FAITHFUL GOD...

What can you expect from a weekend away?  It was a Salvation Army Congress but in another territory: The twenty year celebration of the Salvation Army re-opening and opening fire in Eastern Europe.  I always look forward to traveling with Sven, it is always eventful, and leading up to this weekend was no exception.  Journeying to a new country for me, Ukraine, an old but very special one for Sven.  The thought of meeting new people for me and old and very precious ones for Sven.

I had heard the stories over and over and over again of Sven and Kathie’s early days in Russia; Leningrad, Moscow:  in Kiev, Ukraine, Georgia and Moldova,   I had seen the photo’s … watched the video’s, had Sven’s Grandad’s diary read to me of his early days in Russia too and I had been moved deep in my soul and thanked God for their love, commitment, faithfulness, what appeared to be blood, sweat and tears and sheer hard work to bring about God’s will in what I understood to be hard, hard countries.

Then we arrived at the airport in Kiev and I found people to be warm, friendly and prepared to go out of their way to help me and my disabled husband.  (This is not always the way when we are traveling and arriving in different countries)  At our hotel we very soon met some ex-pat Officers whose brief conversations of their past work began to tug at my heart strings.  On listening to some of their stories I felt as if I was amongst some spiritual giants and I felt both humbled and privileged to be in their midst.  As I continued to listen to and observe these people throughout the weekend the words: ‘faithful, committed, unchanging, inextinguishable’ kept coming to mind and I thanked God for their stubborn determination to help bring about the will of God in what appeared to me to be against all odds.  BUT GOD!

It wasn’t long before I found myself being introduced to some ‘miracles’.  Some had joined our ranks twenty years ago, initially knowing little of God and nothing of The Salvation Army but had turned their backs on communism and the Red Army to join the ranks of the Yellow, Red and Blue Army.  Others will be able to repeat their stories far better than me, but I know I witnessed row upon row of miracles as I sat in their Officers Councils on Friday evening.  The leaders for the weekend were The Chief of the Staff Barry and Commissioner Sue Swanson.  The challenge they brought to the Officers that Friday night was the concept of ‘Immeasurably More’ … ‘God is able to do immeasurably more than all we can ever imagine or ask in our wildest dreams’ … ‘Immeasurably More’ as this young territory move into adulthood,  maybe having been through the rebellion and difficulty of teenage years  and now ‘growing up’ into Christ and moving forward with Him.

I asked Sven about the ’new’ pioneers, those who left home, (SEE PART TWO) family, and the comforts of ‘the west’ in the early to mid 1990’s. The names numbered 20 or so, those Sven himself hold as pioneers and defenders of the faith. Today’s pioneers are mostly the indigenous Officers and soldiers who continue to plant, nurture and serve in new fields of harvest.

Sven shared with me the story of how visitors to St. Paul's Cathedral in London will gaze at the third largest Cathedral in the world in awe. The architect commissioned to restore the Cathedral following the Great Fire of London in 1666 was Sir Christopher Wren, and chose as his them RESURGAM, 'I shall rise again'. Visitors to St.Paul's are often surprised to learn that there is no statue honouring Sir Christopher.  Instead, next to Sir Christopher’s tomb in St. Paul’s there is a small plaque placed there by his son and is inscribed; “Reader, if you seek his memorial – look around you.”

I saw the living memorial to those early nineties pioneers, first and second generation Salvationist…

My heart was overwhelmed as I rubbed shoulders with fellow Officers from Georgia, Moldova, Romania, Russia and Ukraine and recognized our common calling, ‘Called by God to proclaim the Gospel of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ’ through the ranks of The Salvation Army, all our days.  Called to save souls, grow saints and serve suffering humanity whether we find ourselves in Eastern Europe, USA or UKT or wherever in God’s vineyard.

Captain Ruslan was enrolled as a Jr. Soldier by the Ljungholms. He and his wife Marina are the Commanding Officers of the Yalta Corps, Ukraine, planted by the Ljungholms. Captain Rusland is pictured with his children, Anna and Daniel.


Saturday morning found a packed hall as five countries of the Eastern Europe territory gathered together in Congress.

We were encouraged to ‘Celebrate the Past’ and how.  How my heart ached … how my heart ached as I thanked God for those faithful servants who had served no matter what the cost to make possible what I saw before my very eyes that morning.  With pride that morning I carried the name ‘Ljungholm’ although none of this was anything to do with me in the slightest.  However, I do recall as a very young Officer in Councils in the UK being challenged by the then TC Commissioner Dinsdale Pender to pray for something ‘big’ and how he wept as he shared his prayer for the downfall of the Iron Curtain and then beginning to join him in prayer for Christians in Eastern Europe.  Ironically, I also recall hearing stories filtering through of the ministry of Captains Sven and Kathie Ljungholm in Russia and praying for them.  Prayer however, is the only part I have ever played in this amazing story.  And now, I found myself right in the midst of it celebrating the past as I recalled just some of the stories I was aware of.

I thanked God for Farfar & Farmor (Grandad & Grandma) Adjutant Otto and Gerda Ljungholm and for the part they played in and around 1917 as with others they initially brought TSA into Russia from Sweden.  I wept as I recalled the young Cadet Seligman who was arrested at an open air meeting in Leningrad and taken to his death by the Red Guard for his faith, and as I pictured Otto Ljungholm praying for the right words to share with his young wife, a mother of two toddlers, of how her husband and been captured.  And how on arriving back at the compound where they lived heard her crying on hearing the news:  ‘Lord, I thank you that I have been chosen to suffer like this’.

I sobbed as I considered a young Lieutenant who had been found dead and on going to identify her body at the morgue the Swedish Officers exclaimed:  ‘She is not here, she was blonde and there is no-one here of that description’!  Then the guards wafted away the solid black mass of flies and the Captain correctly identified the young, dead, blonde Lieutenant.  And I heard the words again ringing in my ears:  ‘Be faithful and true to the very end’ … what a challenge!

I recalled being told of how the young Officers from Sweden and Norway were forced out of Russia.  The Salvationists in Moscow marched to the Baptist church where they were eagerly accepted and welcomed into the fellowship. Many became prominent in the church’s leadership.  However,  many continued to meet in secret in nearby forests, their fear was the result of the early day pioneers being arrested, persecuted and some never to be seen alive again. Nevertheless they met and in their own way kept The Salvation Army alive.  In their bid to ‘Never let the old flag fall’ they created their own SA banners made up of anything they could lay their hands on in Army colours. As a tribute to those early day pioneers one always stood to their feet on seeing the army colours.

In our home we have a very precious portable mercy seat that was woven together with remnants of old woolen jumpers by Sven’s Grandmother and I imagine the depths and strength of prayers and tears that have been prayed and wept on that mat. It was carried secretly hidd en in a ruck sack to SA soldiers’ homes in and around Moscow where prayers were shared subsequent to the Army’s official expulsion and the Ljungholm’s departure.

The heart wrenching stories go on and on of what has happened down through the years to make it possible for me to have stood in the midst of this congregation of ‘saints’.  I know there have been many, many ‘faithful, committed, unchanging, inextinguishable’ Officers, soldiers and friends for whom I thank God for, but just now I ask you to indulge me as I thank God for the ‘Ljungholm’s and of whom I am now a part of and proud to bear their name.

And so the stories go on and on of what has happened down through the years to make it possible for me to have stood in the midst of this congregation of ‘saints’.  I know there have been many, many ‘faithful, committed, unchanging, inextinguishable’ Officers, soldiers and friends for whom I thank God for, but just now I ask you to indulge me as I thank God for the ‘Ljungholm’s’ and of whom I am now a part of and proud to bear their name.

Major Glad Ljungholm
West Scotland DHQ