As a Holocaust survivor: as a young boy he witnessed Hitler's march into Vienna, he had to say goodbye to his Jewish grandmother who fled to El Salvador, he had to say goodbye to his Jewish mother who fled to Great Britain, he heard (years later) that his Jewish grandfather had been deported to Kiev and was murdered there, and he heard of other Jewish relatives who died in Theresienstadt - yet God was so gracious to him that he was able even to come to Germany and get help from his father and was helped by Evangelical sisters at a farm in Schwäbisch Hall where he got training in agriculture was protected from the Nazis, he was even conscripted by them as an "only" half-Jewish young man, yet God protected him because he got ill just before they wanted to send him to the battlefield, so he did not need to serve as a soldier after all

He gave him a family: he lived with his mother and grandmother in Vienna for several years and learned to love Jewish customs, feasts and the Jewish Bible; he lived with his father, half-sister and stepmother for a couple of years in Stuttgart

He blessed him with a Christian wife for most of his long life: 63 years, and 4 children, and 12 grandchildren and 6 great grandchildren; he loved to spend time with them all and showed lively and active interest in their lives

He kept him healthy, healed him from tuberculosis as a boy, from Malaria at the age of 34, and he got a hip-joint replaced when he was about 80, but for the most part, he was able to enjoy a long, healthy life without disabilities