The love of my people, the French, and the love of American people brought me to Abilene Christian University almost three years ago as a visiting missionary.

I feel blessed to have been given the opportunity to live among the two cultures: the French and the American. I feel richer spiritually and intellectually because of this experience.

During the past 33 years of my life as a Christian, I have witnessed in France the reconciling work of Christ in the lives of hundreds of God’s children from France but also many other nationalities.

I have been able to preach in all the European nations and have seen the same reconciling work throughout the continent. In my 30 years of preaching experience, I have seen how we, Americans and French, have worked together in peace and harmony for the building up of God’s kingdom in human hearts and lives.

At the beginning of World War II, my father was an officer in the Yugoslav army. He became a prisoner of war in Germany. He was liberated from the German prison camp by American troops, and as an officer of the Yugoslav army, was stationed for a whole year at Chlons sur Marne with the American army.

My mother at the age of 18 was in the French resistance, and upon a denunciation was taken into a concentration camp. She is one of the few people who was able to escape a concentration camp and make her way back to Paris by foot.

My father and mother talked very little about their war experience. It was like a dark cloud hovering over their lives that they could not get rid of. Both in their own way had been actively involved in the war against the Third Reich, but they had seen horrors that I would never see and could not even imagine.

Like any other sensible human being, I hate war. My father and mother hated war. But they knew that brutal and violent men are not stopped by wishes and words. That is why they risked their lives when they were still in the prime of life.

I am convinced that the brutality and violence of dictators and terrorists cannot be stopped by wishes and words. I regret that all the allies who fought Adolf Hitler did not agree to fight Saddam Hussein.

I pray daily to God for the coalition troops and their families, for the President of the United States and for all the innocent people of Iraq. I pray that this war may be ended soon so that soldiers may come back to their families safe and sound.

May God bless America and also bless all the nations of the earth with a spirit of grace and peace to His glory.

Yann Opsitch
visiting missionary from France