The German Swiss Conference
By J. T. Boettcher
The fourth annual session of the German-Swiss Conference was held in Sissach, Canton Baseland (about twenty kilometers south of Basel), June 29 to July 5. This village has about twenty-five hundred inhabitants. It is located in a beautiful basin, and is surrounded on all sides by mountains, whose green sides are covered with forests of oak, pine, birch, and beech. In the surrounding farms are many orchards, the cherry-tree, the apple-tree, and the pear-tree predominating. At the time of the meeting, cherries were two cents a pound. We never had a better attendance, either from the outside or of our own brethren. The churches in Zurich, Basel, St. Gall, Winterthur, and Aarau were represented by about thirty delegates, and on Sabbath, there were one hundred and eighty of our people present. The people from the village and the surrounding country were very orderly, and gave14good attention to the truths presented by the ministering brethren. Brethren Conradi, Schuberth, and Weber aided the conference workers in giving the message God has for the people to-day. The weather was favorable throughout. The three hundred or more outsiders on Sunday gave sixty-seven francs toward defraying our expenses. Our people generally expressed themselves as having received the richest spiritual blessings they ever experienced. The work of the conference moved off harmoniously. The reports from the workers showed that God had blessed their labors. The last of December, 1902, we had 290 members; and for the quarter ending March 31, 1904, the membership was 333. The treasurer’s report showed a surplus of three thousand francs. In view of the financial blessing God has given us, we felt it a privilege to join the other German Conferences in voting a second tithe to the union, for missionary purposes, during 1904. During the past year, the hand of God has been seen in many different ways. In the canton of Zurich, where a brother had been doing Bible and colporteur work, and then left for America, one of our workers followed up the interest. The hall in which the meetings had been held did not have the very best reputation, so we desired to change, but we did not know where we could go. We laid the matter in the hands of the Lord, and were directed to a temperance restaurant. Looking over the papers, and thinking that some place might be provided, we asked the family in charge of this restaurant, if they did not know where we might find a suitable meeting-hall. Upon our making this request, they offered us their own house. The tables were set to one side, and the chairs were used to seat the people who came to hear. Our rent was only seventy-five centimes a night, and the lady herself paid twenty-five centimes of that each time the collection plate was passed around, so that we easily covered our expenses. The whole family attended. Shortly the mother and daughter accepted the message, and the father will be baptized this week. He is a machinist in one of the largest silk factories in Switzerland. Upon making up his mind to take his stand, he wrote a letter to the director of the factory, stating his convictions. The director visited him personally, while at the Basel Sanitarium where he was taking treatment, and told him that he could have the Sabbath free. We know that God directed us to the house of this brother. In other localities we have also seen how the Lord has opened the way for people to obey the fourth commandment. Another instance: A young lady was working in an envelope factory in Zurich. She began to obey the Lord’s commandments, and her employer discharged her, but as she had taken her stand for God, she really believed the Lord would open the way for her in some manner. The very day she had to leave the first place, another gentleman engaged in the same sort of work asked her to accept a position with him, and she contracted for three years’ service, with the Sabbath free, at a better salary than she had received before. One thing which would be of interest to our people, we might relate. A brother who has a large family was sentenced to thirty-five days’ imprisonment because he did not send his children to the state school on the Sabbath. But while in jail, he had an opportunity to testify to the truth; for, when the first Sabbath-day came, he was asked to go out to work, as on other days. Of course he could not do this, and he gave them plainly to understand that this was the reason why he was in prison. However, the jail-keeper did not let him off. He had on his morning slippers, and was asked to put on his working shoes. This he did not do. The jailor tried to put the shoes on his feet, but the shoes were rather small, so his attempt was a failure. Then he said, “I will go and get a larger pair, and I will get them on you.” The shoes were brought and forcibly put on his feet. And then he was kicked down the stairway and beaten with the fist, as he went along. Of course he would work under no consideration. Then he was put in a dark room, with no bedding, save a little straw on the cold stone floor. He was obliged to remain there over Sabbath and Sunday. He received only bread and water for his food. This was repeated the following Sabbath. I visited the chief of police of the confederation, who plainly told me that nothing could be done for the man, that the school law as he interpreted it was a part of the civil law which must be complied with. But I went to see the jailor, and had a talk with him about our faith. He of course thought the man an extremist, and wished me to influence him to pay the fine and go home; but this I could not do. The brother was called in before the keeper of the jail, and was reprimanded by the jailer for being in prison when he might be at home with his family, where it would be much better for him. The brother replied that he did not look for ease; with him it was a question of right and wrong, and as the Lord plainly commands to keep the Sabbath day, he must obey God first, and suffer the consequences. The visit, however, had a good impression upon the mind of the jailer. The following Sabbath, our brother was permitted to stay in a room, and was given good food. The remaining time during which he served, he was given the easiest place to work on the farm, and that was to herd the cattle. When he arrived home after having served his time, he found a new sentence pending, amounting to one hundred and thirty francs, or another twenty-six days’ imprisonment. The town clerk and the president wrote him that if he would not send his children to school on the Sabbath, they would take them away from him by force, and put them into orphan asylums or poorhouses. They wrote him that they would inflict upon him the severest penalty of the law, for disobeying the government officers. We know not what the outcome will be, but we pray that in some way the Lord will help this brother and advance his own work in the earth. The school and military laws are great questions with which we have to contend in this country. Our friends who are acquainted with God’s faithful servant, Elder Erzenberger, will be interested to learn that the long years of service which he has seen in the third angel’s message having made his testimony in behalf of our faith of great value, the brethren have called him to labor entirely under the direction of the German Union. The German-Swiss Conference heartily expressed its thanks for the faithful labors of Elder Erzenberger during the past, and asked that the union, in consideration of his being called into the more general work, would at least provide in some measure for his loss by sending a young Bible worker or licentiate, and several experienced canvassers to labor in German Switzerland. The brethren here were very free to express their thanks also for the volume of Testimonies which has been recently received from our Hamburg press, and recommended that all the German-Swiss brethren be encouraged to provide themselves with this book. The report of the nominating committee, which was adopted, reads as follows: President, J. T. Boettcher; Secretary, W. Kury; Treasurer, Hamburg Branch of International Tract Society in Basel; Sabbath-school Department, Mrs. L. Sebald; Conference Committee, J. T. Boettcher, J. Erzenberger, W. Kury, L. Aufranc, A. Weidmann: and these, with four lay-members, form the auditing committee. For the coming year, credentials were granted to one minister, licenses to two licentiates, and missionary credentials to three Bible workers. We have seven colporteurs. The collections of the Sabbath-school on Sabbath amounted to one hundred and thirty-four francs; on Sunday the First-day offerings were taken up, and some comments made about being faithful in these gifts, as they are to go to the support of the East African Mission. The collection on First-day amounted to ninety francs. A collection of four hundred francs for the tent fund was also received on the ground. We begin the new year with hope and courage, and we ask that our friends will remember us in their prayers, that all our workers may be more thoroughly in earnest in their efforts to save souls and hasten the coming of the Lord, through their faithfulness in giving the warning message for this generation. Especially would we ask to be remembered in the continuation of the tent effort at Sissach, as we plan to remain here for a time to follow up the interest.