Missionary Society for the Preservation and Promotion of the Adventist Faith

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The Mission Society for the Preservation and Promotion of Adventist Beliefs e. V. (short MEFAG ) is a free Adventist missionary organization with evangelical characteristics based in Berlin. The congregation's place of assembly is a former synagogue, opened in 1907, which was used as a Kingdom Hall for Jehovah's Witnesses until 2007 .

From the point of view of other denominations, MEFAG is rated critically. She is accused of sectarian traits and intrusive missionary activities. MEFAG has no institutional connection to the Seventh-day Adventist Church and consists only of this one congregation. She sees herself as a "fighting church" and justifies her apostasy from the Seventh-day Adventist organization in letters. It can therefore be viewed as a splinter group even within the Adventists.

history

In 1987 the Berlin-Wilmersdorf Adventist Church excluded its member Bernd Korinth from its community. The excommunicated thereupon initiated a new community, which was named Mission Society for the Preservation and Promotion of Adventist Beliefs (MEFAG). Another name of the MEFAG community, consisting essentially of two to three families, was Historical Adventists . This designation was registered with the German Patent Office on August 22, 2007 as a brand name for the trademark owner MEFAG.

Viktoria and Benjamin Bondar, a married couple from the former Soviet Union , have been operating under the name of Historical Adventists since 2005 . Like Corinth, they were expelled from their original Seventh-day Adventist church . The literature that they publish and distribute is very similar in appearance and content to the MEFAG tracts. A link on their website also leads directly to MEFAG.

In January 2014 there was an internal rift within the MEFAG community. It led to the separation of a group that gathered around Hermann Kesten. The place of activity of this group, which calls itself Missionswerk Eternal Gospel (MWE or MWEEV), is the Berlin district of Spandau . The MWEEV pursues a program very similar to that of MEFAG. MEFAG and MWEEV are in competition with each other. For outsiders, the two groups are difficult to distinguish.

Teaching

In their fundamental views, MEFAG and MWEEV agree with other Adventists. But she attaches greater importance to the writings of Ellen G. White than many other Adventists. The Seventh-day Adventist Church is viewed as part of the "fallen Babylon" and thus of the false religions, since according to MEFAG there will be no true, organized church in the end times. It therefore calls on Christians, especially Adventists, to separate from the Seventh-day Adventist Church (abbreviation: SDA) and to found independent house groups. MEFAG and MWEEV mainly accuse the Seventh-day Adventist Church of joining the ecumenical movement of the Catholic and Protestant churches in the 1950s, thereby making pacts with the wrong people and betraying true Adventist content. It distinguishes itself from the newfangled and ecumenical main branch of the “official church” of the Seventh-day Adventists.

activities

MEFAG and MWEEV publish tracts , writings and videos. They are mainly about the end times and biblical prophecy . The tracts are translated into numerous languages ​​and made available to interested parties.

Especially at church conventions, members of MEFAG and MWEEV hand out eye-catching tracts with red and black illustrations entitled “Facts of the Future”. They have to the content: The Sabbath as divine commandment, the Antichrist and the meaning of the prophecies. When asked about their religious origin, the distributors pretend to be "Adventists". The tracts do not come from the Seventh-day Adventist Church, but from MEFAG or the “Missionswerk Ewiges Gospel” (MWEEV).

The websites of both parishes and other publications show that they are present at a large number of church days (Protestant and Catholic) outside of the event site and program to distribute their tracts.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Description of the building in the Facetten-Magazin Neukölln
  2. ↑ Report of the Evangelical Central Office for Weltanschauungsfragen from 2007 on sects at the Kirchentag
  3. ↑ https://de.scribd.com/document/36125725/H-Kesten-Die-kampfende-Gemeinde-Kleine-Gemeinden-und-der-Abfall-in-der-Organisation-der-Siebenten-Tags-Adventisten . Treatise by parishioner H. Kesten: The Fighting Congregation (Small Congregations and Apostasy in the Seventh-Day Adventist Organization)
  4. ↑ http://www.apd.info/1997/juni/juni1.html Dissociation in a message from the Adventist press service on the Leipzig Kirchentag 1997, note the chapter "Adventists distance themselves from leaflet distributors at the Kirchentag"
  5. ^ EZW: Material service. Retrieved October 5, 2017 .
  6. ↑ Evangelical Central Office for Weltanschauung questions: The Missionswerk Historical Adventists - a new splinter group ; see in particular the paragraph: "It took some time for these connections to become clear ...".
  7. ↑ Oswald Eggenberger (Gre.): Churches, sects, religions. Religious communities, ideological groups and psycho-organizations in the German-speaking area. A manual . Theological Publishing House Zurich, 2003. ISBN 978-3-290-17215-2
  8. ↑ Registered word mark: Community of the historical Seventh Day Adventists; Brand owner: Mission Society for the Preservation and Promotion of Adventist Beliefs eV; Status: trademark registered; File number: DE30729004, register number: 30729004.2; Filing date: May 3, 2007; Date of entry in the register: August 22, 2007
  9. ↑ Evangelical authority for worldview issues
  10. ^ Evangelical Central Office for Weltanschauung questions: The Missionswerk Historical Adventists - a new splinter group ; see in particular the paragraph: "MEFAG distributes - mostly in the context of major church events [...] the brochure [...] and the leaflet [...]"
  11. ↑ Presentation and assessment of the free Adventist mission society and community MEFAG in Berlin
  12. ↑ Oswald Eggenberger (Greetings): Handbook Weltanschauungen, Religious Communities, Free Churches (2015) . Gütersloher Verlagshaus 2015. p. 326 ISBN 978-3-579-08224-0
  13. ↑ https://de.scribd.com/document/36125725/H-Kesten-Die-kampfende-Gemeinde-Kleine-Gemeinden-und-der-Abfall-in-der-Organisation-der-Siebenten-Tags-Adventisten . Treatise by parishioner H. Kesten: The Fighting Congregation (Small Congregations and Apostasy in the Seventh-Day Adventist Organization)
  14. ↑ Handbook Weltanschauungen, Religious Communities, Free Churches (2015). Gütersloher Verlagshaus, point 4.1.2, page 325
  15. ↑ Handbook Weltanschauungen, Religious Communities, Free Churches (2015). Gütersloher Verlagshaus, point 4.1.2, page 325
  16. ↑ http://www.ezw-berlin.de/html/15_807.php Report on the website of the Evangelical Central Office for Weltanschauungsfragen, title: “The Missionswerk Historic Adventists - a new splinter group”. What is important here is the paragraph that begins with "MEFAG distributes - mostly in the context of major church events [...] the brochure [...] and the leaflet [...]"
  17. ↑ http://www.weltanschauung.elk-wue.de/fileadmin/mediapool/einrichtungen/E_weltanschauungsbeauftragte/DoksO-T/Siebenten-Tags-Adventisten1.pdf Description of the Seventh-day Adventist Church by the office for ideological issues of the Evangelicals Regional Church in Württemberg. The last paragraph on page 2 is important here, which begins with “The SDA Free Church should not be confused with the many splinter groups who refuse to open up processes and who often pass on their radical theses at large Christian events as the Adventist position on leaflets. [...] "
  18. ↑ http://www.missionswerk-ewiges-evangelium.de/mwe/de/gemeinde/katholikentag-regensburg-2014.php Illustrated self-presentation of the “Missionswerk eternal Gospel” on one's own appearance in the slipstream of the Regensburg Catholic Day 2014
  19. ↑ http://www.missionswerk-ewiges-evangelium.de/mwe/de/gemeinde/kirchentag-in-stuttgart-2015.php Illustrated self-portrayal of the "Missionswerk eternal Gospel" on one's own appearance in the slipstream of the 2015 Kirchentag in Stuttgart