The main meeting in 2003 was the seventh international conference of LCJE at the Finnish Bible Institute near Helsinki, Finland, August 7-12, where many organisations and individuals of our area took part. The next European meeting of LCJE is planned to be held in spring 2005, at the Lutheran conference centre at Révfülöp in Hungary, located very close to the beautiful Lake Balaton. In all countries the work without major problems. Here two short organisations could do their reports from Germany and the UK:
Germany
December 9-11 fifteen people from different organisations gathered at Neukirchen/Knüll for the annual meeting of the German-speaking branch of LCJE. We informed each other about the current development of Jewish evangelism in our area. We prayed together and discussed how we can work together in different projects. One of our main concern was how to educate coming leaders in the messianic movement. It was decided to set up a working group to consider the matter in detail. The next German meeting will be held December 14-16, 2004 at the same place.
United Kingdom
In April 2003 Jonathan and May Foo from Hong Kong joined the CWI
missionary team in Leeds. Over the last nine months Jonathan and
May have made a very important contribution to CWI's work in the
north of England and have been well received by the Jewish people
they visit.
Toward the end of 2003, Jonathan was asked to give a lecture to
a Jewish audience about the Jewish community in China. The opportunity
came after Jonathan showed the presentation, originally given at
Leeds Messianic Fellowship, to a rabbi who was so impressed that
he immediately phoned a Jewish centre recommending that they engage
Jonathan to speak at one of their meetings.The presentation was
received enthusiastically, and other groups have also shown an interest
in having Jonathan speak to them. China has no history of anti-Semitism,
and during the Holocaust period Jewish refugees from Europe were
welcomed into the country, therefore the presentation is proving
to be a good bridge builder and has great potential for breaking
down Jewish-Christian barriers.
Hartmut Renz
hrenz@evangeliumsdienst.de