"Be strong; fear not!"

Isaiah 35

A dear friend of my dad’s whose name was Jimmy Keller was captured in the Philippines by the Japanese.  “The American and Filipino defenders were forced to retreat to a slim defensive position on the island's western Bataan Peninsula.
The American and Filipino forces fought from an untenable position until formally surrendering to the Japanese on April 9. The Japanese immediately began to march some 76,000 prisoners (12,000 Americans, the remainder Filipinos) northward into captivity along a route of death. When three American officers escaped a year later, the world learned of the unspeakable atrocities suffered along the 60-mile journey that became known as the Bataan Death March.

Japanese butchery, disease, exposure to the blazing sun, lack of food, and lack of water took the lives of approximately 5,200 Americans along the way. Many prisoners were bayoneted, shot, beheaded or just left to die on the side of the road. "A Japanese soldier took my canteen, gave the water to a horse, and threw the canteen away," reported one escapee. "The stronger were not permitted to help the weaker. We then would hear shots behind us." The Japanese forced the prisoners to sit for hours in the hot sun without water. "Many of us went crazy and several died." (The Dyess Story (1943)

My dad’s friend Jimmy was one of the few who came back, who survived the Bataan Death March.  He came back with a bad leg, and a joyful heart to God he came back to his bride and young child and had two more boys.  Jimmy was a man who I looked up to as a child because my dad held him in such high esteem.   Dyess story is about what happened in 1942 in the Philippines, but I remember Jimmy telling my dad about how he held on to God and only ask one thing of the LORD, let me see my wife and child before I die, let me return home.

Isaiah has been instructed to share how the ransomed will return, and verses 3-4, give one 

a clear look at where their hope was being placed.  “Strengthen the weak hands, and make 

firm the feeble knees.  Say to those who have an anxious heart, “Be strong; fear not! Behold, 

your God will come with vengeance, with the recompense of God.  He will come and save you.”  

God is promising His people that He will change them from a wilderness into a garden, and that 

the people of God should only look to God, not other nations.

At this time in our nation’s history, it is the darkest time of my 72 years on planet earth, a nation 

whose foundation was built on faith in God, has now turned its back on the God of our fathers, 

and we the followers of Christ need to cry out the words of Isaiah 35:3-4, “Strengthen the weak 

hands, and make firm the feeble knees.  Say to those who have an anxious heart, “Be strong; 

fear not! Behold, your God will come with vengeance, with the recompense of God.  He will 

come and save you.”  

From the Back Porch,

Bob Rice