Sometime during the 105-day Winter War in Finland, but before the signing of the Moscow Peace Treaty on March 12, 1940, my wife’s mother, Anna-Liisa Kumpulainen, fled for her life; as did just about everyone from her hometown. “The Russians were coming!” to take over her beloved Viipuri and all of the Karelian Isthmus. 400,000 Karelians fled their homes – among them, Anna-Liisa, who hopped atop her bike and pedaled and pedaled and pedaled, traveling on back roads and through dense forests. First, she headed north, then west, until she finally arrived at her new hometown of Lahti – some 400 miles “down the road.”
An event like this, one never forgets – not even when one crosses over into that season of life when much is forgotten. Fast forward seven decades, Anna-Liisa was then in her upper 80’s and residing in an assisted-living community. Confined primarily to a wheelchair, this encumbrance did not impede her independent spirit. But every so often, her dementia would steal her back in time to that Russian incursion; and she’d press the pedal to the metal of her wheelchair and go streaking down her nursing home hallway while crying out, “The Russians are coming! The Russians are coming!”
With just two sermons left in our current sermon series on the Old Testament Prophetic books, we will be hearing from Joel, who shouted a similar warning to Anna-Liisa’s when he cried out, “The Locusts are coming!” Why not attend this Sunday to discover what this was all about?