Elaine Gentile remembers Kristallnacht:

I was born in Offenbach, Germany on March 27, 1937, as Ilse Nickelsberg. My father had the largest and oldest printing company in Europe, employing three hundred workers. Because we were Jewish, the Nazi party sought to take my father's business, which had existed back to my great grandfather, Leopold Nickelsberg (1821).

So, like many Jews in Europe, he was put in the concentration camp at Buchenwald. After months, he was released because he had sold the business to a non-Jew in 1938.

Also, the Nazis were becoming more oppressive towards the Jews. As a child, I have dim recollections of Kristallnacht where our Jewish neighbors' houses and businesses were smashed and burned. Finally, in 1939, having left all our possessions behind, we were fortunate to leave Germany.

As a young girl, I thought often about God and eternity. Our family was Jewish, but not practicing Judaism. When I was older, my interest for God led me to visit many other religious faiths.

What were they? And what did they believe? Then in my late teens, I went to the university. There I met my future husband who explained to me the biblical way of salvation. God's providential ways are not always our ways. Here was a Gentile by name and fact, as an instrument for salvation, reaching out to a Jew.

How glorious! I soon realized I was a sinner who needed a savior, and committed my faith to Him. I came to understand it was a person alone, Jesus Christ, not a religion by which a person obtains eternal life.

Dear reader, you too can be saved, no matter what your religion or creed may be. When we seek salvation, we all have to come the same, one way: by the cross. God is no respecter of persons, when it comes to salvation, death or judgment.

True faith is simply believing God. Believing I'm a sinner, for God says so in Romans 3:23. Believing Christ died for our sins, for God says so in 1 Corinthians 15:3. Believing that by simply trusting Him, I can be saved, for God says so in Acts 16:31.

You may miss out on many things in life, but don't miss out on the greatest decision you will ever make. Your decision in time will fix your destiny for eternity.

The Gospel Herald
Elaine Gentile