The Murdered Are Just a Number - Explore Archived World Race Alumni Blogs

“We were masters of nature, masters of the world. We had forgotten everything–death, fatigue, our natural needs. Stronger than cold or hunger, stronger than the shots and the desire to die, condemned and wandering, mere numbers, we were the only men on earth.” Elie Wiesel

I remember as a wee lad I was always fascinated with World War II. The Nazis scared the snot out of me. The machine guns were cool, but tanks were better. Explosions were pretty neat. I wanted to see Saving Private Ryan in the worst way but my parents wouldn’t let me and would always have a hearty parent laugh at my argument of, “But it’s real life!” I even enjoyed the American and Nazi propaganda posters with the heroic Captain America looking soldier standing tall above the caption reading, “YOU give us the fire, WE’LL give them hell,” and the square-jawed sinister looking Nazi with the caption, “He’s watching you.”

As I grew older I started to learn the facts behind the super sweet tanks and bazookas such as that an estimated 11 million people were killed not in war but in something called the Holocaust. 1.1 million children were killed. I was a child, but this number meant jack to me. It was simply too large for my young mind to comprehend. Even as I passed through high school this number never became real. That’s the problem with astronomical numbers, they’re just that; numbers. Even if that number is an individual each fearfully and wonderfully made by God it’s still hard to wrap your mind around it.

But last week, that number finally became awfully real. Those 11 million were all given faces in my mind and I finally saw the atrocity of what had happened 70 years ago. I had the incredible chance to visit Auschwitz.

I can’t even begin to detail what I learned in one sunny and busy afternoon at Auschwitz.

I saw tens of thousands of shoes belonging to the victims. Big shoes, little shoes, medium shoes, polka-dotted shoes, shoes with bows, fancy work shoes; every shoe carrying the story of a beautiful person who wore them.

I saw two tons of grayish-brown hair, cut from the victims’ heads before they were led to the gas chambers.

I saw a long dimly-lit hallway full of pictures of men and women who had survived the selection process and were about to be sent to work. The sadness and hopelessness in their eyes is something I will never forget.

I saw where they were executed, tortured, abused.

I saw the ruins of the gas chambers that the Nazis tried to destroy to cover up the horror of what they had been doing when the war ended.

I walked the train tracks of Birkenau where they were carted in like cattle and first shown their new homes, minutes later to be sorted just by their looks and age whether they would live or die with the pointing of an indifferent doctor’s finger.

Every picture I saw bore the face of a man, woman or child furiously loved by God. Each bunk had held 6 to 8 people that had been separated from all they knew and loved simply for being different. The cobblestone streets I walked had once born their sweat, tears and blood.

11 million was no longer a number. The murdered had faces. God had grieved over each and every one of the lost. Had we?

It’s so important to remember that every life is something special. It’s a miracle in fact. Yet when we hear how genocide happened here and this many million were lost, or a flood happened here and this many thousand are missing we suddenly seem to forget that they each were important and someone loved by their Creator. We can’t forget this anymore. Even when we hear that almost 300 girls were kidnapped in Nigeria that number is too big for us to think about. We offer up a quick prayer and move on with our day. All the while their family’s hearts are breaking. God’s heart is breaking.

Learning this alone made the trip to Auschwitz worth it. An amazing side note is that we got to do our tour with an older couple named Stan and Eva who had the most adorable Australian accents who were there to find Building Number 8, where Eva’s mother had stayed as a child. I’ll never forget seeing Auschwitz with the daughter of a Holocaust survivor. This too cemented it in my mind the individualism of the victims.

I have so much more I could say about what I learned and saw but I will spare you and let these pictures do the rest of the talking. I do pray that I’ll never forget the individual in tragedies ever again and for my heart to break for those “astronomical numbers” just as God’s heart does. I pray yours will too.