That They Might Know Him - The Strength that was Found in the Hanoi Hilton

The War of Vietnam lasted just a few months short of twenty years. In it hundreds of American planes were downed over enemy territory. The fighter pilots who survived the injuries, that they acquired either in the crash or during the ejection process, found themselves prisoners of war. This is the story of ten such men, all of whom came to be held as captives in the Hanoi Hilton, a prison located in the heart of North Vietnam. Where they were isolated from the outside world and, for more than two years, even from each other. However, in the strictest solitary confinement they discovered that they were not alone...

Porter Halyburton looked at the still intact radio. Compared to the rest of the plane it had survived the crash remarkably well! The pilot's hand rose to tune it but he stopped himself. His training told him that he must destroy the radio to keep it from falling into the hands of the Vietnamese, who would use it to call other American planes into the range of their missiles. But as he pulled a knife from his belt his instincts continued to insist that he should try to get a message through; to let the rest of the world know that he was still alive. There isn't time to do both! The Vietnamese can't be more than five hundred yards away. Ugh, what a choice! But he had to make it, the soldier pursed his lips and destroyed his radio without another thought. There! It was done. Now his fate was really in God's hands.

...

His arm ached, the shoulder was out of its socket and he was pretty sure the bone was broken in a couple of places as well. And his arm was nothing in comparison to the pain that was radiating through his back. Ejecting from a plane, that's moving at five hundred miles per hour, is hard on a man's body! He observed. The little wooden stool on which he sat and the ropes that bound his arms and legs did little to ease his discomfort. Thus, even if he could have understood the words of the hastily appointed judge and jury, Sam Johnson was in too much agony to listen to the proceedings of the shanty courtroom. At least until the interpreter leaned close to explain their verdict to him. "You've been sentenced to die. You're a war criminal." That he heard! The man grinned as he said it,  he looked as though he was enjoying the whole affair immensely. Johnson said nothing in return, he knew too well that he was powerless in their hands. His captors half drug, half pushed him out of the little house and down a trail that led through the woods. Despite the agony he was in, they allowed him no break till he stood at the edge of the trench that was meant to be his grave. A firing squad was waiting. As the commander called for the weapons to be made ready, the American, who had never knelt before the Lord in a church, cried out to Him beneath the jungle canopy. "You know I just need Your help!" He confessed aloud; he was motivated to pray by sheer desperation and he saw no need to disguise it, for he was sure that God knew it already. It was in perfect sincerity that he then, silently, turned his life over to Jesus Christ. The command to fire was given in Vietnamese. Click, click, click, click, click - every one of the guns jammed. So that not a single bullet left it's barrel. Wow! There was no other word to describe it. Sam Johnson began to laugh - he could hardly help himself. He laughed aloud at men who were pointing loaded guns at his chest! For the first time since he had been captured, he realized that these men did not actually hold his life in their hands - that power belonged to one who was greater than them. "From that point forward I never had any fear of them again, because I knew the Lord was with me." - Sam Johnson

"Be strong and courageous. Do not fear or be in dread of them, for it is the Lord your God who goes with you. He will not leave you or forsake you.” (Deuteronomy xxxi. 6)

Most of the ten prisoners survived death sentences before they ever came to the Hanoi Hilton.  Several had stood at the edge of their own graves. Norm McDaniel had been hung till he lost consciousness. Then his executioners cut him down. In like manner, all of the other executions either failed or were strangely abandoned. So, even at the very start of their captivity, the prisoners began to see that, despite the power of their enemies, their lives remained in the hands of God. At the time when they had first crashed, or ejected from their planes, only a few of the ten had professed Christianity yet all arrived in Hanoi either as new believers or with a fresh challenge to live out the faith they claimed. In the jungles of Vietnam they received the one thing they would need in order to endure the prison to which they were headed - and that was God Himself!

“My goal is God Himself. Not joy, not peace, not even blessing but Himself. The person of my God.”  - Leonard Ravenhill

Lying on the block of concrete that he now called his bed, Porter starred up at the dim light bulb. There wasn't much else to look at. For though there was a window on the far wall, it was shuttered to keep any daylight from reaching him. The boredom alone is enough to drive a man crazy! He had only been in the cell two weeks but  already it felt like two months. At this rate, he wondered how long he could manage to persevere. It could be years before they come to free us - if we ever get freed ... No! He couldn't allow himself to think that way! The words of his guard must have been getting to his head, "You're an incorrigible reactionary and you'll never see another American again!" The man repeated, every time he came to the cell. Porter laughed at the statement. It was an impressive insult for someone who could hardly even speak the language, but he had to wonder if the man even knew what 'incorrigible reactionary' meant! His laughter changed to coughing as he breathed in the hot air. It must be more than a hundred and thirty degrees in this cell! As filthy as the floor was, he longed to be able to lie flat on it and breath some 'cool' air through the crack under the door. But metal stocks held his feet in place. The second part of the statement returned to his mind, "you'll never see another American again!" Those were the words that were actually threatening to him! At times he questioned his sense in destroying that radio when he had, had the chance to call for help. God knows we're here. Porter reminded himself.

"God, how I wish You would show me that You really do!" He prayed aloud. Some things have to be taken in faith. A few minutes later, he noticed a ray of light that was shining on the wall across from him. It wasn't the orange glow of the artificial bulb; it was sunlight! How have I never noticed that before? Through an almost undetectable crack in the wooden shutters a small stream of light, of God's light, entered the impenetrable cell. He had been lying on his back for two weeks looking at nothing but the roof and that wall, if it had been there before, he was sure that he would have noticed it! Porter shook his head and smiled. No matter where the Vietnamese put their prisoners God could still reach them!

 That glimmer of light returned to the cell every day for about ten minutes, to freshly encourage the prisoner that his God was indeed present with him. Days later, when Porter Halyburton was finally released from the stocks, he took an old scrap of paper and tore it into the shape of a cross. Then, with a piece of rice from his meager ration, he stuck it to the wall just where the sunlight touched. Now each day, when the light streamed in, it would meet the cross and remind him of the Light of the world who died on such an instrument in order to set him free! 

The crash, having to destroy the radio, the hot prison cell, the stocks, the little beam of light -it was all "so that [he] should seek the Lord, in the hope that [he] might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us;" (Acts xvii. 27) The Lord had been near all the time, just waiting for Porter to look for Him that He might reveal Himself! Porter was not the only one of the prisoners to find God present in his isolation cell. Every one of the men recounted that they shared their prison with rats, cockroaches, and Jesus Christ!

"I had the wonderful, psychological feeling that I was was really pulling one over on the Vietnamese. They thought I was in there really suffering by being alone and I had a cell mate the entire time I was there.That was the Lord Jesus Christ." - Rodger Ingvalson

The prisoners gained strength and courage in fellowship of their Lord. In addition to this, God gave them the gift of fellowship with one another. It was against the rules to make contact with the other prisoners, but the men determined that it would be well worth the risk of punishment to do so. Their prison cells were situated in a long line and they began to realize that when any one of them tapped on the walls or the floor the sound carried through the whole length of the building. By this means they communicated; developing their own code for the alphabet and tapping messages, one letter at a time. It was a slow task but time was the one thing they had in abundance! They told stories and jokes, talked about their guards, and, above all, they prayed. "Every Sunday," Sam Johnson recalled, "someone would stomp on the floor and we would all kneel down together, even though we were by ourselves, and we would pray. The strength of prayer together is much stronger than just by yourself  and I know the Lord heard us."

"For where two or three are gathered together in My name, there am I in the midst of them." (Matthew xviii. 20)

The men prayed together and they prayed individually. Despite their own desperate need, they did not reserve their prayers for themselves. Instead they prayed for their families back home, the troops still employed in the fight, and for one another. Prayer is access into the very throne room of a generous and merciful God and they discovered, that He supplied them with all that they really needed. 

"Prayer was the principle weapon, not anything else, and the principle ammunition was what God gave you back. That was the ability to stay cheerful enough and persevering enough to do what you needed to do." - Jeremiah Denton

When they weren't praying, the prisoners kept their minds and bodies busy. They solved math problems, encouraged one another, remembered happier times, and, when not restrained in stocks, they walked three to five miles per day by pacing the length of their cells. As Denton said, God gave them cheerfulness and perseverance. He also gave them faith, faith in Him, that kept them from despair.

"Someone described faith as taking a rope, tying a knot into it, and hanging on for six years. It was a good description." - Red McDaniel

"In all the seven and a half years I never lost faith in my Saviour - lost faith in others, not my fellow POW's, but the people back home running things, yeah I lost faith in them but never in my Saviour and my fellow prisoners. They were there for me and God was there through them." - Fred Cherry

After the first, two years had passed the solitary confinement slowly began to be relaxed. The prisoners were allowed cell mates, all except Sam Johnson. His isolation was prolonged for three months after the others. It might have gone on longer still, if Jeremiah Denton hadn't called for the prisoners to go on a hunger strike. The rations they were given barely sustained them as it was, yet all of the men willingly forfeited in hope of freeing Sam from his prolonged solitude. It worked! The guards gave in and, within a few days, Sam Johnson was permitted to see two of the other prisoners. It was the first time he had seen a human being, besides his prison guards, in two and a half years! 

But just when things appeared to be getting better, the men had to face a new form of hardship - physical torture. One of the guards told the prisoners, "The Vietnamese have been refining the art of inflicting pain for four thousand years." They didn't doubt the truth of his words, but in this, as in isolation, God provided grace.

"And He said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore most gladly I will rather boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in needs, in persecutions, in distresses, for Christ’s sake. For when I am weak, then I am strong." ( 2 Corinthians xii. 9 -10)

When a man would come back from a torture session, his cell mate would pray for him and the others would join in through their language of taps. In this way they employed the principle of 1 Corinthians xii. 26: "If one member suffers, all suffer together..." God gave them grace that was sufficient to care for one another and He demonstrated His grace through that care. Rodger Ingvalson - recounted an occasion when he was brought into an interrogation room and told that his wife had died. The prisoners never knew whether or not to believe the 'news from home', for they were only ever given bad news. Rodger had already known his wife to be in critical health, however, and so this report deeply shook him. Still he found grace sufficient to allow him to thank his captors for the news. When he was returned to his cell, he could no longer hold back the grief that burdened him. Thankfully God had a fresh measure of grace awaiting Rodger through the prayers and encouragement of his cell mate.

"Perhaps God brings us to the end of our resources so we can discover the vastness of His." — Neil Anderson

On April 30, 1975 the USA came to a peace agreement with Vietnam. Three days later the prisoners were informed of their freedom. Some had spent six and a half years in prison, others up to nine, finally they were told that they would all be going home! They would all be free! When they returned to the United States, they carried with them the lessons they had learned through isolation and torture and the grace God had supplied. Through their suffering they had gained a greater knowledge of their Saviour, become practiced in reaching Him through prayer, grown in faith, and been strengthened by a fellowship of believers with whom they would remain lifelong friends. They counted prison, isolation, and torture worthwhile, "that [they might] know Him and the power of His resurrection, and [might] share His sufferings, being conformed to His death," (Philippians iii. 10) 

May we desire to know the same even if we must endure hardship to find it!

In Christ 

quiana

Sources: Prisoner of Hope Documentary