Rocky Cape Christian Community

Report of a Hungarian Seventh Day Adventist Pastor who visited a Twelve Tribes community in Germany

Dear Brothers and Sisters,  

With this letter I would like to report about a special experience which I had on the last day of last year. This experience is all about an encounter,  which I cannot in any way take as a coincidence, and I am sensing that it has brought a change into my life which cannot be ignored.

I would be glad if you could share your thoughts and opinions with me. (A circular letter such as this may be something new, but it seems to me that it is a useful way of exchanging our experiences.)  It is true that our congregation consciously considers itself God’s chosen people in these last days. At the same time, it confesses in its doctrine that the letter written to Laodicea is to be understood as written to us. The roots of the Adventist movement seem to have been in a “Philadelphia time” when Christ brought us out. We are hoping for the renewal, which will lead the rest of the congregation back to brotherly love.

Furthermore, we believe that God’s people is wherever the gospel is clearly preached, and where God’s commandments, with the fourth commandment included in them, are honored — even if the deeds are based on the lukewarm Laodicean congregation.  What would we say if we unexpectedly came upon the Philadelphia congregation!? If it came into existence completely independently of the Adventist movement?! If we met a Sabbath-keeping community whose members would prove to have the brotherly love of the first Christians — who would have nothing to do with Babylon and obviously nothing with Laodicea either!?

How it all began

The first encounter was in the summer of 2000 in France between my physical sister (She is studying French) and two strangers.

Right in the crowd of a music festival, near the market booths, my sister started noticing two men in their booth who were selling clothes home-made out of linen and wool, along with shoes. They stood out to her in this crowd because of their eyes that shone with purity; they were like a city set on a hill. When talking to them, it came out that they were Sabbath- keeping Christians (even though they do not refer to themselves that way) who fellowship daily and extensively with more than a hundred people in the context of a life which is not only believing, but all-encompassing.

My sister spent a few days including a Sabbath with them in a tucked-away village in southern France. Her letters home were expressing how moved she was. Deeply stirred in her faith and in her life,  she came home.

During her stay there, she had already been invited to an upcoming wedding. She went to attend it along with my mother. I would have liked to go with them, but unfortunately wasn’t able,  due to my service duties.  According to their report and even what meets the eye,  they have received a lot of understanding of a life of perfect love,  even though in the picture of the community some extraordinary doctrines were also unfolding before me.  The third time, I decided to go myself.  At Christmas time,  I was finally able to get some time off. This time, my sister was unable to go —because of exams, so on 12/25/00, I went with my wife and my mother. I would like to report here about this third visit.

The Encounter

This time, the destination was Germany —at the wedding, my mother had met some members from the community in Germany where part of the brethren of this special community live. (In this case only 900 km instead of 2500 km from us. In Europe they are also to be found in England and Spain.) We visited the southern of two houses in Germany. Surprisingly enough, the house they live in is in a very small village, which can’t even be found on the Germany map.  Seven houses and a chapel make up this hamlet.

We were arriving at the time of the “evening sacrifice ” at 7: 00 pm. We weren’t done pulling into the yard yet when the door opened and a rather short,  bearded man came out. He was wearing a headband,  his hair was cut short and tied back. He greeted us in Hungarian —David,  a Swabian from Transylvania,  learned Hungarian in his native village. With one arm he hugged all three of us, saying, “God brought you here. ”

After we went inside, he introduced us to the gathered community. They were welcoming us with one minute of clapping —they felt honored that we came for a visit from so far away. The honest faces,  smiling at us, loosened up our stiffness right from the start. Before long, the guitar, the clarinet, and drums were struck up; they were singing in English, it was sounding at the same time modern and ancient:  Hebraic rhythms and tunes became audible. Both little and older children took each other’s hands and danced in a circle, later some adults danced also. The atmosphere was in no way prayerful and solemn, but rather full of joy; both the songs and the dances were completely free of all ecstatic symptoms.

After the music, a man started speaking. He wasn’t preaching, but he spontaneously shared his thoughts with the others. He gave thanks that he was able to be together with his brethren. Soon someone else took over, quoted some Bible verses, and added his own thoughts to it. All of this took a good half of an hour. After that, the community formed a narrow circle, encircling the children in the middle. The men lifted their hands up to God to give thanks and to ask for His blessing. The outward forms aside, it wasn’t much different from the prayer meetings as we know them. (Except that it may have been a little more casual.) The women also prayed, but not with lifted up hands; they were always wearing a head covering during prayer times.

After the gathering, they showed us our places to stay. My mother got an extra room, and the two of us were put up in a large trailer. Later we found out that two married couples had moved out to be able to give us their own beds. (The trailer is the home of a young married couple who was still almost in their wedding week.) Since there was no more room in the house, they had to be put up with somebody in the neighboring village.

On the table there were a fruit basket and some cookies that had been prepared for us, along with a handmade welcome card painted with children’s hands that showed a hilly landscape, trees, birds, and a rainbow. On the back cover we were greeted in the name of the community in broken Hungarian. This series of a little attention here and there felt so good that I realized that I had already learned something —about true hospitality.

Yet,  I didn’t have the slightest idea how much more I was going to learn within a week —what I never would have believed:  that little children were going to be my teachers.

The “Light of Dawn ”

The history of the community goes back about 30 years.  In the late’60s in an area of the United States,  a married couple from a Pentecostal movement started practicing this fellowship of love with others —“love ” meaning the “first love ”of the time of the apostles. As a result of the frequent gatherings of the brethren many didn’t want to go home anymore ….  Together they searched the Scriptures and laid aside their pre-conceived notions and saw the truth more and more. Thus they also received the Sabbath.  Their way to the truth is as the light of dawn, which shines brighter and brighter until the full day (Pr.  4: 18) .

This process is still going on to this day —this may be part of the secret why the community, despite its theological limitations,  seems credible.  Orthodoxy or tradition didn’t come in as with most churches (And I’m afraid ours is included), which makes it impossible to grow.

As time went on, this life of brotherly love also sprang up in other countries. Today, they are about 2000. (They couldn’t tell the exact number.) The adventurous way the community in Europe came about and the testings it went through are such that a movie could be made of it. After passing through half of the continent, it finally settled down in southern France.  In their communal life,  in their understanding and teaching they have always remained united even though they live thousands of kilometers apart. They don’t have a teaching profession,  or a leader,  or a clergy. There is no loose or organized community,  but only a local community whose daily affairs are being directed by elders. To my knowledge elders are not elected,  but have their gifting within themselves,  which becomes evident to the whole group.

In answering my question how the unity and the common growth in the truth will come about, they simply said that it is God’s Spirit at work. They generally only take steps together: They only receive something if the whole community can give its Amen to it. One of the most recent of such experiences was the foot washing, which takes place before the Lord’s Supper —while we were there, they had just been practicing it for little more than half a year. Besides,  they eat clean foods (They are almost completely vegetarian), understand the historic prophecies,  watch the signs of the times, are waiting for the second coming of the Redeemer, and do not believe in an advent preceding the peace age, that means they are premillenialists.  In the way they clothe themselves and in their child rearing methods they largely follow Ellen G. White’s recommendations without being aware of it or even knowing these testimonies.

Some doctrines differ greatly from what we have received,  e.g. their understanding of prophecy was surprising and new to me, and in some points different from our view.  Again with other doctrines it seems as if they did not distance themselves enough from the so-called general Christian ideas — they believe in the immortality of the soul,  drink wine at the Lord’s Supper,  and are lagging a little bit behind in their doctrines on the eating of the body of Christ,  but they do take steps essential to salvation going as far as the “light of dawn” that shines brightly.  I would like to add here that I am making these observations for the sake of facts and not to credit ourselves with my knowledge of biblical truths,  or to give us cause for arrogance. This would not even be possible for two reasons. On the one hand, it is not certain that we can interpret the differences as lagging behind. It seems to me that they have progressed further in certain doctrinal questions where the Adventist community has been stuck for 100 years. (I will expound on this thought in the following.) On the other hand, even if all the doctrines that differ from ours were wrong, we couldn’t escape this question: What pleases God — mere knowledge, which is useless and represents the lamp without oil (Matt. 25: 3) , or the people on whose way the light is shining and who are continuously in the sanctification of life (from glory to glory) ?

The Twelve Tribes

In talking with them the community’s main teaching and greatest hope was brought out time and time again: the establishment of the twelve tribes of Israel. This is not to be confused with the so-called “Evangelical Christian doctrines, ”which see in the prophecies the conversion of physical Israel. They see clearly that the physical people no longer play a role in God’s work of redemption. At the same time,  however, they apply the term “Spiritual Israel” more concretely than in well-known interpretations. They believe that God has a people in the different churches from which He is calling them out as the shepherd calls his sheep out of the different folds (John 10: 16) . They believe that the time for this has come now, because Christ’s plan is, “to make ready a people prepared for the Lord ”(Luke 1: 17) before His return. They are proclaiming God’s call to His own,  “Come out of her, [that is ]Babylon. ”(Jer. 50: 8)  This reminds me of what was the saddest thing for me during the whole time of the encounter: It was brought out unmistakably that they consider the Adventist community to be a part of Babylon also,  even though they didn’t express it in this way. It was impossible to argue against this view —because their personal experiences with Adventists unfortunately agreed with it. The community firmly believes that the new people that God is gathering will come about “from every tribe and tongue and people, ”according to the pattern of old Israel in twelve tribes. According to their belief ten tribes have come into existence so far (We visited Levi) ; they are still waiting for Joseph and Benjamin to be established (The listing of the tribes is according to Revelation 7. I did not succeed in finding out whether this was of any importance or consequence to their life together other than the symbolical,  organizational significance.)

They base their hope on following Scripture verses:

Acts 26: 6-7 – In this context they pointed us to the fact that when Paul spoke this (in the present tense) ,  the twelve tribes had ceased to exist a long time ago,  for only the remnant of Judah returned from Babylon.  However,  it could not be said of the Jews at that time that they “were continuously serving [God] night and day. ” They think that the early church already existed as a “twelve-tribed people” at the time of the apostles,  expressing that this new people had taken on the redemptive role of physical Israel.

James 1: 1 – The apostle obviously was not speaking to physical Israel here — the no longer existing twelve tribes; yet,  he is using the term “12 tribes.”

Rev.  21: 12 – One can only enter the new Jerusalem through one of the 12 gates,  and each gate symbolizes one tribe.  One can imagine that it is striking how many hints relating to the 12 tribes of Israel there are in the New Testament,  especially in Revelation,  e. g.  the 144, 000,  in Revelation 12 “a woman clothed with the sun,” whose crown consists of 12 stars,  etc.  With this background even the truth known to us that Jesus called exactly 12 disciples into service takes on a different meaning.  Even to the disciples this was important enough that they deemed it necessary to choose Matthias in Judas’ place (Rev 1: 26) .

The “Pure Hands”

Besides their openness to new realizations and their attentiveness to the leading by the Spirit, the other secret to the unity in love is the way that they practice their joint prayers. Even though faith and prayer contain many outward formal elements, none of it is practiced merely in rote. There is sound thought and a conviction behind every form; every gesture contains revelation.

The lifting up of hands in prayer is based on 1 Tim. 2: 8, “Therefore I want the men in every place to pray, lifting up holy hands, without wrath and doubting.” It is the deep conviction of the brethren that if their mutual love is tainted by disunity,  indignation, or a lack of peace then God cannot hear their prayer. The only condition is that they live in unity with one another; that is why they pay closest attention to that. Since many people live close together, there is also more opportunity for friction,  and of course they also fall —but these little losses of peace are cleared up with one another and before the Lord every 12 hours before the common prayers in the morning and the evening. When they come together for the gathering, there already is peace — they express this by tenderly hugging each other and greeting each other with the “Shalom ”(peace) word.  After that, the men lift up holy hands without wrath and doubting to God. The lifting up of hands:  creed.  It means, “Lord, there is nothing between us that would hinder us from coming before you. Even if we sinned we have forgiven each other. We love each other the way you loved us, so we are claiming your promise: In the name of our Master we ask you, hear our prayers.”

Music in the Life of the Community

Songs, music, and dancing are integral parts of community life. At every gathering, they sing; usually,  they also dance. By that they express their joy, etc. ,  that they are thankful for each other; that their prayer times are a celebration for them. The dances are almost all circle dances, which express the unity of the community (or, the “body” as they frequently call it) . Our ears were unaccustomed to the music,  compared to our service songs the tunes were light,  and next to the Hebraic melodies you also felt reminded of “Christian” songs adopted from Protestant Free Churches. (My sister observed the same thing during her first encounter in France. The answer: They also sense that their music with which they praise God, isn’t coming from a totally pure source. But because they are coming out of the world, they don’t have anything else to give and believe that God receives their honest and heartfelt praise. They hope that their children, who are growing up apart from worldly influence, will make a purer music.) During that week, I also realized that we still need to learn in this area.

One thing that I became aware of was the way they sang: The lyrics were clear and powerful, and you could tell by the eyes of the singers that they were conscious of the contents of the songs. They didn’t use a songbook, because they knew all the songs by heart. They would translate the lyrics for us and said that it was important to understand what the songs were talking about.

Something else I learned was a verse from Psalm 149: 1, “Sing to the Lord a new song.” What I heard may not have been esthetically perfect, but it was a new song — new and always based on renewed experiences, praise coming from the heart. In this community new songs are being born, because this community is alive. That is where I had a very sad awakening —wherever no new songs are being born the congregation is dull and bears the sure sign that it is dying off, for this means that there are no fresh new experiences for which the believers can give thanks with songs of praise.

The Daily Life

To really experience the working days this one week in the community was not enough. For that reason I would like to try and characterize the atmosphere. One observation I made gave me a little enlightenment about this:  active rest. Their weekday peace does not consist of doing nothing —they were all doing something.  In the overall rhythm of the hustle and bustle and working, one would hardly notice any organizational structure. They told me that they pay attention to each other and, as time goes on, the different jobs can thus be given to people according to their gifting, and they will also feel comfortable with it.  Splitting wood and doing the dishes are seen as a service equally as much as playing music or teaching Scripture. There are no gradations (ranks) . 

Work, rest, family times, and personal times of silence are in a natural balance. They strive to live a natural and simple life, which is also happening.  There are no stressed-out parents, no neglected children. There is no useless activity, such as so- called fun or meaningless conversation, and no purposeless work just done for mere survival’s sake.  There is no distinction between work time,  private time, and life of faith. This separation in three,  which we are so familiar with, is out of the question here. Those who earn a living for the community by working outside the community, consider their work evangelism.

They only work together, so they do not hold jobs in the world, but support themselves by self- employed businesses. (Their way of life even makes sense economically — they live in households, cook and eat together, and don’t spend any money on luxury items. They live on much less than what would be necessary if each family had to finance itself.)

They don’t spend much time with books. The only books they give their attention to besides the Bible are necessary non-fiction books. They consider the secular understanding of education useless, as they do materialism. Someone said, “I don’t have anything that I consider my own, and I am not bound to the things of the world. This is true freedom.” They practice all these things apart from any fanaticism, as if it were the most natural thing in the world. Love makes rigid rules unnecessary — I believe they don’t have any rules. They adjust to each other and let the Holy Spirit lead them. Surprising,  but it works.

The simplicity is vivid also in their appearance.  They don’t wear jewelry or adorned secular,  fashionable clothes. The men never wear ties.  Nevertheless,  their clothing is not uniform, but individually colorful, made from natural fabrics in such a way that one can comfortably move about in them. It is important that their body members are covered, too —partly for health easons,  partly for moral reasons. The women’s clothing is not tight- fitting. (Aren’t we familiar with these aspects, too?)  Men wear beards and, in our eyes, long hair —they call it short. (Long enough for it to be tied back, the rest is cut off. To them that is all there is to it.)

They do not feel as if they emigrated from the world. (Of course, this was also the first question that came up in me.) In many ways they are connected to the outside world, but as much as possible they keep themselves from its detrimental influence. When they joined the community, they gave up everything for it,  but did not burn the bridges behind them. They cultivate their relationships with friends and family,  they visit their relatives, and their relatives also visit them. They also seek new human contacts, because their evangelistic activities take place on this level.  They do not give “lecture series, ”neither do they depend on doing this. People come and marvel, and because they see good fruit, many get baptized and stay with them.

They are a light, because they have understood the deepest secret of shining —only the whole body can give testimony, etc. , by their daily life. Even the most excellent preacher of the word could not accomplish this ministry by himself.

The Children

I could have brought up many theological and reasonable arguments against the life in community.  But I admit that, in view of the children, they got stuck in my throat. The children didn’t resemble in any way the children I had known thus far. When the parents spoke about them or prayed for them, they would frequently call them, “our wonderful children. ” Their beauty, gentleness, and servanthood are a true miracle in our modern world. (When I say beauty, I also mean an outward beauty —this goes for almost all the children; the children of the French communities supposedly have these striking qualities,  too. One can sense the effect of love in the bringing up of the children.)

The most sacred hope of the brethren is in their children: They are the new generation whom they want to preserve from the defilement of the world and who are going to live a purer life than they did.  The 144, 000 who will be similar to Christ (Rev.  14: 5) , will come forth from them. An older man who doesn’t have any children himself said, “Apart from our children we have no future. ” The new generation is not born in the hospital,  but at home —in the family and the loving environment of the community.  Only in an emergency do they fall back on medical help. Among the women there are several who are able to direct a birth,  because they had many opportunities to gather experience. During the birth, the father (“abba ”) is always with his wife.

They told us an impressive story: A little boy did not cry after his birth, he was not breathing no matter what they did. Every second,  he was coming closer to death by suffocation. Then his father held him up to God and begged for the life of the child. The little baby broke out crying and received the name Samuel Ruach from his parents.  An infant is almost always with the mother (“imah ”) for the first 5-6 years. It partakes of the blessing of mother milk as long as it needs it and is not nursed unnaturally. During this time, it is already participating in the daily community life and,  depending on the age, can accomplish a task or a service.

I did not see any toys in the children’s hands.  There was no need for “their getting distracted with something, ”for they were constantly getting attention. Whenever they played, it would be more for the furtherance of the community or their development; but what was obvious is that they found their greatest joy in being able to participate in the life of the adults. It would be an honor for them whenever trusted with a responsible task. (Next to my wife, who was helping in the kitchen, there was a four-year-old girl peeling carrots with a 6-inch/15 cm-long knife. She didn’t cut her hand, and her parents didn’t scream at this sight either. When she got tired of it, they let her go —their little ones only work as long as they enjoy it.

First, they teach them the joy of working, and then they gradually get them used to the weight of responsibility.)  At about six years, they start teaching them in age-sensitive groups. They do not spend a single day in school, because their fellow students would defile them by the influence of the worldly spirit. It is through their home schooling that they are really able to preserve the children’s spiritual purity. This is silently being accepted by the German authorities.  From time to time, a commissioner of the school board stops by and sees for himself the development of the children, and beyond that he doesn’t get involved. In France, where the campaign of the anti- cultists is very rough, similarly as in Hungary, the brethren are experiencing more difficulties. Because their children aren’t going to secular schools, don’t watch TV , and don’t even get vaccinated (to them it is a matter of conscience, and they don’t want to defile their children even in this way) , this community in France was depicted as the most dangerous cult, and they have to live with the threat of the state’s taking their children from them.

There is one thing for which their community life and home schooling certainly does not prepare the children — for a life outside the community if they still chose that. This obviously is a hindrance to this lifestyle (They see this, too) , but it is clear that the parents have to choose between the two opposed objectives. They prepare their children for that which,  according to their faith, they are called to do.  Other than that the children are of a balanced nature and happy, free of all the psychological symptoms, which are so characteristic of the children of this day and age. In one week, we haven’t seen one argument, no aggression came out of them nor any unruliness. The brat didn’t rebel, and the little ones didn’t become hysterical. It did not happen once that a child interrupted an adult. They know what kind of a life there is in the world, and they have no desire for it. A father told us, “It happened that some children of about ten years who had been to a nearby city with their parents, came home crying, because they saw their peers on the streets and felt a lot of compassion for them. ”

Loving and consistent corporal discipline is an integral part of their bringing up of children. They teach the children that discipline takes away the guilt. Afterwards, the parents don’t burden the children with it anymore, rather they make efforts to release them from a guilt-ridden conscience. Due to this way of bringing up children it has already happened a number of times that children turned themselves in when they had done something, in order to receive their discipline (which sometimes isn’t even necessary anymore in such cases) . In the children’s eyes the parents represent God; by training them to obey, their parents prepare them for a practical faith. This perspective of being God’s representatives also obliges the parents —they view their children the way God views His creation —not with strictness, but with an unceasing and unchanging love.  When a child turns twelve and if the parents consider him mature, he is free to decide to follow Christ along with the community. Then he is baptized by immersion based on his confession and is considered a member of the community.

Apart from one or two exceptions the youth who grew up in the congregation don’t leave the community.

The Sabbath

The community doesn’t keep, but rather it celebrates the Sabbath. I used to think that was the same thing, but once I came here, I realized that there is a difference. They begin the Sabbath together every Friday night at 7: 00 p. m. Before that, they cease from work at 5: 00 p. m. and spend those two hours preparing physically and spiritually.  The works that are being accomplished on Friday are also the necessary preparations for Saturday: They clean the house, in the kitchen they prepare the food for the celebration (They already make these preparations on Thursday) , and they set the tables in a festive way. It is as if they were expecting an honorable guest, or as if they were preparing for a wedding. It turned out later on that these impressions weren’t coming to me by mistake,  but that is exactly the way they view the Sabbath.  On that evening, we gathered at 7: 00 p. m. to celebrate. Minutes went by, and at first, there was no common program yet — the brethren greeted each other (hug, “Shalom ”) and conversed after that in smaller groups. Then younger and older children appeared. One of them distributed cups, and the other one poured herbal tea or a grain beverage. A three-year-old boy handed out napkins, and the girls offered cookies on a tray. Part of this waiting is an accustomed ritual — together they wait for the Sabbath as for a beloved guest.

After about half an hour, the music grew louder —they celebrate the beginning of the Sabbath each time with singing and dancing. Even now the atmosphere wasn’t prayerful and solemn, but one of joy, yet we did not feel uncomfortable, and it did not seem to us as if we were participating in a desecration of the Sabbath. Their joy was very honest; it wasn’t the music that set the mood, as in the Charismatic congregations, but thankfulness coming from the heart is what prepared them for the celebration, for singing and dancing “before the Lord. ”

Just as Friday night is devoted to rejoicing, the next day is devoted to serious study of the Word.

Baptism

In the following I would like to eport about the Sabbath I spent in the community, which wasn’t a normal Sabbath for them either. In the morning,  there was no indication of that yet. During the common morning prayers, however, the events took an unexpected turn.

Before they came together to pray, a young woman spoke up, whose voice we had rarely heard until then. Monika was not a part of the community,  but she had at that point already lived with them for four or five weeks. She wasn’t a guest like us either,  for she had already given up her job and her apartment. She had only kept the most essential personal things and truly moved in with the community. In the following two days, we were going to become eyewitnesses to her rebirth.  She started out by thanking God for leading her into this community. She said that she had found what she had been looking for all her life — purity and true love. She had considered herself a Christian even before, but she sensed that she hadn’t found her true Redeemer and Master, Yahshua, until now. (In the community they call Jesus by His Hebrew name because of its meaning, “God saves ”) . She expressed that she was longing to be received into the body and that she wanted to partake of baptism.

After her words, silence filled the house. (“This is a new situation —that’s why we are silent,” David whispered to me in Hungarian.)

After one minute, someone stood up to speak — Yehezkel, a young man and father of three children who –we suppose –might be one of the spiritual leaders of the community. He asked his brothers and sisters who had been coming to know Monika for the past few weeks, to give testimony of her — how they judged her, whether her motives were sincere, and whether they could support her being received into the community. In a solemn atmosphere, aware of the weight of their own words, the brothers and sisters shared one after the other. You could almost feel the tension in the air. Monika was biting her lips, so much was she paying attention to the words as if her life or death was being decided upon. Everything that was shared was of greatest importance, because even if only one brother said that he didn’t have total peace they wouldn’t baptize her, but she would have to wait for the whole body to unanimously receive her. However, all the brothers and sisters ended their words by saying, “I have an Amen for her.” After the last person shared, and upon Yehezkel’s leading word, the assembly gave a resounding “Amen ”for Monika’s baptism.

After that, everybody scattered to put on their jackets, hats, and scarves. One brother called the neighbor on whose property there are three fishponds, to ask him “whether they may bury someone in his pond. ”Of course, the neighbor, who isn’t surprised about anything anymore, consented.  Part of the preparations for baptism was the warming up of a vehicle, so that Monika could quickly be seated in a warm place after her baptism (immersion) .

The landscape was white; the fresh snow was glistening in the winter sunshine. The community proceeded to the fishpond where Hoshua,  a youth,  broke open the ice of the pond with a big maul.

After all the preparations were finished,  everybody became quiet. The Holy Scriptures showed up —two brothers read out of the Bible, and each one gave a short word of explanation. After that,  Yehezkel and Kepha – another “elder”—went into the water (the ice just caved in under Kepha) and also helped Monika into the water. Now the atmosphere was really solemn. Monika broke the silence: With a determined voice, almost yelling, she gave confession of her Savior before the body and all of creation. She hadn’t prepared herself. There was no minister there who asked her all the mandatory questions, which she answered with, “Yes.” Her words to the Master Yahshua came from the very depths of her soul, she had made Him King over her life. She confessed the Messiah before people believing that He would also confess her before the Father and the angels in heaven (Mt 10: 32) .  After her confession, Monika was immersed in the icy water in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. The assembly who –until then –had been holding its breath, now broke out in rejoicing and applauding. On shore they wrapped her in blankets. Then they surrounded their new sister, and several of them prayed for her by laying hands on her shoulders. After that, they lifted their hands up to the heavens again to give thanks to the Creator — the One who had given Monika new life.

Before Monika took a shower and changed her clothes, the children and youth spontaneously started to dance in the house. When Monika had finished,  she came back to her brothers and sisters with a head covering. The celebration they had to welcome her cannot be described.

After these things, the congregation surrounded its youngest member with special care for days. The previously reserved and distanced girl blossomed out like a flower. With all her heart she responded to the love shown to her as though relieved to have given her heart to Yahshua and her brothers and sisters.  When we were saying good-bye to the community on Monday morning, she gave us such a good squeeze as if she was saying bye-bye to a close relative —as if we weren’t just one week-old acquaintances. As the others in the community also did, she received a new (Hebrew) name for her new life at the Lord’s Supper on the evening after the Sabbath. At the morning prayers on Sunday morning, she was already being called Tehora Ka Sheleg —pure as the snow.

The Victory Cup

It is very difficult for me to put into words what was going on within me on this Saturday evening.  Every Saturday evening, or rather at ten o’clock at night, after the children have been put to bed, the community celebrates the “breaking of the bread.” Guests cannot participate in this Lord’s Supper. For this reason I don’t know exactly what the procedures are. But besides this there is a ceremony before the Lord’s Supper that repeats itself every week where we could still partake. At this occasion, they drink from the “victory cup.”

While they were passing the cup around, Yehezkel was explaining to the guests what it was all about. This is not the cup of the Lord’s Supper, which represents the poured out blood of the Messiah, but the cup which Yahshua passed to His disciples before the Lord’s Supper, during the meal.  Luke recorded this part. In his record it becomes clear what the Master told His disciples before the breaking of the bread . See Luke 22: 17-18, 20.

This cup was the sign of the wedding of the Lamb — followed (later) by the breaking of the bread and the cup which is “the new covenant in My blood. ”The cup at the Lord’s Supper is a memory, but the first cup is a sign —the second one is pointing back to the death of Christ; the first one is pointing ahead to the glorious coming together. Yahshua and His disciples aren’t going to remember the sacrifice at Golgotha at the wedding feast, but together they are going to empty out the cup of victory over sin.  Those who were victorious over temptation in the past week drink from the victory cup. Each one judges himself by his own conscience —the conscience either allows or forbids drinking from the shared cup. Someone is victorious even if he fell, but quickly came clean of his sin with God and men —if he immediately got engaged in the fight against sin and didn’t allow it to rule over him. The cup marks a weekly thorough self-examination, which might mean this, “If the wedding of the Lamb were today could I participate in it based on my most recent deeds?” But if I let the cup pass without drinking from it then it means, “I am not worthy to partake of the meal with Christ. ”The largest part of the congregation drank from the cup, even the children,  but there were also children and adults who did not drink.

In the end, the victory cup returned to Yehezkel who was leading the ceremony (the procedure) .  Yehezkel put the cup aside, looked his brothers in the eyes and, with just as determined a voice as before,  explained why his conscience didn’t allow him to drink. He didn’t go into intimate details, but in two sentences he clearly characterized the sin that overcame him during the week. All the others who didn’t drink —both the gray-haired adults and the little children —did the same after him.

A father of two children: “I cannot drink, because I reacted to my wife this week and harbored bitterness in me for too long. I ask Yahshua to forgive me and to help me be victorious over myself, so that I can drink next week.”

A five-year-old girl: “I cannot drink,  because I was disobedient to my parents and not a good example. ” An eleven-year-old girl: “I cannot drink, because I didn’t get up on time this morning, and because of that I couldn’t go pray or prepare myself. But I want to be victorious over laziness, because I want to love Yahshua more than my bed.”

Two weeks have passed, and I am still unable to write or talk about these moments without being moved inside. I don’t know how long I was just sitting there motionless while my chest was being squeezed as with a hoop. I haven’t known this feeling, because the last time I wept was twelve years ago —in my school years because of a random love story. I just knew that I needed fresh air, so I got my jacket and went out into the yard. Breathing loud I inhaled and still didn’t understand what was happening with me.

Six years after my baptism, and after four years of pastoral ministry, I have fallen on the rock here in Germany in this village, which doesn’t matter on any map, and I can only say that I can’t go on living the way I used to.

After 45 minutes, I was able to stop crying.

Closing Words

Dear brethren, my report has become more extensive than I had planned. But now I’ll leave it at that. I would be glad if as many of you as possible could write to me what you think about what I described here. Can we ignore this encounter as if nothing had happened? What does the mere fact of the existence of such a congregation mean to you? Can you reject them with a good conscience because of their theological differences? Is there something that we can learn from them? Can these fruits come from a bad tree? If, however, they come from a good tree then where are the “Twelve Tribes ”? What is the role of Yahshua’s people in the completion of God’s redemptive work?What is then –in view of all this – our role in the completion of God’s redemptive work? Finally, a question which I was asked even by someone in our own congregation, “Can their way also be the way for us?” Or, put differently, “Can we have a way other than that of brotherly love?”

András