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CELC Conference

© Pastor John Vogt of the LBK congregation in Gothenburg

The past month was consumed with the preparations and hosting of the Confessional Evangelical Lutheran Conference's fourth triennial meeting. The CELC unites the church bodies throughout the world which are in fellowship with the WELS. We were given the privilege of hosting the conference in Kungälv, a suburb of Gothenburg. In all, according to my count 140 people participated. They came from 18 countries. There were representatives from 19 sister churches, as well as observers from two not in our fellowship. The conference itself was a blur of activity for Sandy and me, with the first guests arriving on the Saturday before the conference and the last leaving nine days later on the Monday after. We truly enjoyed the opportunity to visit with so many different guests. Our one regret is that time and activities did not allow us to sit down at length with each participant individually.

Some highlights -

Sunday Service, April 24 -

Twelve early visitors arrived in time to join our congregation for worship on Sunday morning and spoke to our members about their churches and work. I had prepared a Bible class for use after each spoke, but never had the opportunity to use it since the talks filled the Bible class time.

We had prepared a special English-Swedish service for the benefit of our guests and used the opportunity to invite the attendees of our English Bible Class to join us. Nine from China came to the service, including three adults who are never attended anything with us before (two of whom were husbands). In addition, three young men from the Church of Sweden attended and asked about the possibility of coming to theological courses at Biblicum.

Sandy had our CELC visitors over to the house for Sunday dinner and treated the 14 of us to my favorite Swedish meal, fresh salmon in white sauce.

Arrivals

Monday was spent in trips to the airport and train station to pick up arriving delegates. LBK pastors, members from our congregation, Sandy, and I kept a steady stream of vans and cars on the road. I figured that I alone drove 350 miles that day. We succeeded in getting everyone safely to the conference center.

There were only a couple minor glitches. The Puerto Rican representative's flight was cancelled in Newark. We found him 24 hours later, sitting in the Gothenburg airport with a sign on his chest that said "CELC." And I played dumb American. The two Peruvian couples said they were arriving 9:15, so I went to the airport to get them -- only to discover after some waiting that their arrival was 21:15 (i.e. 9:15 P.M.). It was my mistake; we use the 24-hour clock here for travel times.

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