The First Camp Meeting in Friedensau and the Sending of the First Missionary to Tanzania

Did you know that one of the first pioneer Seventh-day Adventist missionaries in Tanzania was Johannes Ehlers sent directly from Friedensau?

Johannes Ehlers was born around 1873-1876 in Germany. Ehlers spent one year in mission training at the Adventist Mission School in Friedensau and in 1902, Ehlers was married to Rosa.

The next year things quickly changed for the better. It so happened that on July 9-19, 1903, when the first German Camp Meeting of the German Union Conference was held in Friedensau, a decision was made to enter German East Africa as a mission field. Although the camp meeting itself was a forum for church reelection, baptisms, Bible studies and so forth, it became the arena for making a decision to enter German East Africa. Such decision would not only become an avenue for the Friedensau Mission to train more missionaries and be sent, it was a historical event that birthed a missionary zeal in Germany and in Europe.[1]

What is important about that event was that Ehlers was appointed pioneer missionary for this purpose.  Ehlers, who was about thirty years of age at that time, was ordained as a church elder for this purpose. Ehlers was joined by Abraham C. Enns. They formed a team and were instructed to act as scouts to understand and ascertain the missionary openings offered in the then Tanganyika. While in Tangayika, Ehlers engaged in public lectures, literature evangelism and home Bible studies to spread the gospel. In February 1906, Ehlers took ill in the mission field. Later that year, the Ehlers family returned to Germany on account of Johannes’ ill health.[2]

Be that as it may, the entrance of Adventism to then German East Africa is closely tied to Friedensau and the Mission Training in Friedensau. It was Ehlers’ training in Friedensau that gave him the opportunity to laying the foundation that catalysed the growth of the SDA Church in a country which boasts hundreds of thousands of Adventist believers – today’s Tanzania.