2009 Convention Convenes at Monastery Where Luther Turned Protestant

The highlight of this year’s ASI Germany convention (29 Oct. – 1 Nov. 2009) certainly was the report by the Australian Adventist Rodney MacCallum. The convention took place in the Erfurt Lutheran monastery where Martin Luther had spent several years and where he first encountered a gracious God. Rodney told the attendees about his contacts with Moslems and the major breakthrough in Adventist-Moslem relations.

The 80-130 in attendance were able to choose between two workshops on witnessing and giving Bible studies. The main speaker was Karen Lewis, Director of a Bible Worker Program of the Rocky Mountains Conference. Since she herself only recently had become a Seventh-day Adventist she was able through her refreshing approach to introduce Bible lessons which she had devised herself. She pointed out that for 78% of all baptisms in the Adventist Church, the key in the beginning is friendship. Karen herself had studied the Word of God with 87 people of which 85 were baptised. In the beginning she was unable to find the right material for Bible studies. Therefore, she devised her own lessons covering 30 topics. They are arranged in such a way, that in the beginning a close personal relationship with Jesus will start to develop. Only then are the people guided into getting to know the Bible truth and prophecy.

The second main speaker, László Szabó, was born in Hungary and today is lecturer at Friedensau Seminary where he teaches Practical Theology. In his workshop and during another presentation he confirmed the accuracy of Karen Lewis’ approach. He told his audience that during a family and friendship camp meeting for unblievers in Hungary, many people opened up to the influence of the Holy Spirit. As a result, many decisions for baptism were made.

The “raisins” in the convention pie again were the testimonies of the German ASI members some of who described their path into the Adventist church and their missionary activities. It once again became apparent that especially the nesly converted Adventists are the most active when it comes to sharing the gospel with others. Among those were Dr. Rüdiger Rentsch and his wife Mei Rentsch. Mei was born and raised in China and had come to Germany to study mechanical engineering at Bremen University. She got to know the Adventist church through a university employee and fell in love with the message. She passed her enthusiasm about the Advent Message on to her lecturer. The outcome was, that both got baptised and a week later got married to each other. Their witnessing already resulted in two more baptisms. Rüder’s and Mei’s vision is to establish a mission for the Chinese graduate students in Germany. At Bremen University alone there are currently approximately 1,000 Chinese graduate students. Another impressive testimony came from Gordon Gray. The American is Director of Gospel Outreach, an ASI ministry with currently more than 2,000 indigenous missionaries in the field.

Dr. Gerhard Padderatz, re-elected President of ASI Germany, the presented the surprise guest of the event, Rodney MacCallum. He is an Australian, who maintains friendly Adventist-Moslem relations. Some months ago – after he had helped out a Moslem lady – he had received an invitation from an influential Moslem to speak about the Advent Message in a mosque. When he wanted to finish his presentation after his allotted 30 minutes, he was requested to continue speaking. Thus a short presentation turned into a lecture of 2 hours and 45 minutes. The believers in the overcrowded mosque were listening intently and were fascinated – especially about the Adventist understanding of last-day events as foretold in prophecy. After that the leaders asked “If you Adventists have this light for more 150 years, how come that only now we hear your message?” Since then Rodney has been asked to give many more lectures in this mosque. More often than not they have been transferred to the internet via Livestream.

It is Bible prophecy, which entices the interest of our Moslem friends. The Islamic leadership of that mosque who had received a valuable copy of the Great Controversy as a gift decided to photocopy the book six times and distribute the individual chapters amongst their members – two chapters at a time. This way everyone was able to study the book at the same time. They confessed: “We have never read a more profound book!” All over the world now there are many Moslems who show an interest in the Advent Message.

Could it be that during the next few years, we find more and more Moslems friends being interested in the Adventist message? How are we going to react? Are we prepared to “do our homework”, which means to start to re-studying the treasure of our prophetic knowledge? All attendees at Erfurt were deeply moved about this report.

The annual fundraising for selected mission projects came to over 26,000 Euros ($39,000) twice the amount needed for the projects. God certainly was present in the historic buildings where Reformation history was written some 500 years earlier. And he was present in hearts of those present.

Sigrun Schumacher