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Series Code: TIJ
Program Code: TIJ002120A
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00:24 Washington, D.C., capital of the United States, stands at the 00:28 epicenter of world espionage. In fact, it has more spy's than any 00:34 other city in the world. Spying has a long history here. From 00:40 the halls of government to tranquil suburban neighborhoods 00:43 there are scores of dead drops, covert meeting places and secret 00:48 facilities. Literally a constellation of clandestine 00:54 sites unknown to even the most avid history buffs until now. 00:59 Recently new books have been published that trace more than 01:04 two centuries of secret espionage history herein 01:08 Washington starting right back with spymaster and first 01:12 president George Washington. These books with accompanying 01:17 maps list dozens of spy sites across the city and now 01:21 thousands of tourists visit Washington each year to follow 01:25 the footsteps of moles and sleuths and trace the covert 01:29 operations that influenced the outcome of wars and changed the 01:34 course of history. In fact, there's so much interest in 01:39 espionage here that there's even an International Spy Museum that 01:43 allows spy enthusiasts to examine hundreds of gadgets, 01:49 weapons, bugs, cameras and secret technologies. The museum 01:53 houses the largest collection of international espionage 01:57 artifacts ever placed on public display. All this is a reminder 02:03 of our fascination with spies and espionage. Some are even 02:09 obsessed by it. Just look at the cinema figures. Spy movies have 02:14 always been popular. People just seem to love the cloak and 02:19 dagger escapades of these characters whether James Bond in 02:23 the Bond movies or Ethan Hunt in the Mission Impossible series. 02:27 Spy thrillers are always popular and often fun to watch. And 02:34 though these are made up stories the fact is that real life 02:38 spying goes on all the time. And though I doubt these real life 02:43 spies had the kind of action that say James Bond might see in a 02:47 single day there's no question that spying can be a dangerous 02:52 business. It could cost the spy his or her life. Today we're 02:58 going to look at the story of a real spy, someone who worked 03:02 during the very tense years of the cold war. This spy, though 03:07 not as glamorous as James Bond, took a great risk to do what he 03:11 thought was right. And some believe that his actions and 03:16 bravery saved the world from a nuclear catastrophe. Who was 03:21 this spy? What did he do? And what lessons can we learn from 03:27 this story? We'll find out in today's program The Spy Who 03:32 Saved the World. His story will surprise and inspire you and it 03:38 carries a special message for us today. 03:42 ♪ ♪ 04:06 Bombs exploding. Though World War II ended more than 70 years 04:12 ago we certainly still live with the legacy of that war today. 04:16 One of the legacies of the second world war was the cold 04:20 war. Cold as in contrast to hot in the sense that though the two 04:25 sides were at war it wasn't an overt shooting war. The 04:31 antagonists weren't dropping bombs on each other's cities. 04:34 But the hostilities and animosities between the 04:38 Americans and the Russians ran deep. And in any one of a number 04:43 of instances, the cold war could have turned hot, real hot. And 04:50 that could have easily led to World War III. There was, 04:54 however, one time in the early 1960s where the tension became 04:59 so great that it brought the world itself to the very brink. 05:04 This was the Cuban missile crisis. Now if you want to talk 05:10 about a manifestation of the cold war then there's nothing 05:14 better than Cuba itself. The island of Cuba is less than 150 05:21 kilometers off the coast of Key West, Florida. So in 1959 when 05:28 revolutionary Fidel Castro took over the country and declared it 05:32 a socialist republic, another name for communism, well you can 05:37 imagine how well that went over with the American capitalists 05:41 just to their north. Cuba? Now communist? The Russians now had 05:49 an ally close enough to the United States that people have 05:52 actually swum from Cuba to Florida. Well the Americans 05:57 weren't going to stand for that. In fact, then kept top secret at 06:02 the time, it's now known that the United States Central 06:06 Intelligence Agency, the CIA, had tried numerous times to have 06:11 Fidel Castro assassinated. Some of the stories sound right out 06:17 of a James Bond movie. Apparently the CIA tried 06:21 everything from poisoning Fidel's cigars to planting a 06:25 bomb in a conch shell in the water where he liked to scuba 06:29 dive. The Americans even tried to get the Mafia, generally 06:33 efficient killers, to do the dirty job for them. After all 06:37 Castro had kicked the mob out of the country. So they had plenty 06:42 of reasons to want to see him dead. However, the mobsters, it 06:47 seems didn't have any more success than did the CIA at 06:51 getting rid of Castro. Then there was the Bay of Pigs fiasco 06:55 when CIA-backed Cuban exiles invaded the country in 1961 in 07:02 an attempt to overthrow the communist regime. Within in a 07:06 day the whole thing collapsed. Many of the invaders were killed 07:10 or captured and the Americans, especially John F. Kennedy, came 07:16 out looking pretty bad. The Bay of Pigs fiasco, however, was 07:22 small potatoes in contrast to what came the next year, known 07:26 in history as the Cuban Missile Crisis. An American U2 spy plane 07:33 had helped confirm what a Russian spy had already told the 07:37 Americans. That the Soviets were constructing nuclear missile 07:42 sites in Cuba. Nuclear-armed missiles just 150 kilometers 07:48 off the coast of 07:50 the United States. The Americans had to do something. 07:54 Because from Cuba no city in the United States was safe. First 08:03 the United States set up naval blockade of Cuba. They would not 08:07 allow Russian ships with arms to enter Cuban waters. Second they 08:13 demanded that the missiles be removed. This too was a gamble. 08:19 If the Russians who declared the blockade an illegal 08:23 provocation tried to enter Cuban waters a military confrontation 08:28 could have quickly escalated into a nuclear Armageddon. One 08:33 later account expressed it like this: 09:09 Eventually realizing just how dangerous the situation had 09:12 become the Russians sent a letter to Kennedy agreeing to 09:16 remove the missiles if the Americans promised not to invade 09:22 Cuba and would eventually remove American nuclear missiles 09:25 stationed in Turkey. The crisis ended but nerves were so frayed 09:31 on both sides that they soon created a direct hot line 09:36 communication link between Moscow and Washington. The idea 09:41 was that in the event of another crisis they could at least talk 09:45 to each other quicker than they had before and not come so close 09:50 to wiping out the world. Though the cold war went on until the 09:55 early 1990s many historians agree that at no time before or 10:01 after this crisis had we come so close to what could have been 10:06 nuclear annihilation. Some have argued too that were it not for 10:11 one man, a man most of us have never heard of, the dreaded 10:16 nuclear war would have come. The man's name is Oleg Penkovsky 10:23 and some have dubbed him the spy who saved the world. Who was 10:28 he? What did he do? And what message does he have for us 10:34 today? Well Oleg Penkovsky was a senior intelligence officer, a 10:39 Colonel, in the Soviet Military Intelligence the GIU. Among his 10:45 jobs he was to collect scientific and technical 10:48 intelligence from the United States, Britain and other 10:52 western allies. Starting in the early 1960s Penkovsky began 10:57 passing secrets to the British and the Americans. He tried 11:02 contacting the CIA first, but they dragged their feet. 11:06 Eventually in Moscow he met with a British businessman who was 11:11 really a spy for MI6, the British intelligence agency. 11:15 They went to a hotel room where Penkovsky revealed a hidden 11:20 pocket in his trousers. He took a razor and cut open the pocket 11:26 and handed the agent the documents. Among these documents 11:30 was a letter that Penkovsky had hand written to the Queen of 11:34 England and to President John Kennedy. In it, he said this: 11:50 Before long both the Americans and the British were working 11:55 as closely as possible with Penkovsky who working under the 11:59 cover of being the head of the Soviet trade delegation in 12:03 London would meet with the Americans and British and pass 12:06 on documents. At the same time, when in Moscow, he would meet 12:12 with Janet Chisholm, the wife of a British diplomat in Moscow and 12:16 an agent of MI6 and would pass on secrets to her there. One 12:22 account described the meeting like this: Janet 12:26 Chisholm and Penkovsky made their way separately to the 12:30 small narrow city park on the 2nd of July. It was busy and 12:36 Penkovsky waited for the rain to come and the crowd to thin 12:39 before approaching. Janet was wearing a brown suede jacket as 12:44 agreed. He gave the children a box of sweets. Inside were two 12:50 sheets of paper and seven rolls of film. The material was so 12:55 important that parts of it would be communicated personally to 12:59 the president of the United States nine days later. It would 13:04 be the first of a dozen such brush contacts between the two 13:08 in the coming months. Her husband was under heavy 13:13 surveillance but she believed hers was minimal. Can you 13:19 imagine the risks that this man was taking? Can you imagine what 13:24 would have happened to him if he was caught? Yet Colonel 13:28 Penkovsky truly believed that he was doing the right thing. 13:44 Penkovsky soon turned into an invaluable asset to the West. 13:52 For 18 months he had supplied the Americans and the British 13:57 with a treasure trove of valuable information It was this 14:01 information that first alerted the Americans about the 14:06 existence of the missiles there and so when they sent their 14:09 planes up they knew where to look. And second he showed the 14:14 Americans that the Russians had nowhere near the nuclear 14:18 capability that the West thought and that a lot of the Russian 14:22 talk was mere bluster. This gave the Americans some breathing 14:27 room. That is, instead of being so afraid of the Russians and 14:31 perhaps striking first out of that fear, thanks to Penkovsky 14:35 Kennedy knew that he had time and that the Russians were 14:40 really bluffing. And so many believed that we have Oleg 14:44 Penkovsky to thank for the crisis not turning into World 14:48 War III which, had it turned nuclear, could have wiped us all 14:53 out. Now what did the spy who saved the world get for his 14:59 great work? After all, not every one gets a chance to save the 15:05 world. Well he was betrayed by a double agent working for the 15:09 Americans. He was arrested, tried publicly and shot by the 15:16 Soviets. Some argue that he committed suicide in his cell. 15:19 Either way what an unjust ending for a man who had saved the 15:25 world and done so much good. What is the saying? No good deed 15:31 goes unpunished. But you know maybe you've noticed something 15:36 along with me and that is we don't see a lot of justice in 15:40 this world do we? All around us every day our senses are 15:45 bombarded by the injustice, the unfairness of life. Evil so 15:51 often it seems goes unpunished while over and over the innocent 15:57 suffer. Look at the innocents, the children suffering in wars 16:01 around the world. Children. And I haven't even touched on issues 16:07 like human trafficking, poverty, exploitation and on and on we 16:12 could go. And then, yes, there's the issue of the gap between the 16:18 rich and the poor. We've heard about the one percent club 16:22 comprising the top one percent of the world's richest people. 16:25 Well according to one agency that works for the poor, this one 16:31 percent club has as much wealth as the rest of the world combined. 16:35 And though some dispute the numbers there's no question that 16:40 the gap between the rich and the poor is vast and deep and seems 16:47 so utterly unfair doesn't it? And you know in this context the 16:52 question arises: Doesn't all this injustice prove that God 16:57 doesn't exist. Isn't injustice like this one of the excuses 17:01 that people use to deny the existence of God? They argue 17:05 that with all this injustice, pain and suffering in the world 17:09 it's not possible for a good and all powerful God to exist. And 17:14 while on one level that may seem to make sense, on another it 17:18 makes no sense at all. Why? Well because the same Bible writers 17:24 that reveal the existence of God spend a great deal of time 17:28 recounting stories of terrible injustice as well. For the Bible 17:34 writers the existence of injustice didn't negate the 17:39 existence of a loving and all powerful God. In a Bible that 17:44 has 900 pages by page four, four we have the story of Cain 17:51 murdering his brother who was later called righteous Abel. Now 17:57 righteous Abel, the good son, so to speak, is murdered by the 18:01 bad one. Talk about injustice. Again the Bible is barely 18:07 getting started and here already we have a case of injustice. And 18:13 then there's the story of Joseph a young lad sold into slavery by 18:18 his brothers and then he spends years as a slave and as a 18:22 prisoner. Now if you know the story, it does have a happy 18:27 ending. But think about Joseph's grieving father who for years, 18:32 decades even, believe that his son had been killed by wild 18:37 animals while all that time his brothers knew the truth. Listen 18:41 to that father's grief recorded in Genesis chapter 37 and 18:46 verse 35: 18:56 All through the pages of the Bible the injustices of our 19:01 world are not sugar coated at all. Many of the stories in 19:05 scripture don't end like fairy tales, and they lived happily 19:08 ever after. No. The Bible stories don't all end that way. 19:14 Because many of the stories of real lives don't end that way 19:19 now, do they? Have you ever read the story of David and Bathsheba 19:24 King David gets a soldier's wife pregnant while the soldier's 19:28 away in battle. In the end, the only way to solve the problem 19:33 is to make sure the soldier gets killed. And that's exactly what 19:38 happens. David gets the soldier killed and then gets the slain 19:43 man's wife for himself. Talk about injustice. Oh yes there's 19:49 also the story about a man who owned a vineyard that King Ahab 19:53 wanted. Well the man refused to sell it to the king. So before 19:58 the story is over the queen has the man falsely accused. Here's 20:03 what the Bible says: 20:29 And by the way, with the vineyard owner Naboth 20:32 now dead the king 20:34 gets his vineyard. Injustice. So here's the reality. All the 20:41 injustices, the evil that we see in life around us and that can 20:46 make people doubt the existence of God all of them and more are 20:51 portrayed in one way or another in the Bible, in the word of God 20:55 Yes in the word of God, war, famine, crime, pain, suffering 21:03 everything that we hate about life here is depicted in this 21:08 book because that's reality. And the Bible is about reality. 21:13 I mean, who'd believe the Bible if it did nothing but depict 21:18 this world as a wonderful and happy place filled with 21:22 wonderful people living wonderful lives that always end 21:28 nicely. But that's not how it is is it? No of course not. And 21:34 that's why scripture doesn't portray it that way either. And 21:38 yet at the same time the Bible over and over again talks about 21:44 the reality of God, of God's love, of God's goodness and of 21:49 God's promise to one day bring the justice that is so lacking 21:54 now. So amid stories of war, of violence, of famine, of 21:59 oppression, of all the things we see wrong with this world the 22:04 Bible also says this: 22:20 You don't think these writers knew of the pain and injustice 22:24 of this world. Of course they did. They suffered from it 22:29 themselves. And yet amid it all they had known and experienced 22:34 the reality not only of God's existence, but of his love. 22:38 That's why they could write about it as they did. And then 22:43 there's Jesus himself saying this: 22:58 You want to talk about injustice God himself in the person of 23:05 Jesus comes to this world and he does only good. Does nothing but 23:10 heal the sick, comfort the sorrowing, help the poor, the 23:15 needy, the outcasts. And what does he get for it? Well read 23:20 the story of Jesus on the cross. He is the loving, caring God of 23:26 justice experiencing for himself the reality of all the injustice 23:31 this world itself has to offer. And he does it because he loves 23:36 the world, even despite the evil and injustice in it. The story 23:43 of Oleg Penkovsky is just one of billions of stories of injustice 23:48 in this world. Yet this is the same world that God loves. 23:53 A world that through Jesus he promises to completely fix and 23:59 make over. He promises to bring the justice that we will never 24:04 see now. God knows all about the injustice here. He knows it 24:09 firsthand. He's experienced it himself in ways that we never 24:15 will. And he asks you to trust in him, to give yourself to him 24:20 in order that you can have hope, true hope that this world 24:25 can never, 24:26 never offer you. That's why he came and died for you, paid the 24:32 penalty for your mistakes. Don't turn away from all that he has 24:37 done for you. Rather reach out and accept the gift of hope, 24:43 happiness and peace that he offers you right now as we pray. 24:49 Dear heavenly Father, today we wish to thank you for the 24:55 reality of your love. What a hope it offers us in a world 24:59 that is so full of injustice. We look forward to the day when 25:04 Jesus will return and make all things new. We all want to be 25:09 ready to meet Jesus when he comes so that we can spend 25:12 eternity with you. We ask this in Jesus' name, Amen. 25:19 If you're struggling with the challenges of life and would 25:24 like God's guidance then I'd like to recommend a free gift we 25:28 have for all our viewers today. It's the Bible study guide The 25:32 Secret of Happiness. You'll find it most helpful in guiding you 25:37 regarding how to make right moral choices and follow God's 25:42 leading. And again, as I said, it's absolutely free. There are 25:47 no costs or obligations whatsoever. So please don't miss 25:51 this wonderful opportunity to receive the gift we have for you 25:55 today. Here's the information you need: 26:00 Phone or text us at 0436-333-555 in Australia or 020-422-2042 in 26:10 New Zealand or visit our website www.tij.tv to request today's 26:17 free offer and we'll send it to you totally free of charge and 26:21 with no obligation. So don't delay. Call or text 0436-333-555 26:28 in Australia or 020-422-2042 in New Zealand or visit our website 26:35 to request today's offer. Write to us at: 26:51 Don't delay. Call or text us now 26:56 The Incredible Journey and Pastor Gary Kent with Pastor 27:00 Louis Torres and Carol Torres as the principal trainers are 27:03 opening a Bible College in Sydney in February of 2020. This 27:07 14-week program will give you the skills you need to be an 27:11 effective co-laborer with Christ to carry the message of the 27:14 crucified, risen, and soon coming Savior to the whole world. 27:18 For more information and to register phone or text us at 27:22 0481-315-101. Email us at info@tij.tv or visit our website 27:30 at TIJ.tv/events. 27:36 Be sure to join us again next week when we will share another 27:40 of life's journey's together. Until then remember the ultimate 27:45 destination of life's journey. Now I saw a new heaven and a new 27:50 earth. And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes. 27:54 There shall be no more death nor sorrow nor crying. There shall 27:58 be no more pain for the former things have passed away. 28:03 ♪ ♪ |
Revised 2021-06-23