Called to Controversy (21 page)

Moishe, overwhelmed by the situation, said to no one in particular, “I need to pray about whether to make a complaint.” He sat down on a bench and silently prayed. He soon returned to the desk sergeant and said, “I'm willing to forgo the charges on one condition. I want these guys to come to our outdoor meetings every Sunday to keep the peace.”

The desk sergeant replied, “That is your prerogative, Mr. Rosen, but I'll make a notation on my report that if you decide to file charges, you've got the next ninety days to do so.”

Moishe nodded. He had only two months left until his graduation, and then he would leave for his next post. He didn't know of anyone else who planned to continue the outdoor meetings after he left.

The sergeant asked the accusers if they agreed to the terms. After gathering the group into a huddle, the leader said yes.

Moishe recalled, “This was a glorious turn of events, because after that, each Sunday when I arrived to begin the outdoor meeting, a small, ready-made, albeit less than enthusiastic crowd was waiting for me.”

In the years that followed, Moishe often retold this incident as he trained other missionaries. He described it as the perfect illustration of the value of a hostile witness. One person with integrity and absolutely no particular fondness for the accused can give a far more credible defense than any number of friends. This was one of many reasons why Moishe always appreciated good, honest opposition.

*
Years later, Moishe was in Southern California, preaching in MacArthur Park to a fairly good crowd. Suddenly they all began looking up. Then he saw Leon, who apparently had not recognized him. Moishe smiled and called out, “Leon, don't worry. Jesus really is coming; you don't have to keep looking up.”

FIFTEEN

The truth is never cheap, but the righteous can always afford it.

—MOISHE ROSEN

M
oishe passed his destination—Caldwell's National Newark and Essex Bank—and pulled into the parking lot of a church. He had no idea how he would pay the doctor and hospital bills for the baby girl who was born six days earlier. He was fond of telling people that “Ruth came into the world with a full head of black hair,” a fact that made far more of a first impression on him than had the initially yellowish complexion. Now, rosy pink and healthy, his new daughter was ready to come home.

Although they had planned this pregnancy, the thrifty young couple hadn't exactly planned how to pay for it—and that was highly unusual for them. The Rosens had all of one hundred dollars in the bank, and Moishe knew that would not be nearly enough to pay for the medical costs. He hoped that he could negotiate the rest and pay over time.

When Moishe entered the bank, only one teller stood behind a window, but fortunately there were no other customers. Moishe was eager to get back to the hospital in Newark, arrange payment, and take his wife and new daughter home.

To Moishe's chagrin, the teller was engrossed in a sociable conversation with another employee. She did not even turn to acknowledge him as he stepped up to her window.
Why don't you stop your yammering and try doing your job already?
he silently excoriated the teller. When at last she acknowledged him, he pushed his bank book toward her and said tersely, “I want to withdraw the balance from my account and close it.” The teller resumed her conversation with her coworker as she checked the records. He had $103 in the account.

Well, it is three dollars more than I expected
, he thought as he signed the withdrawal slip. He watched distractedly as she counted out three single bills into one pile and ten other bills into a second pile, once again talking to the other employee. He didn't bother to examine the bills; he shoved them into his pocket and strode out the door.

He was halfway down the block before he pulled the money out of his pocket to straighten the crumpled bills and realized the teller had given him three single bills and ten twenties! Her lack of attention had resulted in a one-hundred-dollar error in his favor. For a moment he was elated.
Praise God for how he's provided!
he thought. But within seconds he sighed because he knew that God didn't provide that way, and he knew that he had to go back to the bank.

This time, adding insult to injury, he had to wait in line for the teller. When it came his turn he informed her, “You made a mistake when you counted my money.” She eyed him somewhat disdainfully and said, “I'm sorry sir, once you leave the window, the transaction is final.”

Making every effort to remain calm Moishe replied, “Well, you better hope that's not true because you gave me two hundred dollars instead of one hundred. I don't know what you believe, but you can be thankful that I believe in Jesus because he's the only reason I came back.” Then he counted back five of the ten twenty dollar bills and returned them to her with a grumpy glare. It was not the most gracious expression of faith, just proof of the genuine difference beliefs can make. The teller did not thank him for possibly saving her job, nor did he expect her to.

Moishe then drove back to Presbyterian Hospital and went straight to accounting. To his great surprise, he learned that he owed nothing. They were still covered by a Blue Cross policy they had signed up for in Denver, and the hospital accepted insurance payments as full remuneration from ministers or ministerial students and their families. Scarcely able to believe it, he sought out Ceil's obstetrician, who explained that, like the hospital, he never charged ministers or seminarians. Just as Moishe had known that God had not been at work through the teller's poor work ethic and subsequent mistake, he felt with a very grateful heart that the kindness of this doctor was certainly God's provision—and his way of reminding Moishe that honesty was the best policy.

He told Ceil the good news about the medical expenses, and they left the hospital with light hearts and their precious new baby. They were eager to introduce her to “big sister” Lyn at last.

Becoming a big sister had not been the happiest day of Lyn's life, not because of sibling rivalry but because of a nasty cut she'd received while playing in the backyard with the neighbors. The day Moishe's second daughter was born, he returned home to find his older daughter with a cold washcloth pressed against her bleeding forehead. The landlady who had been watching her explained what had happened and assured Moishe that it was not as bad as it looked. He took Lyn to the emergency room, where she got stitches.

Lyn was not the only one to experienced drama that day. Moishe was sound asleep at home after a very eventful day, when, at midnight, a doctor woke Ceil in her hospital bed. He said, “Mrs. Rosen, I'm sorry to wake you, but there's a problem with the baby and we need your permission for an emergency procedure.”

A terrified Ceil responded, “What? What's wrong with my baby?!” After the birth, she'd had only a fleeting glance of the newborn before the nurses had swept her away for various tests. Earlier in the pregnancy, the doctor had cautioned Moishe and Ceil that there might be an incompatibility between the RH factor between the mother's blood and the baby's. The couple had optimistically dismissed the prenatal warning as a possibility, not a probability.

Now the baby needed a total blood exchange, and the doctor needed Ceil's signature to authorize the procedure. After the doctor rushed away with the signed permission, the nurse looked at her sympathetically and asked, “Mrs. Rosen, would you like me to call your husband?”

The couple had no phone, and Ceil did not want to awaken the landlady. “No,” she said. “I'll wait till morning. Unless . . . something happens before then.”

“Now, nothing's going to happen. The pediatrician on call will take excellent care of your baby. I know she is very sick, but you just wait and see. She'll be so much better in the morning.”

Ceil spent a dreadful night with little sleep. She was desperate to talk to her husband, and the night seemed endless. At last morning broke and she could make the call.

Moishe was scheduled to speak that morning, an engagement that she had forgotten. She was shocked when the landlady, Mrs. Ciancetta, explained that Moishe was not home, but she was caring for Lyn. For the first time in their married life, Ceil was upset that Moishe was not with her when she felt she really needed him.

When he arrived that afternoon, totally unaware of the crisis, the worst was over, just as the nurse had predicted. Ceil was so relieved that she did not communicate much of what she had felt about Moishe's absence. Meanwhile, the doctor who had performed the blood transfusion came to introduce himself and to explain what had happened. As he extended his hand the young father grasped it firmly, trying not to show his surprise. The doctor who had saved his daughter's life was black.

Moishe had not met many African Americans in Denver. In general, he was not given to thinking in stereotypes. But recently he'd harbored a growing prejudice without realizing it. The Italian section of Montclair where they lived abutted a predominantly black neighborhood. Ceil had grown increasingly uncomfortable about walking to the store because she had to pass some day laborers who ogled women as they walked by. Ceil would have been uncomfortable no matter the color or ethnicity of the men, but it happened that they were African Americans. Knowing this, Moishe had been nursing a growing dislike toward a group of people with whom he had had very little personal experience.

He hadn't even realized his prejudice until he gripped the hand that had so skillfully cared for his baby girl in the middle of the night. In that moment, he knew that he would never make an assumption about any man or woman based on skin color. This doctor also waived the fee for the lifesaving procedure he had performed. All in all, Moishe had lived and learned quite a bit during the first week of his younger daughter's life.

Life in Montclair was far more agreeable to Moishe and Ceil than their first year of campus residence. Initially they shared a house owned by the Cassies, a warm, caring Italian family. Moishe's fond memories of life in Montclair included tantalizing aromas of genuine Italian cooking from Mrs. Cassie's kitchen and the occasional samples she would bring upstairs.

Four-year-old Lyn was a very sociable child, so in the summer, Moishe and Ceil looked for a daily vacation Bible school (DVBS) where she could meet others her age. Grace Presbyterian Church, which was within walking distance of their apartment, had such a program.

Their only experience up to this point had been with Baptist churches. As Moishe recalled,

These churches did not stress being Baptist, but they did emphasize the importance of believing the Bible—and a couple of people had explained to me that “we” [meaning that particular church] were Baptist because we took the Bible seriously. Based on that, I concluded that if somebody wasn't a Baptist, they didn't take the Bible seriously. I didn't know what Presbyterians, Methodists, Lutherans, etc. believed, but it seemed to me that if they really believed the Scriptures, they would be Baptists too. So much for deductive logic. I added two and two and got three.

Despite Moishe's early doubts about non-Baptist denominations, he and Ceil enrolled Lyn at the DVBS at Grace Presbyterian Church. Through Grace, Moishe discovered that genuine Christians belong to churches of various denominations. He later said of the Presbyterian pastor, “Frank Hunger was more of a Christian than I was. He was a thoroughgoing evangelical who believed in missions. At one time, he had served as president of Biblical Seminary. And as our family began to attend the church regularly, he personally undertook to encourage me. The people of Grace Presbyterian were very kind to Ceil and to me. . . . They didn't seem to expect a whole lot from me, but they honored me by having me teach an adult Sunday school class.”