Baptistic Theologies, 2009

ult of his expulsion, he joined the Moravians. The Moravians soon grew strong in Norway. They had their own meetings, some with pastors, in Christiania (Oslo), Moss, Drammen, Kongsberg, Sande, Holmestrand, Larvik, Skien, Kristiansand, Lista, Finnpy, Karmpy, Bergen, and Trondheim. They became the spiritual inheritors of Pietism, which was divided into different groups. Ibid., p. 41. 3 Hans Nilsen Hauge writes about one of these meetings during one of his travels in Asker (which is a town outside Oslo).... 'In Asker was a remnant of a religious movement, which I believe a layman had been the originator of, from the beginning he had been a very humble and God fearing man, so when the persecution began in Norway against them, some of them went to Germany, but later returned to Norway. I did not know any of them having a different view than the State religion, outside of their strong desire and strong conviction, their talk about those who had a different view of life and living, and in their serious search and practice of the Scriptures. I talked numerous times with an older person with the name of Christen 0degaarden, who showed more and more respect towards me....’ Christen 0degaarden was one of the Zionittene. Ibid., p. 37. 4 Professor Stiansen states that this movement was the pioneer in the evangelical renewal in the State Church in the regions where the Zionittene gained power. And was a forerunner to later free church revival movements such as the Lammers movements and the Baptist beginnings.... Ibid., p. 38. Baptist Beginnings in Norway 103 will devote a considerable part of this paper to the preparation of the soil since this is an aspect that is often overlooked. Influences on Baptist Beginnings For nearly a thousand years Norway has been a so-called Christian country. About four hundred years ago Lutheranism succeeded Roman Catholicism as the religion of the State. The National Constitution, adopted in 1814, declared in article 2 ‘that the Evangelical Lutheran Religion’ should remain the official State religion of Norway. 5 In spite of this the nineteenth century was a time of emergence of religious pluralism. 6 7 After the 1840s, the Evangelical-Lutheran state church could not recognise itself as the only Norwegian recognised church. The revival movements, the emergence of various evangelical free church organisations and foreign missions work took root after 1814, which changed the Lutheran church from within. Pietist Influence By the beginning of the eighteenth century, the Lutheran Church of Norway had become very committed to ‘orthodox’ ways in its beliefs and n practice. This intellectual orthodoxy began to ‘choke’ the life out of the church and the people began to look for alternatives. They desired a more personal experience with God and this is where Pietism played an important part. Within Lutheranism one fruit of the depressed economic and religious conditions following the