ONWARD Page 1 June 2003

MARTHA SCHLEGEL MARX
1915 – 2003

Martha Schlegel Marx, 87, went home to be with her Savior at the home of her daughter and son-in-law in McLean, VA on Thursday, February 27, 2003. One of five children of Henry and Anna Laura Schlegel, Martha was born in Nazareth, PA. After graduation from Salem College, she spent a year teaching in Colfax, NC.

For the next three decades, Martha served with her husband, Rev. Werner G. Marx (deceased, 2001) as a missionary with the Moravian Church in Honduras and Nicaragua. She loved her Lord Jesus Christ and served Him leading Bible studies and prayer groups, musical worship, and managing the accounts for the Moravian schools. She also developed a ministry to the wives of seminarians. Martha is still remembered by the many Miskito people whose lives she touched.

After returning to the United States, the Marxes moved to Pasadena, California to be close to their adult children. Here, Martha worked at Gospel Light, GLINT ministries and City Hall. In 1980, they moved to Winston-Salem where they were members of Fairview Moravian Church. Martha was involved in Bible studies and prayer ministry and especially in the initiation and support of ONWARD. Martha went into glory as a result of a stroke. However, for many years she struggled with Alzheimer’s disease. In the midst of this terrible affliction, Jesus’ light always shone in her. Daily, she carried her beautiful smile all the way to the day she met her Savior.

Martha lived the last eleven years of her life in McLean, VA. She was preceded in death, not only by her husband and son, Tad, but also by her brother, Henry Schlegel, and sisters, Katherine Hughes, Mary Walter and Louise Paul. She leaves a son John, and daughter-in-law Sonja of Dillingham, Alaska; a daughter, Martita and her husband Jerry Wein; and four grandchildren, Andrea and David Wein, and Christopher and Angelica Marx, as well as many nieces, nephews and friends. A funeral service was held Sunday, March 2, 2003, at Fairview Moravian Church with burial in God’s Acre.

NEWS FROM STAR MOUNTAIN

At the beginning of the third year of the current Intifada the Israeli occupation divided the West Bank into separate areas with military check points on the borders between these areas. All the Palestinian cities were re-occupied and put under curfew.

Movement is restricted to within a few kilometers around Star Mountain, only a small number of neighboring villages can be reached. The road to Ramallah is controlled by military checkpoints and can only be used, if at all, on foot. Each day it is uncertain which children or staff will arrive at the Center. Over seventy people have so far been killed at the checkpoints. Children are born in the desert sand because the mothers cannot reach the hospital in time. People die of heart attacks because the ambulances are refused access. It is understandable that the Israelis feel the need to protect themselves against terrorist attacks but what we experienced at the checkpoints has little to do with the fight against terrorism.

When the students are not able to come to our Center, we are going to them. We are training them at home in their families and their villages.

The financial situation of the parents of our students gets worse because most of them have lost their jobs. With the help of international relief organizations we have been able to distribute baskets of food to eighty families.

Our staff spends more than 3 hours on the road to get to Star Mountain, using alternative dirt roads. The journey would normally take 15 minutes. Some of them were held for more than 2 hours at the military checkpoints and the soldiers did not allow them to pass, using tear gas and sound bombing to make them turn back. All these obstacles did not stop our staff from working as they could e.g. following up disabled persons by telephone.

Sometimes they even slept at Star Mountain, several days away from their families. The brother of one of our teachers was killed by the Israeli military and her husband was arrested when he (to P. 2)