10.10.2011

150 years of Batak Mission

It was a moving jubilee celebration service in the church of Unterbarmen (Wuppertal) on Friday night. An Indonesian choir from Bielefeld, the brass band “Blechwerk” from Wuppertal and the small choir of the United Evangelical Mission contributed to the solemn atmosphere. A great number of Indonesian guests from all over Germany and even from the Netherlands were among the about hundred worship participants.

Sermon by Barbara Rudolph

Together with the German participants they sung the bilingual songs and heard the sermon given by church official Barbara Rudolph. The head of the Ecumenism Department of the Evangelical Church in the Rhineland preached about the coming kingdom of peace (Micah, chapter 4). This is the text that the missionary Ludwig Ingwer Nommensen (1834-1918) had chosen for his first sermon on Sumatra. In her sermon, Barbara Rudolph led the congregation to the realization that, at all places and all times, all peoples depend on God. “There are not those who already know, who have already attained salvation, there is only approaching God, listening and learning together,” Rudolph said.

Mission has Left its Mark on Wuppertal

“The Mission has helped to shape the city of Wuppertal,” Silvia Kaut, Mayor of Wuppertal, said in her welcome address at the reception following the service. She said the UEM was regarded as a part of the city. Even the Indonesian Consul General Damos Dumoli Agusman had arrived from Frankfurt to attend the celebration. “Thank you God for bringing the missionaries to us,” the evangelical Christian said in his address. He emphasized that the missionaries had not only brought the gospel but also education to Indonesia, and that Nommensen’s work continued to have an effect to this day. Regine Buschmann, UEM moderator, said: „150 years ago, Nommensen would certainly have never dreamt that a Batak Christian would be a member of the Management Team or the Women’s Officer of the Mission in Wuppertal or an ecumenical co-worker in Bethel.”

Symposium: Today’s Mission and Church put to the Test

“The church in Indonesia must again focus on those issues that really concern the people,” was one of the statements in the discussion that took place in the main auditorium of the Theological University of Wuppertal on Saturday. The symposium had been organized by the UEM and its Archive and Museum Foundation. More than 60 persons had signed up for it, almost half of whom were Indonesians living in Germany. The panellists were Gomar Gultom, the General Secretary of the Protestant Communion of Churches in Indonesia (PGI), Eirene Gulö, member of the UEM Council, and Christian Sandner, pastor in the Parish Service for Mission and Ecumenism (GMÖ). Prior to the discussion, working groups had taken a critical look at mission and church and their relation to other religions, the state, the role of women and to the traditional culture (Adat). Sonia Parera-Hummel, UEM Executive Secretary Asian Region, concluded: “The path ahead of us is long and difficult. But as with the missionaries in those days Christ will help us also today to fulfil our mission.”