Our Lamb has conquered let us follow Him.
The first missionary in India, Ziegenbalg, while travelling on a ship of the Dutch-East-Indian Company back home to Germany had to halfway through his journey spend several weeks at the Cape where he witnessed the Dutch settlers’ treatment of the Khoi people (“Hottentot”) as lesser beings. Count Zinzendorf had heard about this situation at the Cape and wanted to send a gospel bringer to the Khoi.
In the year 1737, a young man from Herrnhut, named Georg Schmidt who as a result of his protestant faith had previously spent six years in prison in the Catholic region of Austria where he was sentenced to hard labour and had to build fortresses, came to South Africa. Thus, the Moravian Church were the first missionaries amongst the indigenous people of South Africa.
When he arrived at the Cape, he found Khoi families scattered around Baviaanskloof. He gathered them and started his work. For Georg reading the Bible was essential to understanding the meaning of the gospel. His foremost task was to teach his Khoi brothers and sisters spoken and written Dutch. He also baptized them. Baptized “natives” who could read outraged the Dutch settlers and in the year 1743 Georg Schmidt was deported. Georg Schmidt is regarded as the founder of the first Christian mission station in South Africa.
In the year 1792, nearly fifty years later, another group of Herrnhut brothers received permission from the British to do mission work in South Africa. Thus, the first Moravian Church in South Africa congregation started at Genadendal. Many more such congregations started under first the Afrikaans speaking people until missionary work reached the Xhosa speaking people in the east.
In the year 1867 the General Synod in Hernnhut decided to divide the congregations into two regions. A Xhosa-speaking region in the Eastern Cape and an Afrikaans-speaking region in the Western Cape.
Two provinces of the Moravian Church developed in South Africa over time with one office in Cape Town and the other in Matatiele. They were united into one province in the year 1998 and had ten districts spread over South Africa, with a Provincial Board to govern in the Inter-Synodal period.
For many years the administration was done from Genadendal until the office was moved to Cape Town at a later stage. First it was at the house of the President with an outbuilding and one staff member. Later it was moved into the offices in Lansdowne.
In essentials unity, in non-essentials liberty and in all things love.
We, as Moravians, commit ourselves to the Lordship of Jesus Christ as we strive to renew our spirituality, affirm our unity, and improve our stewardship.
why we exist
We are governed first by the Word of God, the Bible and then a set of rules and ordinances as set out in our Church Order. We adhere to the following rites and sacraments: The Rite of Confirmation, Sacrament of Baptism, Sacrament of Holy Communion and the Observance of the Lord’s Supper. With the whole of Christendom, we share faith in God the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
We believe and confess that God has revealed Himself once and for all in His Son Jesus Christ and that our Lord has redeemed us with the whole of humanity by His death and His resurrection. That there is no salvation apart from Him and that He is present with us in the Word and the Sacrament. He directs and unites us through His Spirit and thus forms us into a Church.
In the light of divine grace, we recognize ourselves to be a Church of sinners. We require forgiveness and live daily only through the mercy of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. He redeems us from our isolation and unites us into a Living Church of Jesus Christ.
We require forgiveness and live daily only through the mercy of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. He redeems us from our isolation and unites us into a Living Church of Jesus Christ.
The church is the body of Christ on earth, empowered by the Holy Spirit to continue the task of reaching the lost and discipling the saved, helping them become fully devoted followers of Christ.
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