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We hear a lot about heroes these days. Accomplished athletes are admired as idols for throwing around a ball, while actors in blockbuster movies portray individuals who can fly and use their incredible powers to save the universe. However, in the real world, it's encouraging to know there are humble and hardly noticed genuine heroes all around us. Without a desire to be praised or even recognized, there are selfless good Samaritans who are willing to sacrifice their lives so that others can live, a testament to John 15:13. The following story is an example of these heavenly secret agents.
Irena Sendler was a Polish nurse and social worker who worked in the Warsaw health department during World War II. In a short window of time between 1942 and 1943, she, along with a small band of co-workers, led a courageous effort within the Warsaw ghetto to secretly smuggle at least 2,500 Jewish babies and children away from facing the certainty of the German concentration camps. She and her small team of helpers were members of Zegota, an underground organization established in 1940 by the Polish government for the purpose of rescuing Polish Jews. The team was given permission by the Nazis to enter the ghetto to help segregate the city's 380,000 Jews, and this was the window of opportunity that helped with the dangerous undercover plan to secretly smuggle babies and young children to safety.
The Zegota used every idea possible to rescue the innocent, which included hiding them in toolboxes and under gurneys, sneaking them into ambulances, taking them through sewer pipes or other underground passageways, wheeling them out in suitcases, and leading them out through an old courtyard which led to the non-Jewish areas. Irena carefully recorded the names of the children on cigarette papers and sealed them in glass bottles, which she buried in a colleague's flower garden. After the war, the jars were dug up and the lists handed over to Jewish representatives. Attempts were made to reunite the children with their families, but sadly, most of the parents had perished in the Treblinka death camp.
Irena was arrested in October 1943 and taken to Gestapo headquarters where she was interrogated to surrender information about the leaders of Zegota. She endured severe beatings which included her legs and feet being broken. With orders to be executed, (with what many consider to be a miracle from Heaven), a secret deal was made at the last minute between Zegota and her would-be executioner, and she was released. Irena was later found unconscious along the side of the road and had to use crutches for the rest of her life as a result of her injuries.
One of the 2500 names placed in the jars was Michal Glowinski, who became a professor of literature. He said, "I fondly think about her and owe my life to her." Elzbieta Ficowska was another name who came forward to say how eternally grateful she was for the heroic actions of the Zegota team. In her case, she had been smuggled out of the ghetto inside a large toolbox when she was just five months old.
Unlike the German industrialist Oskar Schindler, who saved more than 1,000 Jews by employing them at his Krakow factory and is widely recognized thanks to an award-winning book and film, Mrs. Sendler's story remained relatively unknown until a few years ago when it was discovered in America by a group of Kansas school children who wrote a play about it called "Life in a Jar." Word spread very quickly, and now the world is aware of her and her team saving many defenseless victims of the Nazi ideology. When interviewed, Irena sternly insisted she did nothing special and is quoted as saying, "I was brought up to believe that a person must be rescued when drowning, regardless of religion and nationality. The thought of being considered a hero irritates me greatly as I continue to have pangs within my conscience that I did so little. My emotions are overshadowed by the fact that my faithful co-workers, who also constantly risked their lives, did not live long enough to share their sorrow for those they could not save." She spent her last years in a Warsaw nursing home and passed away in 2008. "Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind regard one another as more important than yourselves; do not merely look out for your own personal interests, but also for the interests of others" Philippians 2:3-4.
Dr. Holland is an ordained minister, chaplain, and author. Read more about the Christian life at billyhollandministries.com.
