Communicating by air

A life example of God directing how to serve Him
by Tim Slapak

“Every occurrence in my life is a magical part of a puzzle by which the Almighty has masterfully put together the entire picture of the plan for a person's life; the one that I'm going to describe here is specifically in connection with evangelism service for Him.”

Evangelism vision and mission of brothers from the Christian Fellowship of Halford House in London.

I take the liberty of noting that if the events that took place in 1967 at the Christian Fellowship Halford House congregation in Richmond, London didn't happen then I wouldn't have gone to England, I wouldn't have taken so many interesting, sometimes almost unreal, paths, I would probably not be a British citizen, and I wouldn't have changed from the career I had studied for as a computing expert to being a consultant and coach in the development of individuals and teams. 

It began with an idea, an inspiration, that four members of the Halford House Christian Fellowship evangelical congregation Douglas Harris, Michael Fishbacher, Paul Skaife and Ron White received. They were convinced that God was leading them to evangelism in what was then Czechoslovakia. They were looking for a way to do it, they prayed about it. They decided to get a telephone directory of phone numbers in Prague. In those days such a list came in a thick book. They again prayed to God for advice on how to proceed. One of them flipped through the pages and reached one. With his eyes closed, he aimed his finger at one of many rows and pressed his finger on it. On that row was the telephone number of our Šlapák family in Prague. He rang the telephone number, and my brother Pavel, who was there purely by chance at the time, answered the phone. It was purely by chance because on that day he was supposed to be in Plzeň, where he was studying electrical engineering at university. Pavel could speak English, which at that time not many of the people listed in the Prague phone directory could. Sometime later, Doug and Michael came to Prague to meet Pavel, they visited our family, and from then there was continuous active contact between Halford House and Pavel. 

Pavel was invited to London, he was welcomed very warmly at Halford House (HH), and he spent several days there. 

Doug and Michael also established contacts at the Church of Brethren congregation in Smíchov, which is where Doug later met Noemi Čížkovská and her family. Noemi then married him and she now lives as a widow with her children in south-west London. 

I came into contact with HH later, in early 1968. Pavel was assigned to go to Chicago in the summer of that year for my Dad's aunty Anna Bárta to bring her to Czechoslovakia, where she wanted to spend the rest of her life, she was almost one hundred years old. Therefore, Pavel couldn't count on going to England that year. It was my turn; I was invited to visit instead of my brother. 

Arranging my way to the West was not simple, getting a permit from the various authorities and work departments was demanding in terms of time, politics, and relationships. In 1968, luckily there was a political enlightenment in Czechoslovakia, later termed as the 'Prague spring'. I went through various stages, some of which were not easy. Now I know that it was God's purpose for me to go to England. The British authorities gave me a visa for half a year; the Germans and Belgians gave me visas for several days to travel to the English Channel. My departure was in November 1968. 

Image 1. Mila and Tim from the Czech section with Robert Poloha from the Slovak section of TWR with Renata Vozeh and children

Image 2. Mila and Tim with Ota Vozeh, the director of Czechoslovak section TWR

There was a broader purpose behind the change

In August 1968 a tragic historical event occurred, which for many years directly, and possibly for at least several generations indirectly, marked the fate of our nations in Czechoslovakia, and my life too. Our sovereign land was invaded by Warsaw pact countries with 500,000 soldiers.

After 21 August, my trip to the West was not totally certain, anything could have happened before my planned departure under the uncertain political circumstances. We were under occupation by the Soviets.   

In the end, my journey to England took place. I left behind many projects at home and at work, my parents and brothers, relatives, my relationships with other people, my girlfriend, friends, private life, boxes full of things and documents, correspondence, letters… It wasn't written anywhere when or if I would return. 

HH had invited me to visit for several days, and that invitation got extended. The situation in Czechoslovakia was getting worse, I decided to stay in England for longer. My friends found me temporary work with enough income to cover my needs. Half a year after my arrival, my girlfriend Míla came from Prague to visit me, then there was an opening for me as a student at the University of London to supplement my engineering qualifications from Prague, supported by a scholarship from IBM. I settled in in the UK for a longer time. The people at HH arranged our wedding, and after studying we relocated to Leicester, where we were both offered excellent jobs. We were given contacts from HH for a spiritual base in our new city. First, we went to Free Evangelical Church, and later we became members of a Baptist congregation.

Creative ways of God's leadership

Soon after getting settled in in Leicester, we met Peter Anderson, who like many people was important to me for my personal development in the UK, through my brother, the globetrotter Pavel. 

Peter Anderson was in contact with our church in Prague and with other Central European and Eastern European protestant congregations since the intense Bolshevik times in Communist Czechoslovakia, and he was a determined, but also a smart evangelist, aware of the socialist circumstances and danger in that part of Europe. He established legitimate church contacts, he sometimes travelled with his wife Audrey on official pre-announced visits, and he inconspicuously and cleverly organised illegal deliveries of Christian books printed in the West in the Czech language.

One day he was preaching to our local congregation on Vrázova street, in the Smíchov area of Prague, where my brother Pavel heard him. After Peter's service they started talking, as was usual for him at any opportunity he had to speak with a foreigner. When Peter replied to one of his inquisitive questions that he is from Leicester, that got things rolling, Peter promised to send us Pavel’s greetings, and immediately the Lord inspired him with a plan that then influenced the direction of our interests in working for the Lord. Peter soon visited our home in Glenfield, a suburb of Leicester.

While having a pleasant conversation about his work, especially about his contacts with Christians in Czechoslovakia, he started to enthusiastically talk about the Christian organisation Trans World Radio, which invested into establishing a broadcasting station in Monte Carlo, from where it communicates the Gospel on radio frequencies to those countries in Central and Eastern Europe where it's not so easy to be an active practicing, Christian. In Monte Carlo, a Czechoslovakian division, led by Ing. Oto Vožeh, also started operating. Oto and his family had left Czechoslovakia, he became an immigrant and started to devote his efforts to developing two divisions - a Czech one and a Slovakian one - to establish and broadcast radio programmes to Czechoslovakia. The communications tower in Monte Carlo had several powerful antennas. Oto's division apparently needed help, there weren't enough people that side of the Iron Curtain to deal with it. The Poloha family helped him. They had escaped to Wales and were to create programmes for Slovakia. Robert and Emi Poloha decided to get stuck into it, they began working diligently, Robert alongside his work commitments at a textile factory, and Emi as a mother with three children. The work for TWR was unpaid. 

Peter mentioned that the Lord had given him this opportunity to involve us, and after a detailed explanation of his plan he left, saying that we should pray to the Lord about it and that we would soon meet and should let him know how we decided. Peter's local congregation, Knighton Free Evangelical Church, was very active, and he invited us to go there, then we occasionally visited it. While we were living in Glenfield, we regularly went to Kirby Muxloe Free church, at which our daughter, Kristyna, had her dedication to God. 

The following Sunday we went for a service to Knighton, and Peter and Audrey invited us for lunch at their home. 

After a good, typical English lunch at the Anderson family home we all sat comfortably in their sitting room with a view of their garden, Audrey brought coffee and biscuits, and we began to have a serious conversation about our possible involvement in TWR. Before that, Míla and I had thought it through, we received a clear "get involved" from above, and we decided to take the advice, we had already told Peter about our decision. We then got answers from him to many of our questions relating to many practical matters. How do we start? Will someone show us how to make such a 15-minute-long programme? How will we learn to record the broadcasts? What about technical equipment for it? Where will we get the money for it? What should the programme be about? We immediately or within the next several weeks received answers to all those questions and had our specific needs seen to.

The Lord will provide. 

We received books from McGregor, an evangelist from the USA, whose work we were supposed to loosely adapt for Czech Christians. I was usually the one who put it on paper, Míla typed the text on the typewriter, and then one of us narrated it. 

Peter arranged a visit of professionals from BBC Radio Leicester, who found an area in our house that had to be transformed into a soundproofed recording area, and they helped us to do that. We got the highest quality recording devices, including great Tanberg equipment and all of the necessary up-to-date accessories so we could create good quality programmes. Where did the money come from for that? The Lord had his solution for it. At a seaside holiday resort in Eastern England, Butlins at Skegness, there was to be held a regular annual meeting of many thousands of Christians lasting for several days. Peter organised for the program to include my talk, in which I spoke about Christian faith in Czechoslovakia at the time and told the participants about direct observations from my own experience. At the end of my contribution, Peter Anderson spoke about working at TWR, which we were getting into, and of the need to acquire good quality technical equipment for it. The cash collection that followed then was enough to cover the necessary expenses for the highest quality equipment. During the following months, Míla and I took part in a conference at the offices of TWR in Monte Carlo, there we met the Vožehs (our family and theirs knew each other indirectly from congregations at our church in Prague). Afterwards, we took part in communication skills training in Monte Carlo so that we could make good quality programmes. The entire matter of our involvement was dealt with as if it was meant to be. 
We were glad and thankful that we could do it.  

We worked at TWR from 1973 to 1979. Getting work done by deadlines, sending tapes with prepared voice recordings so that they could be used almost immediately, with just a standard opening with an introduction and a standard ending being added to our part, was enjoyable for us and it was good practice for what we would do in the future, even though it was demanding in terms of time, it was unpaid, and we were doing it on top of our regular paid jobs. Our boss was Ota Vožeh. He led the Czech part and the Slovakian part of the Czechoslovakian division. We continuously communicated with each other by post, and if urgent then by telegram or by phone. We met several times when we were at the offices in Monte Carlo. Ota and Renata were invited in 1974 to Knighton Evangelical Church for a discussion about work at TWR, and they also visited us. Robert and Emi Poloha were in charge of the Slovakian programmes.  

Thankful letters from our listeners in Czechoslovakia were a great reward for us all at TWR. We got messages about how people who due to illness or other reasons couldn't regularly go to church services listened to us. At that time, radio was the only way for them to receive spiritual support. Some of our friends and relatives recognised our voices but so did employees of secret services, who were not very happy about our work, and they tried to make our lives and the lives of our families difficult, particularly when after the amnesty in 1980 we could travel to Czechoslovakia. Soon before the end of our work at TWR, some new workers came to the Czech division in Monte Carlo, and after the birth of our son David the Lord had other things for us to do. We stayed in touch with TWR after 1978. Broadcasts by TWR were made legal in Czechoslovakia after the fall of the Iron curtain, and the Czechoslovakian division was relocated home. 

This episode of our lives is one of many pieces of evidence showing how important it is to put our trust and hope in leadership from the Lord, to rely on His love, His determination of the direction our missions in life should take, and His wisdom, which immeasurably exceeds the wisdom of our own plans. It was an important lesson for me about how it is worthwhile at every crossroads in life when deciding on what to do, on which path to take, to look for His will and to let yourself be led by Him. He has the best decision prepared for us. It's not always easy, it might not seem to us to be the right thing at that moment, but it will be worthwhile.   

“Even today's troubled period is under His control.”

Tim Slapak