“Come to think of it, I mused as we drove home, I have never seen Tante Corrie embarrassed. She always expected that people would take her just as she was­­. And now, after her stroke she still expects it. It was the result of a deep confidence that God accepted her just as she was and it had not been shaken now that she could not speak. She was accepted, and so she could accept people just as they were.”

Corrie ten Boom of the 1970s was a worldwide traveler and speaker, telling thousands of people from all walks of life in dozens of countries about her World War II experiences and how God had sustained her through those years. Always as she traveled, Corrie was accompanied by a personal assistant, a younger woman who could help with the rigors of travel and constantly being on the move.

Working as Corrie’s personal assistant was no simple task, as the job combined the exhaustion of travel with the unpredictability that came with Corrie’s lifestyle. Two women, Connie and Ellen, had already spent a few years with “Tante” (Aunt) Corrie before moving on to get married and begin their families, and now Corrie’s third—and final—assistant would be Pamela Moore, a young British woman who had lived in The Netherlands for several years.

Corrie’s experiences through WWII are widely known, but what many people don’t know is that a series of strokes halted Corrie’s public work and ministry several years before her death. For the last two-and-a-half years of her life, the woman who had endured so much and emerged victorious was not physically able to leave her room.

This was not the story anyone expected for the strong and persevering Corrie ten Boom. It was certainly not the reality Pam had expected when she agreed to accompany Corrie in her ministry. Despite the unexpected setbacks, Pam stayed on as Corrie’s assistant until Corrie passed away on April 15, 1983—her 91st birthday.

As Corrie’s final personal assistant, Pam chronicled those last years of Corrie’s earthly life. She also shared her own spiritual wrestling as she watched her friend and mentor endure the pain and frustration of her abilities slipping away. What was the point of this pain? How can God possibly find good in it?

In The Five Silent Years of Corrie ten Boom, Pam works through that age-old question: Why would a good and sovereign God allow His child to suffer?

“The days went slowly by. We heard the familiar whirring of the electric bed as we lowered it to change her position, the metallic clicking of the rails as we raised and lowered them to turn our patient, the ticking of the brown clock. Nine months passed. It was not easy for her or for us. It was very hard sometimes. There were days when the routine seemed endless and the hours seemed to last for days.”

It was in that suffering that Pam saw Him work, as she saw lives touched and she gained a front-row seat to Corrie’s own experiences through the ordeal. Could it be that God was using this, too? Just like He had used Corrie’s concentration camp experience? God had brought good from the horrors of Nazi cruelty. Could He – would He – bring good of this, too?

“Up until this time, in common with a large part of the western world, I had set great store by strength and achievement…Particularly in America, I had found ‘self-image,’ or our view of ourselves, was related directly to what a person achieves. But what happens when a person becomes old, frail, brain-damaged, and in some eyes, apparently useless? How does God view that? How should society view that? I had been learning that our real selves can be discovered only in the Lord Jesus Christ. The Bible tells us that He died to save us from our sins, that we are ‘precious, holy, beloved, dear children, hidden in the hollow of His hand.’ And in that hand He also holds our times.”

People brought to Corrie’s bedside were greeted with the same love and warmth (albeit quieter) that she had shown to prisoners and audiences in her travels. Caretakers who spent hours with this incapacitated Corrie but had never met her before were impacted by her life—even as an invalid. Her consistent patience and kindness in the midst of suffering was not lost on the people around her.

The Five Silent Years of Corrie ten Boom tells the last chapter of Corrie’s life on earth, how a soldier for God endured her final battle. In a time when the sanctity of life is challenged more and more, this story reminds us all that those of us the world might see as weak and expendable are just as valued and used by God. And it reminds us that no matter where life finds us right now, our times are in His hands, too.

Photo Credit: Pam Rosewell Moore Ministries, Facebook