FOR many world travelers Stockholm, the iSwedish capital, spells sophistication and prosperity. This beautiful city of one million, built on numerous islands in Lake Malaren, is the nerve center of Sweden, Europe's most prosperous country. Modernistic buildings silhouette the skyline, and streets lined with elegant shops are flooded by heavy traffic.
Sweden a nation of age-old traditions, as well as cultural and religious institutions, has since the turn of the century completely changed its face in its explosive outreach for a new way of life and a higher living standard. Quality, efficiency, prosperity, and pleasure are all terms widely used by authors in their attempts to portray this nation of 8 million citizens.
There are 3,500 Adventists in Sweden, 400 of whom live in Stockholm, where our church property in the old city center stands in the shadow of the demolition squad. By 1971 the bulldozers will have leveled it to the ground, and a new skyline will take form on this site. The Stockholm church is therefore busily engaged in planning for new church facilities.
However, more important than the plans for a new church building is the work now going on in the field of building the church membership, and these days Stockholm is responding to Adventist preaching in a way that is beyond the expectation of all of us who live and work here.
Five Thousand Attend Opening Meetings
The preacher is Australian born Northern European Division evangelist J. F. Coltheart. It appears that the lecture-type archeological approach that Coltheart has used with success elsewhere also appeals to the Swedes. At any rate, the response from the public was fantastic, and well over five thousand people came to hear the opening lectures.
To find a suitable hall in Stockholm was a problem, but we ended up with the beautiful and modern Folkets Hus Congress Hall in the very center of the city. With a seating capacity of thirteen hundred this half-circular hall was booked for four sessions, 2:00, 4:00, 6:00, and 8:00 P.M. on Sundays; and two sessions, 6:00 and 8:00 P.M. on Wednesdays. Congress Hall can also, through a system of movable walls, be separated into smaller hall units, seating either nine hundred or five hundred, so the hall adapts itself marvelously to the particular type of program Pastor Coltheart had planned. Furthermore, within the premises of this modern building are a large number of other halls, cafeterias, lecture rooms, theaters, et cetera, which made it possible to arrange the Bible Seminar, a vital detail in Coltheart's method, within the same building where the campaign was being held.
Pastor Coltheart is using the archeologi: cal approach in his ministry and is linking Biblical truth to the historic past as expressed in the magnificent remains from antiquity in the Biblical lands and the Mediterranean area.
Advertising
Under Pastor Coltheart's method, endeavors are made to bring out as large an opening audience as possible, and then for the rest of the campaign to work through the elimination method within this audience. Consequently all the advertising is done during the opening week and is as follows:
1. A letter of invitation containing the program for the opening meeting and a special invitation card are sent out. The addresses are taken from the telephone book and the envelopes are handwritten.
Experiences in other fields have proved a response of approximately 8 per cent based on the number of letters sent out. With 5,200 seats available, 65,000 letters were sent out one week before the opening meeting, and the newspaper ads were scheduled to appear in the papers the day' after the letters had reached the homes. People had to book their seats in advance over the telephone, and each advertising media and each newspaper had its own number so it would be possible to discover the effectiveness of the various medias. The booking office had thus six telephone lines coming in. The next morning telephones started to ring, and for a couple of days the lines were almost blocked because of the heavy booking. All seats were taken a day and a half after the advertising drive was put on, and between two thousand and three thousand people could not be supplied with tickets.
The Bible Seminar
After the second week all public advertising ceased, and the campaign concentrated on the people who were already attending. Naturally the attendance dropped from week to week as more and more testing truths were presented, and today, after eleven weeks, the audience numbers between six hundred and seven hundred. What is promising, however, is the attendance at the Bible Seminars. These seminars, which are public Sabbath meetings, started after the ninth week of the campaign. The first Bible Seminar lasted for the full day, or ten hours, and 175 were in attendance. The program varies with a number of items, including Bible marking. Meals were served to the attending people, who were all supplied with name cards to enable them to get acquainted. Many signed up for the seminar in advance, and there was a registration fee of one dollar. The seminar held the following week was reduced in time to the Sabbath morning only. The attendance was two hundred, and the program was more geared after a regular Sabbath program in our church. The seminar prepares the people for our church, and after five to seven weeks the people will meet in our church.
The evangelist has not exercised emotional pressure on his audience. The lectures are packed with information and interesting details and give a very thorough explanation of the subjects presented. Printed or duplicated papers containing outlines of the studies are distributed to the people in attendance, who put them in a scrapbook provided for this purpose.
There is no song or music except some special items, and these are mainly in the second half of the campaign. In the Bible Seminar, however, congregational singing is introduced, and here more pressure is put on as the people mature. This way they are led to make a decision for Christ.
The lectures were translated. The interpreter is the North Swedish Conference secretary-treasurer, Bertil Utterback, who does this difficult job in an excellent way. There were some doubts to begin with whether it would be possible to carry on a campaign through an interpreter in a country like Sweden, but there have been practically no drawbacks.
A team of eight workers cooperate with Pastor Coltheart in the campaign, and house visitation is carried on in a big way. Each team member averages more than one hundred calls a week. The campaign has now entered into its final stage, and the first baptism will be held in May, followed by several others as the people are prepared.
This is a period of great evangelistic activity in the Stockholm church. Enthusiasm and happiness among our members are by-products of this crusade, which has been of great value to our work as a whole in Sweden.
