Evangelicals and Europe’s spiritual reality.

Lecture CNEF (Conseil National des Évangéliques de France), 27 January 2012

Rev. Niek Tramper

Intro

It’s very encouraging to see you all here, seeing such a vibrant dynamic organization. The roots of CNEF go back to a period of reconciliation of Evangelicals, a time of asking forgiveness and seeking unity. That’s why I am convinced that CNEF is not a result of activities of men, but a gift of God. In the name of the wider European Evangelical body I want to greet you and to congratulate you with this beautiful congress. What you do on a national level in France, that is what EEA tries to do on a European level. We have three main focus points:

• To unite across denominations to come together to pray. How can there be future for Europe, if we don’t join hands to pray for this continent?
• To equip. EEA represents 36 national movements like CNEF, which means a massive amount of resources. So we can cooperate, for example to equip Christian students to prepare for a career in politics, cooperate to combat the evil of human trafficking, or work together in Europe wide church planting networks
• To represent. For CNEF it is very important to represent the Evangelicals of France to the authorities. Likewise European Evangelicals need to be heard in Brussels. If you are convinced that European Evangelicals need a clear, united voice in Brussels, pray and support the work of our staff member Christel Ngambi. He works for you!

A couple of months ago I was asked to speak at an Evangelical Alliance meeting in Germany together with the Ghanese pastor Richard Aidoo. He should speak about the theme: ‘Full shelves and empty faces’. He actually didn’t touch his subject, but he started to declare his unconditional love for Germany and the Germans. ‘My fathers heard the gospel because your fathers brought it to the darkest places of Africa. Now I want to pay back a little bit!’ His whole lecture was telling funny stories how he broke the ice and took every opportunity to share the love of Christ with his fellow citizens who hide themselves behind their books and their newspapers in the train and the bus. Richard, who came as a refugee from Ghana 20 years ago, is leading a growing international church in Düsseldorf (New Life Church), with 6 services every Sunday bringing together over 1000 people from more than 40 nationalities, including German. They took over a Roman Catholic Church building in Düsseldorf for 1 Euro and prepared it as their church building.

The spiritual reality of Europe

The story of ‘New Life Church’ is not exceptional. We see many examples of vibrant churches on our continent. Therefore it was a shock for me to notice that at Cape Town Lausanne congress in October 2010 Europe was seen as an old cynic lady who lost all her interest in God, and certainly in the church, a spiritually dying continent 

In Latin America, parts of Asia and Africa the number of Christians grows 10 times faster compared to the growth of population. The past decade brought an important change: 50% of all Christians actually live on the southern hemisphere. In 1900 in Africa only 1% was Christian. Now Christians form half of the African people. The centre of Christianity moves again. It moved from Jerusalem to Alexandria and Rome. Later it moved to North Europe and to North America. Now it has moved to the south, to Brasil, Peru, to China and Korea. Recently I heard a report from the churches in China. Congregations experience a fascinating growth, that already begun during the cultural revolution and that continued under communism. On an average Sunday in China more Christians come together for a church meeting than in the whole of Europe!

Marked by fear.

The famous US sociologist of religion Philip Jenkins, who published several books on the future of Europe is very pessimistic about the future of the traditional church in Europe. According to him, European Christianity is near to disappearing. He even said a couple of months ago: ‘We should prepare the burial of the official church.’ 

According to Jenkins Europe is a ‘continent of fear’. Confirm the way European media deal with religion as a problem, whether you speak about islamization of Europe, the paedophilic priests in the RC church (institute that brought rottenness), or the fear for all kinds of religious sects, including evangelicals. In all cases religion is seen in a criminal perspective. Many articles and interviews in European press have as a basic emotion: fear, fear for losing individual freedom, fear for losing personal and social security, fear for losing financial and material possession. But do we have to stick to that reality?

Signs of hope in Europe

Like the Reformation and the revivals in times of crisis, I believe that ‘Evangelical revivals’ are a ‘sign of hope’ in Europe. If we consider Pentecostal and charismatic churches belonging to the Evangelicals  we may see a massive worldwide growth. They seem to be the only growing churches in Europe. Growth of Evangelicals in France is one of the signs of hope! Although you may question the point what we mean by growth. Growth in numbers doesn’t necessarily mean growth in healthy spiritual life and in a Biblical life style. Nevertheless, let me mention three areas where I see signs of hope in the whole of Europe. 

1. Migrants. In many European countries migration is addressed as a problem. Nationalist politicians stress the danger of loosing security, jobs, traditional, national values. We shouldn’t forget that many migrants are Christians. Migrant churches are the fastest growing churches in Europe. The biggest ones in Kiev, London being Nigerian. In nearly all big cities in (Western) Europe the dying established churches can be confronted by vibrant, dynamic, growing migrant churches with a very non-Western liturgy but also a very non Western approach in helping their members to face the social day to day challenges like housing, educating children, employment, financial crisis etc. Recently in the city of Rotterdam it was calculated that the common effort of the migrant churches to help migrants with social problems helped the city council to save over 4 million Euro!

2. Church planting. I consider the European Church planting movement as an important sign of hope for renewal. It has grown considerably the last 10 years. Do you know that over 20 pan-European networks already exist? At the end of October I attended the City to City Network meeting in Berlin, bringing together over 450 church planters from across Europe. Interesting initiatives were presented in Baptist as well Reformed churches. In the city of Budapest you can find over 4 flourishing church plants belonging to the Reformed church of Hungary. A Baptist church in Zalau (Romania) experienced 5 years ago some miraculous healings after an intensive period of prayer. It meant the start of an unthought-of growth and today the church has 5000 members and around 10 church plants in the environment.

3. Revival movements in the established churches. Established churches are in great problems today. Within the RC church great scandals dealing with paedophilic priests were publicized. But we must not forget that in the bosom of the traditional churches renewal movements have been growing since a couple of decades. The roots of the Evangelicals are in the Reformation. The Reformers loved the church and had pain about the church. Can we still love our mother, our grandmother. Can we feel pain because of her? I belong to a Pietistic Evangelical movement in the Reformed church in the Netherlands and I can testify that now over 400 churches belong to that movement, while at the end of the 19^th century this church was very liberal and marked by rationalist theology. You could hardly find any Evangelical churches. Today in my home church each Sunday you will find around 1000 people, including many youth and children. Last week of December nearly 3000 young people came together in Erfurt, Germany for the Mission Net congress. This is an initiative supported by EEA and EEMA. In the same week 30.000 young people came together in Berlin for the Taizé meetings, most of them Roman Catholic. There is a growing number of young people with spiritual hunger. Can we help them? Pray for them? Help them to find the truth in Christ?!

Actual challenges for the European church

How can we summarize the main challenges for today’s church?:

1. I mentioned already the growth of non-Western Christianity in Europe. The heart of Christianity is in the South and the East (if you consider growth, dynamics, influence on daily life). If you think about money, theological education and power, the centre is still in the North/West.  The church in Europe has many colours now. But still there is a lot of devision between Western and non-Western churches. We need to work for cooperation. This is a task for CNEF as well as for the EEA.

2. Many Christians welcome the disappearance of the church as an institute of power. Does it mean that we have to refrain from public engagement? No, Daniel choose the serve in the pagan society of Babylon even while he could consider the authorities as enemies. There is a big need to help individual Christians to live their Christian life in the ‘market-place’. Our Evangelical calling is to bloom at the place we are planted!

3. The rise of Islam and of Buddhism. This requires two things:

A.  A renewal of apologetics to answer questions and objections of Islam and to understand the core values of (modern forms of) Buddhism. We have to know their world of thinking and living

B.  Loving, hospitable and caring communities to live the faith and to show the truth of love.

4. The end of the affluent society. We have to face a new reality in Europe: financial loss, decreasing market, increasing unemployment and poverty.  In this context churches are called to provide a safe place for poor people, the unemployed, the weak, the refugees. A counter-culture guided by the values of the Kingdom, not any longer by the standards of economic and financial power. Can we make a difference at the basis of the values of the Gospel at the very spot where we life and work? With God’s help we can. May the living God help us from day to day. To Him the honour and glory!