Dutch Legacy

Dutch Legacy

It is a bit strange to be sitting in the Brussels mission home on the last chair left. The movers have come and gone. Tomorrow we will unload the moving van at the new mission home in Leidschendam. (about 15 – 20 minutes south of the mission offices in Leiden).

The mission home has been in use here for over 30 years. At least 11 mission presidents have lived here and close to a 2,000 new missionaries have spent their first night in Europe here. Each one of them has added to the culture that is alive in our mission today. We like to think of this as OUR mission but it really isn’t. Yes, it is the Lord’s mission and yet in a way it belongs to every missionary that has ever served here.

It all started in June 1841, when Elder Orson Hyde was en route to Palestine, he spent more than a week in Rotterdam. While here, he engaged in gospel discussions with a leading Jewish Rabbi.

Paul Augustus Schettler and A. Wiegers van der Woude were set apart in the spring of 1861 to preach the gospel in the Netherlands. Van der Woude, a native of Holland, had been baptized in Cardiff, Wales, in 1852. He was possibly the first Dutchman to receive the gospel. The two arrived at Rotterdam on 5 August 1861. Van der Woude traveled to his home town of Friesland where he shared the gospel with relatives and on 1 October 1861 baptized three people including two cousins. These were the first known baptisms of Dutch people in the Netherlands. Schettler traveled to Amsterdam and on 23 December 1861 baptized three people. The two missionaries concentrated their labors in Amsterdam and soon had 14 converts. Early in 1862, they organized the first branch of the Church there. In 1863, missionary work and baptisms extended to Gorinchem, Leeuwarden, Rotterdam, Werkendam, and Heukelom.

The two world wars slowed and practically stopped missionary work when all American missionaries were called home. After world war II missionaries were not allowed back into the Netherlands for many months because there was so little food in the aftermath of the war. Soon food and clothing began arriving from America to help ease the burden of the saints. When the saints’ needs were met the church supplied food to the red cross to distribute.

President David O. McKay met with Queen Juliana in the royal palace in 1953. An exchange of letters followed and the Queen accepted a specially-bound copy of the Book of Mormon from President McKay.

Official recognition of the Church was granted in August 1955, after nearly 20 years of petitioning. On 12 March 1961, the Holland Stake in The Hague was organized with J. Paul Jongkees as president. This occurred 100 years after the beginning of missionary work in the Netherlands and marked the creation of the first stake on the European continent and the first non-English-speaking stake in the Church.

As you may know this marks the 150^th year after missionaries first came to the Netherlands. It took a hundred years the first stake to be formed. In just the last 50 years, 3 more stakes have been formed in our mission.

In the early years a large quantity of the converts in Holland left the country to become part of the ‘backbone’ of the Church on the American continent. Today we see many of our converts returning to Africa, China and other parts of the world where they again are acting as pioneers for the church.

So you see we share ‘our’ mission heritage with thousands of other great missionaries. Our daily challenges are not so different than those faced by them.

Belgium-Netherlands missionaries are an amazing group. You are particularly obedient and truly have a vision of your purpose to teach people to repent and be baptized into Christ’s Church. You do this work having love for your companions and the people you meet. You are putting your personal desires and needs secondary to the needs of those you love and teach.

As says the title of a book written by LeGrand Richards, a former Dutch Mission President, you truly are a part of a Marvelous Work and a Wonder.

You are in a long line of great missionaries gathering the wheat from the tares in these two countries. I would ask you to ponder the culture and heritage of our great mission today and walk with a little more spring in your step. Talk to a few more people. Be a bit more unified with your companion. Put forth a little more effort to prepare and practice your teaching skills..

Sister Brubaker and I are so grateful to be a small part of the legacy of this mission. Even more, we feel blessed to be able to work along side you wonderful missionaries, as we join past missionaries, to help share the “Greatest of all Gifts” with our brothers and sisters here in Dutch speaking Europe.

Have a great week,

Love,

President Brubaker