All articles in category Germany
By Peter Winch
February 2016
Germany
Encouragement in Berlin
Liberal Christianity, National Socialism, Communism: the turbulent developments of modern German history have seemingly attacked the true church from every angle, and this is the case in Germany’s capital city, Berlin. Berlin has a population of 3.5 million and is at the centre of one of Europe’s fastest-growing economies. It is also playing a significant role in the European refugee crisis, welcoming thousands of migrants every month. Spiritual desert However, a mere 0.5 per cent of those living in this strategic city attend an evangelical church and 60 per cent would self-identify as atheistic. Against this backdrop, it has been all the more encouraging, therefore,...
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By Ben Franks
August 2015
Germany
Berlin church plant
It is apparent that Western Europe is still a mission field in 2015. Nations that would have once boasted full churches and many believers have drifted far from the truth of the gospel. Aware of this need, the church planting committee of the Evangelical Presbyterian Church in England and Wales (EPCEW) was in much discussion, during late 2011 and into 2012, concerning the needs and opportunities in Europe. In God’s providence, there were several German Christians known by one of EPCEW’s ministers and after several on-the-ground meetings in Germany, it became clear that a potential church planting nucleus was developing in Berlin. So, in September...
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By Kevin Bidwell
April 2013
Germany
Church planting in Berlin
In September 2012, the Evangelical Presbyterian Church in England and Wales (EPCEW) began a monthly church planting Bible study in south west Berlin. However, any work of church planting rarely begins without preparatory work beforehand.
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November 2011
Germany
Delayed justice
Delayed justice The Associated Press (AP) has reported that prosecutors have reopened hundreds of dormant investigations of former Nazi death camp guards. These might now be charged under a new precedent set by the conviction of retired US autoworker John Demjanjuk. Demjanjuk, now 91, was deported from the USA to Germany in 2009 to stand trial. He was convicted in May 2011 of 28,060 counts of accessory to murder, for serving as a guard at the Sobibor death camp in Nazi-occupied Poland. Given the advanced age of the suspects — the youngest are in their 80s — the German prosecutors’ office have told AP that...
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By Martin Erdmann
October 2003
Germany
Can Germany rediscover the Reformation?
Humanly speaking, the Protestant Reformation began in Germany, where Martin Luther discovered justification by faith alone and spoke out against the errors of Rome. As the Reformation spread to other lands, and new leaders emerged, German preachers and theologians remained in the forefront of what was perhaps the greatest spiritual movement since the first century — a movement to which all Protestant Christians trace their roots. Yet today, reformed Christianity is virtually unknown in the German-speaking church. Theological wasteland Only a handful of German or German-Swiss pastors are reformed in their theology or preaching, and even they do not always have churches committed to...
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By Audey Shepard
July 1999
Germany
MISSIONARY SPOTLIGHT-GERMANY
Witness in Heilbronn This is in spite of the fact that, over the years, established churches have been making great efforts to win the youth back into their fold. They have tried every (worldly) method to attract them that they could think of, yet all to no avail. Many church buildings will now need to be sold because of the falling attendance; it simply costs the government too much money to keep them open. Other churches are being consolidated into fewer meeting places, because congregations are so small. Proud of tradition There are very few truly biblical churches in Germany which hold to the truths...
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July 1999
Germany
MISSIONARY SPOTLIGHT-GERMANY
In August 1887, C. H. Spurgeon wrote in The Sword and Trowel that ‘Germany was made unbelieving by her preachers’. What happened in Germany between 1517, the year Martin Luther nailed his ninety-five theses to the church door in Wittenburg, and 1887, when England’s leading preacher made his bleak assessment, to account for this situation? Mosaic Charlemagne (742 – 814) had united Germanic tribes within the Holy Roman Empire, but only until his death. The Reformation deepened divisions in the land, fragmenting it into a mosaic of fiercely independent states, now nominally Roman Catholic, Lutheran or Calvinistic. This position continued until the emergence of Prussia,...
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By Audey Shepard
July 1999
Germany
MISSIONARY SPOTLIGHT
Witness in Heilbronn This is in spite of the fact that, over the years, established churches have been making great efforts to win the youth back into their fold. They have tried every (worldly) method to attract them that they could think of, yet all to no avail. Many church buildings will now need to be sold because of the falling attendance; it simply costs the government too much money to keep them open. Other churches are being consolidated into fewer meeting places, because congregations are so small. Proud of tradition There are very few truly biblical churches in Germany which hold to the...
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