Baptistic Theologies, 2009

vic Churches, which was in itself a sign of an identity that transcended ethnicity. Just before the Second World War, the Polish political situation was clearly full of foreboding. The German population in Poland started to turn 76 ‘Ksztalcenie teologiczne ...’ K. Wiazowski, Slowo Prawdy, Warszawa, 2003, p. 8. 77 Emil Wagner, Baptysci i Pokrewne Ugrupowania, Tygodnik Powszechny, 39, 24 IX 196. The whole article was reproduced in Slowo Prawdy, September, No. 12, 1961, p. 16. Between the Wars: Golden Years of Polish Baptists 101 more toward Nazism, the Jews were being persecuted and there were 78 tensions over Ukrainians. The economic situation in Poland was deteriorating. The Baptist churches had been involved in the difficult period of national reconstruction after the First World War and then had seen their mission work flourish in significant ways. What they did not know was that a great deal of what had been accomplished would be devastated by the War. What was to come, for Polish Baptists and for society as a whole, was worse than anything they had experienced before. Yet the decades considered in this study show what Polish Baptists, at their best, were able to achieve. Pastor Zbigniew Wierzchowski, Gtogow, Poland. 7,s Norman Davies, Serce Europy (Heart of Europe) (Oxford: Oxford University Press, Polish Edition, 1984), p. 128. 102 Baptistic Theologies 8 Baptist Beginnings in Norway: Preparing the Soil for the Establishment of the First Baptist Church in Porsgrunn/Skien Alf Olav Kavli Introduction Throughout history, changes and new developments has never happened in a vacuum. It has always been a reaction to various processes and pressures either from the outside or from within a country or organisation. The Baptist work in Norway did not ‘just happen’, it started as a result of outside events and because of the influences of others and other movements. In this paper I will show and document how and which of the various spiritual movements and revivals contributed to Baptist work gaining a foothold in Norway. I will document how the Pietist 1 2 3 movement opened the way for the Moravian Brethren, who influenced Hans Nilsen Hauge who led the ‘Haugian revivals’ which laid the groundwork for Zionittene and finally for G.A. Lammers’ revivals. 4 One influenced the other and, I will argue, prepared the way for the other, which finally produced the ‘prepared soil ’ for the Baptist work in Norway, beginning in 1857, and the eventual establishment of a local Baptist congregation in Porsgrunn/Skien in 1860.1 1 Ingulf Diesen, Norges Vekkelseshistorie gjennom 1000 dr [Norway’s Revival History through 1000 years] (Trondhjem: Hermon Forlag, 1994), p. 25. 2 Some of the Pietist revival members became involved with the Moravian movement. One of them had previously been a Lutheran Pastor, Gerner i Valer, who led a large revival in Vestfold. After returning from Germany as a res