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In the Rhenish Conference

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Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Apr 14, 1910

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 87, No. 15.

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In the Rhenish Conference

By Guy Dail

HERE in Elberfeld the last annual session of the Rhenish Conference, which has been assembled since Wednesday, closed, evening after the Sabbath, January 29. The forenoon service took the form of a revival, and a number manifested their desire to reconsecrate themselves to the Master. This afternoon was solemnized by the ordination of Brother E. Gugel to the gospel ministry. In the social service that followed the ordination, about five hundred took part within half an hour, giving short, earnest testimonies. The congregation was divided into many groups, so that this was made a possibility. The help of Brethren L. R. Conradi, J. H. Schilling, and O. Itzman, and Dr. E. Behn of Friedensau, was appreciated.
The Rhenish field is compact. It is composed of Rhenish Prussia, and is situated in the beautiful Rhine Valley. This is one of the great industrial centers of the German empire. It contains such cities as Cologne and Duesseldorf, Aix-la-Chapelle and Bonn, and Elberfeld-Barmen, Essen, Saarbrucken, and Crefeld, in all of which we have churches or companies of believers. The population of Rhenish Prussia is seven million, very largely devoted to the manufacture of silks, cottons, and hardwares.
Two hundred sixty-six were received by baptism and vote last year. Three new companies were received into the conference at this meeting. After the auditing was done, there was sufficient surplus in the treasury to warrant the voting of three hundred dollars toward the West German Union Mission fields — Austria, Dalmatia, and Holland and Flemish Belgium — and one hundred dollars for the union conference educational fund. Forty copies of “Ministry of Healing” were sold at the meeting. The book sales for the year amount to nearly $8,120, a little less than in 1908.
There was harmony in the business transactions throughout. Elder J. G. Oblander was re-elected president. He will be assisted by nearly twenty workers the coming year. The evening lectures were well attended, many being obliged to stand during the entire service.
We bespeak for this conference, with its wide-awake people, its unentered cities, its largely Catholic inhabitants, and its great harvest-fields, an interest in the sympathies and in the prayers of our brethren in all parts of the world.
GUY DAIL.