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would mean starving to death. I never ceased insisting that he should allow himself to be baptised. Finally he came to see me, and said: "I have made up my mind. Next week the great autumn festival starts, the new year, and the Festival of Atonement. The synagogue will be visited by a great many rich people who otherwise never come near it. I shall get a great deal of money. And then I can be baptised."

I asked him how much money he expected to get, and he told me about five hundred lei, which was a lot of money for a beggar.

I continued to question him: " Do you believe that God created heaven and earth?" - "I do." - "Do you believe that God gave the Jews in the wilderness manna from heaven and water from the rock?" - "I do." - "Do you believe that Jesus fed thousands of people with a few loaves and fishes?" - "I do." "Do you believe that Jesus can give you five hundred lei, so that you no longer need to postpone the fulfilment of God's commandment?" - "How can Jesus get the money for me? I must put off being baptised until after the religious festivals."

Without thinking, I said something which caught me unawares: "God will not receive you after the festivals are over. For forty years now you have bargained with Him, and now you let him wait for a mere five hundred lei. God is a great God, and He will not allow Himself to be mocked. You will be received by Him today, or never. "When he left me the old man was angry, because he thought I had spoken harshly to him.

The day after the Day of Atonement, the old man's daughter came to ask me to go to him immediately at his house. He had been standing outside the synagogue in the cold autumn rain, and was stricken with double pneumonia. I ran as fast as I could, but it was too late: when I arrived he was already at the point of death. I went to find a doctor and asked him to restore the old man to consciousness, if only for a few seconds, so that he could express the wish to be baptised. But it was impossible. He died without receiving baptism.

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I knew another case involving a Jew who in his younger days had heard the Word in Jerusalem, and had accepted the faith. Later he came to Rumania. Every time the question of baptism was broached he postponed the idea, declaring that he wished to be baptised in the Jordan. Several decades passed before he was able to make the journey. In his old age he finally set off on his pilgrimage to the Holy Land. He died on the way, in Istanbul, before his wish could be fulfilled. His daughter, who was also a believer, told me this with tears in her eyes, but she did just what her father had done. She was converted thirty years ago, but has still not been baptised. The young learn nothing from the old.

February 2000

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