Auschwitz and the surrounding camps were liberated by the Soviet Army in Nazi controlled Poland on January 27, 1945. There were only 7,600 people still there when the Red army arrived. 58,000 men and women had been lead away on a death march in an effort to conceal the magnitude of their crimes. They were marched by the Nazi SS soldiers to Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in Germany. Only an estimated 20,000 survived the over 800 km march that took place over several weeks. Liberation did not come soon enough for the estimated 1,100,000 people that died in Auschwitz. Those events that took place in the early 1940’s mark the most cruel and gruesome acts of man against his fellow man in recorded history. I pray such bondage and atrocities will never return to be practiced.
When we think of liberation, do we think of our own liberation from sin? If we knew the price of sin and the ugliness of sin would we turn back to serve it? Paul, in Romans 6:5-7 wrote, “For if we have become united with Him in the likeness of His death, certainly we shall also be in the likeness of His resurrection, knowing this, that our old self was crucified with Him, in order that our body of sin might be done away with, so that we would no longer be slaves to sin; for he who has died is freed from sin.” In Christ, we are freed from the bondage of sin that leads to death. The old man of sin is dead. We must now focus our efforts to serving God. “But now having been freed from sin and enslaved to God, you derive your benefit, resulting in sanctification, and the outcome, eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Rom. 6:22-23). This great liberation that we have found in Christ allows us to serve a living God, and we are to be freed from the fear of death that once controlled us. “But when this perishable will have put on the imperishable, and this mortal will have put on immortality, then will come about the saying that is written, “DEATH IS SWALLOWED UP in victory. O DEATH, WHERE IS YOUR VICTORY? O DEATH, WHERE IS YOUR STING?” The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law; but thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Cor. 15:54-57). After receiving liberation, would you go back to sin and death?
Those that were liberated from Auschwitz passed on stories of their experiences in the camp to future generations so that no one would forget. The theme for the 70th anniversary celebration was “Never Forget.” Survivors encouraged people not to let the memory die, and that to do so, would mean the victims of the Holocaust would die again. We must never forget that we have been liberated lest we, too, return to sin and die a second death.