceau rescued over 70 children, while his cousin Loinger rescued more than 350.
He could not, however, save his own father, who was executed while imprisoned at Auschwitz.
Marcel's heroic actions bring to mind the famed quote oft attributed to St. Francis of Assisi, “Preach the Gospel at all times, and if necessary, use words.”
While it might be possible to lead a band of children to a safer border without words, words are essential in order to bring the saving message of the Cross to the world.
"How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them?" (Romans 10:4, NIV).
"Preach the word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage—with great patience and careful instruction" (2 Timothy 4:2, NIV).
"Bee" Devoted to One Another in Brotherly Love
"My dad has bees.Today I went to his house and he showed me all of the honey he had gotten from the hives. He took the lid off of a 5 gallon bucket full of honey and on top of the honey there were 3 little bees, struggling. They were covered in sticky honey and drowning. I asked him if we could help them and he said he was sure they wouldn't survive. Casualties of honey collection I suppose.
"I asked him again if we could at least get them out and kill them quickly, after all he was the one who taught me to put a suffering animal (or bug) out of its misery. He finally conceded and scooped the bees out of the bucket. He put them in an empty Chobani yogurt container and put the plastic container outside.
"Because he had disrupted the hive with the earlier honey collection, there were bees flying all over outside.
"We put the 3 little bees in the container on a bench and left them to their fate. My dad called me out a little while later to show me what was happening. These three little bees were surrounded by all of their sisters (all of the bees are females) and they were cleaning the sticky nearly dead bees, helping them to get all of the honey off of their bodies. We came back a short time later and there was only one little bee left in the container.
"She was still being tended to by her sisters.
"When it was time for me to leave we checked one last time and all three of the bees had been cleaned off enough to fly away and the container was empty."
*Beekeepers in Covert Township, Michigan captured the remarkable moment a few bees help another very sticky bee. Click here to view the video.
The post continues, "Those three little bees lived because they were surrounded by family and friends who would not give up on them, family and friends who refused to let them drown in their own stickiness and resolved to help until the last little bee could be set free." - Original author unknown
Ok, so bees may not be people, moved and motivated by love or affection or concern for one another, but they clearly have, imprinted in their DNA, an understanding of community -- what's good for the bee is good for the hive.
As such, this beautiful picture of care and rescue may be more about instinctively wanting to "waste not" the honey clinging to the dying bees, as much as it was about saving the bees themselves. However, the added benefit from their actions would be that the three endangered worker bees would be saved to continue their important labors for the hive. What's good for the bee IS good for the hive, and vice versa.
All explanation aside, this is still a remarkable picture of the care and concern each one of us ought have for our brothers and sisters in Christ. As believers and members of both the local body and the Body of Christ universal, we exist in a mutually valuable and symbiotic relationship with each other and the church at large. When one hurts, we all hurt. What's good for the bee-liever is good for the Body, and vice versa.
If nothing else, this beautiful picture from nature reminds us to "Bee" devoted to one another in brotherly love.
"Be devoted to one another in brotherly love; give preference to one another in honor" (Romans 12:10, NASB).
"This makes for harmony among the members, so that all the members care for each other. If one part suffers, all the parts suffer with it, and if one part is honored, all the parts are glad" (1 Corinthians 12:25-26, NLT).
Prairie Schooners
In the American Old West, the pioneers used a kind of self-defense called "circling the wagons." It involved driving a wagon train in a circle so that the pioneers could camp inside and keep the wolves out. Today, some people see the church as a circle of wagons, protecting them from the world around them.
The Hebrew people had to circle the wagons in Babylon. They chose not to eat the Babylonian food or adopt the Babylonian customs. They stayed separate, kept their rituals, preserved their culture, and protected themselves. This lifestyle produced a group that would be called the "set apart ones," or in Hebrew, "perushim," which we translate Pharisees.
The problem was Jesus took a different approach. He taught His disciples to reach out to outsiders. As a result, the Church started a mission to reach Gentiles rather than keeping separate. With Jesus, there would be no circling of the wagons.
Funny thing about those pioneers. They called their wagons "Prairie Schooners." A schooner is a sailboat. Those tarps stretched over their wagons looked a bit like sails. And like a boat that sets out to open sea, the pioneers weren't searching for safety but for adventure.
We must continue to do the same. We are not here to keep people safe from the world; we are here to change the world. We're here on a great adventure; to reach lost people for Jesus, not to hide out from the world.
"Then Jesus came to them and said, 'All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age'" (Matthew 28:18-20).