Posted on by lgandre

Holding Hands and Letting Go (Close to Home – Part II)

The taxi pulled up to Hampden Dubose Academy in Mount Dora, Florida. George was nervous as he jumped out and prepared to execute his surprise visit on Frances. He hoped to lie low and not create a big stir among the tight knit staff and students as he called on her.

It wasn’t that he needed to be nervous exactly…since their chance meeting during his first furlough back to the states, they had been writing.

Frances had been teaching at Hampden Dubose Academy for seven years; and while the ministry to Christian children of missionaries had its joys (including time teaching students such as Elizabeth Elliott); her family said (perhaps a bit tongue-in-cheek) that the long hours and no pay had turned into borderline slave labor and nunnery. Her family encouraged George to “get her out of there;” and George’s sister (who had been roommates with Frances at Wheaton) offered helpful hints along the way. The families seemed to be all for the union.

In addition, not being big on suspense he had written her before leaving on this second furlough and asked her to marry him and she has said yes. So this surprise was just…well…the fact that he was there. And the ring, of course.

But it turned out to be George that got the surprise at Hampden Dubose. Or rather, he learned there is no such thing as surprises at Hampden Dubose. The first girl he saw offered to help George find Frances. But, unbeknownst to him, she was the headmasters’ daughter and tipped off both Frances and her parents that he was there before he even found her. And while his reception by Frances was warm, his overall reception at Hampden Dubose was quite cool.  They didn’t want him to take her away.

[I tell more of my grandma’s story including in this blog.]

Five months later, June 5, 1948, George and Francis were kneeling side by side in Canadensis Moravian Church. Her in her wedding dress, and him with a gaping hole in the bottom of his shoe. The depression years had been good preparation for mission life; he was (and still is) that tight.

[If you missed it, read more about their nearly 70-year marriage in this blog.]

George’s second tour in Japan had only served to convince him even more of the unique need and opportunity for the gospel. George had been assigned to a chapel in Hamadera (Osaka). Whole families from the US moved there as part of the occupation and the two groups were integrating as Japanese often worked for them as household help. His new chapel soon became a mix of American and Japanese. It was the first time in their lives that these Japanese had the freedom to read or even own a Bible.

And while most Allies were struggling with a hatred for the Japanese after the brutalities of the war, George had an unusual love for them. Perhaps his lack of racial prejudice traced back to the way he saw his mother eat with, pray with, and celebrate with Maddie, their black housekeeper in his early years.

During the war, he had not had much direct interaction with Japanese since he saw only one Japanese surrender…an old blind man who came out of the jungle with a rice sack tied to his sword.  Even then, George had done his best to protect him and even get treatment for his medical needs.  The old gentlemen was in such poor shape, he had maggots even in his eyes. The old man didn’t understand his kindness and neither did the other soldiers. It was all he could do to keep him alive long enough to reach the aide station.

And George had seen enough of the Japanese cruelty to understand the animosity. His responsibilities had included not only spending final moments with dying soldiers, but also writing to their families afterwards. Even worse, during his time in Manilla, he saw the aftermath of the atrocities committed to women and children.

Maybe that was why the Japanese were so surprised by the civility of the American occupation forces. Despite the bitter traces of the atomic bombs, the Japanese were anxious to learn English and learn from the tall, white Americans busy releasing the grip of the Emperor who, until now, had been not only their dictator, but their god.

Ministry in Japan took off immediately with receipt of a telegram. Another missionary named Esther Bower who worked near the Mikimoto Pearl farm (on the East Coast of Honshu) needed help restoring their bombed out mission. Together, they were able to start a church and a kindergarten.

So after kneeling at the altar holding hands with a man with holes in his shoes, Frances stood up to a new adventure as wife of a missionary headed to the war torn nation of Japan. There was no candidate school, language school, or transition time. She and George would visit churches, start a new “Mino” mission, share about the opportunity to minister in Japan, begin a family, take a long boat ride across the Pacific, and begin a new diet of fish and rice.

George’s brief time in reserves came to an end when he found out he had been given orders to Korea. The orders had been sent to Philadelphia by mail and then, slowly, by boat to eventually catch up with him in Japan. By the time he received them, he was already considered AWOL. There was nothing to do but write back and let them know that his service in the US Army was over.  He was fulfilling a different set of orders: that of “bringing the blessing of the gospel.”

(Stay tuned for Part III…because stories worth telling just can’t be rushed.)

 

 

Posted on by lgandre

Close to Home (Part I)

george on rockMy mailbox held a pile of junk mail and bills.  As usual.

But this time, it also held one special note.  A card from my grandfather.  The same one whom I’ve been telling everyone who will listen about…because he just turned 100.

Yes, he’s one hundred…That means he was born in 1917.  When Woodrow Wilson was president.  The year that the US declared war on Germany.  When the average house was $3,200.

A lot of life has been lived since then; and it has had a lot of pretty remarkable moments.

Grandpa was the grand son of a poor immigrant, John “Henry” Oestreich, who started out as a newspaper delivery boy.  His father, George W Oestreich Sr was a factory worker, turned dental salesman, turned dental instructor, turned restorative dentist.  He married in 1916 and my grandfather, George, came a long soon after followed by two girls.

His happy childhood memories included a dog named “Rags” who followed him home, and canoeing on the lake near the cabin his father built in the Catskills. As the sun would sink over the mountain, he would often sit on the porch and play “Taps.”

George was inspired to play the trumpet when he went with his father to Willow Grove and heard John Phillip Sousa lead the US Army Band in “Carnival of Venice.”

But life took a pretty drastic turn when his father died relatively suddenly George’s senior year of high school.  The Great Depression hit soon after and the stock market crash took most of Henry’s investments in the building and loan with it.  But a few of Henry’s friends from Wharton School of Business stepped in to help save some of his stock in AT&T, Dupont, and Philadelphia Electric so that they were able to keep the family home.

Geroge’s mother went to work and so did George.  First at LD Caulk Dental Supply and eventually also taken classes at Wharton school of business.

It was around that time that George really began to take his faith seriously, getting involved in “fishing club,” playing the trumpet and bringing friends to enjoy fellowship in the home of a local business man.

He soon transferred to Temple University–hitchhiking to school each morning and heading to work each night.  It was not an easy road–even when he got a lift.  The professors were not appreciative of his stand for his faith–one even failed him out of spite.  During the summers, he still went to the Catskills and would work for the farmers milking cows and threshing wheat.

His final year of college he spent at Wheaton where he recalls doing Greek homework with Ruth Bell–A young missionary kid who would later marry a frequent chapel speaker name Billy Graham.

It was also there that he met Frances Mikels.  But that part of the story was still long from being written…despite the long walks in the cornfields.

Dr Harry Ironside came to Wheaton and encouraged students to come to Dallas for seminary.  George would soon find himself in Texas under the teaching of Dr. Ironside and Dr. Lewis Sperry Chafer.  He served as janitor to earn money and against the odds, resurrected a closed church in Grand Saline (home of Morton’s Salt Mines).  There he would play trumpet while a young parishioner played the sax.

God would use two years pastoring this tiny church as the experience he would need to get a position as an Army chaplain.

It was 1944.  World War II was reaching its climax.  After training, he boarded the Admiral Eberly on its maiden voyage and head to the Pacific Theater.  His arrival in Manilla was timed just as General MacArthur was fulfilling his promise to take back the Philippines.  He road a jeep up a bull dozed road through the mountains until the road gave up.  Then he finished the hunt for the 25th Division alone and on foot.

By the time he found his troops, he was out of daylight to dig a meaningful foxhole.  He would get his first introduction to the sounds of war in a shared foxhole with shrapnel falling around them.  It was a long night.

After the war was officially over, George was sent to Japan with the occupation forces traveling through Wakeama to Osaka, Kyoto, Nagoya, Shizuoka, and Gifu and finding divine opportunities to connect with Christians who, up to this time, had been in hiding for fear of severe persecution.

He keenly remembers one evening when he was walking by himself through a tangerine orchard and heard a hymn being sung.  It led him to a house where he boldly knocked on the door.  When the Japanese gentleman opened the door to see a US soldier, he quickly slammed it again.  But George was nothing if not persistent.  He kept knocking and perhaps it was the cross on his lapel that caught the eye of his new Japanese friend.  George was invited in and took part of the family devotions…the family singing hymns in Japanese and George singing the same hymns in English.

When George left for his first furlough, his new friend came to the train station to say goodbye.  George said, if I come back, what do you want me to bring you?

The elderly gentleman, living in a desolate country in a desperate time replied simply, “bring us the blessing of the gospel.”