The Man Who Said Yes in the Dark

In December 1938, twenty-nine-year-old Nicholas Winton arrived in Prague and found something that shattered his plans. Hundreds of Jewish families, desperate and hunted, were begging anyone who would listen to save their children. Winton was a London stockbroker with no connections to refugee work, no organizational experience, no particular reason to say yes — except that the need was undeniable.

Over the next nine months, Winton forged documents, persuaded British families to open their homes, and arranged eight trains to carry 669 children out of Czechoslovakia before the borders slammed shut. He worked from his desk at the stock exchange during lunch breaks, filling out forms and cutting through red tape. He told almost no one. For fifty years, he kept a scrapbook in his attic and never mentioned what he had done.

Joseph of Nazareth faced his own moment of impossible calling. Everything respectable in his world told him to walk away from Mary quietly. Instead, the angel spoke, and Joseph simply obeyed. He took Mary as his wife. He named the child Jesus. No fanfare, no public explanation — just a carpenter doing exactly what the Lord asked, even when it cost him his reputation.

Sometimes faithfulness looks like a man saying yes in the dark, trusting that God's purposes are worth more than the world's approval. Joseph did as the angel commanded him, and through that quiet obedience, the Almighty brought salvation into the world.