June 1st - Haarlem

Tuesday, June 1
Haarlem

Today started out very frustrating, but ended up okay. I had several
things that I wanted to do in Amsterdam, and explained to Lonnie that
they all closed around 4 or 5PM. Even so, we did not leave the hotel
until after 10. We thought that we might park at the airport and take
the train into Amsterdam. We didn't want a repeat performance of Rome.
First, we couldn't find our way to the airport. Then we decided
that parking there wasn't going to work. Finally, at 12:30 I told
Lonnie to just go back to the hotel and start over on public
transportation and just go to Haarlem. We finally arrived at Haarlem
at around 1:40PM. We went to the Info center and asked where we were
so we would know how to get to Corrie Ten Boom's House. That is where
I really wanted to go three years ago, but we didn't make it. It was
good that we stopped by the Info center, because our map had Corrie Ten
Boom's house in the wrong part of town. The lady at the info center
sold us a good map, then told us how to get there. We arrived at the
house at 1:50, after deciding not to take time to stop for lunch, and
found that the only English tour of the day was scheduled for 2PM. The
Lord blessed us richly by getting us there just in time. It was a great
tour. We met a couple from England who knew someone in West Memphis,
and had met with Adrian Rogers a few times. The man used to be a
Baptist minister in England, but is retired now. We also had a girl on
the tour from Canada, who played the Ten Boom's favorite hymn on their
piano. The woman who conducted the tour had known Corrie Ten Boom
personally. She preached a full sermon during the tour, which was a was
a great blessing. We saw the narrow space where 6 people were hiding
when the Nazis showed up. Lonnie stood inside of it. I didn't. I
cannot imagine how 6 people could have gotten in there from other parts
of the house in just 70 seconds! (They had to crawl through a very
small space to get into it.) I seriously cannot imagine how 6 people
got in there anyway! After the Ten Booms were arrested, it was a couple
of days or so before the people in hiding were rescued. If you have
never read "The Hiding Place", you should. I have read many of Corrie
Ten Boom's books. They are very inspirational when you realize all that
she went through, and how she used it to serve the Lord the rest of her
life.