Hope for Europe
emerged from the need for a umbrella for united strategic
action in Europe after the collapse of communism. Many fresh
initiatives began to focus on Europe, east and west, in the
early '90's, and a climate of confusion, crowded and competitiveness
threatened to develop. In order to build cooperation and coordination,
various evangelical leaders met in the first of what has become
the annual Hope for Europe Round Table, in 1992. At the second
Round Table, a year later, a plan emerged to create an umbrella
for cooperative action towards the re-evangelisation of Europe,
called Hope for Europe
Hope for Europe (HFE) is a movement embraced by the European
Evangelical Alliance (EEA), the Lausanne Committee in Europe,
and numerous other organisations linked in the Coalition for
the Evangelisation of Europe (CEE) but is itself not an organisation.
It is pan-evangelical and pan-European, promoting networking
across national borders in many fields, and cooperation across
networks within nations, towards the shaping of Europe’s future.
At the annual HFE Round Table, network convenors meet with
representatives from the sponsoring bodies, and empower a
working group (WG) to give ongoing cohesion and direction
to the movement.
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1.
To build networks across Europe:
The horizontal elements of the star/cross represent the networks
HFE aims to promote across the borders of Europe’s nations,
where believers from different nationalities build relationally
to partner together in the task of shaping Europe’s
future.
2.
To encourage partnerships within our nations:
The vertical elements of the star/cross represent partnerships
within each nation that HFE aims to encourage, between different
ministries, organisations and churches, working together towards
the common task of shaping each nation’s future.
3. To promote a common vision of
faith and hope for Europe:
The circle encompassing the star/cross represents the common
vision embracing these networks and partnerships, a vision
of individuals, families, communities and even nations being
transformed by the hope of the message of Jesus Christ.
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Several gatherings have been called in recent years to address
the spiritual needs of Europe, and various new initiatives
have begun:
In 1988, the first Lausanne-Europe conference took place at
Bernhauser Forst, issuing in the Stuttgart
Call to the Re-Evangelisation of Europe
which called "the Christians of Europe to a fresh commitment
of make disciples of Christ in their continent and beyond".
In 1991, the Lausanne Committee convened leaders in the Budapest
Summit to develop strategy for those working in post Marxist
countries. Six guidelines emerged as recorded in the section
of the report A
Strategic Response :
1. Enable the churches and mission organisations in these
countries to undertake the work of evangelising their own
people;
2. Model and encourage cooperation in the work of evangelisation;
3. Go where Christ is not named or known;
4. Undertake long term involvement that aims to produce fruit
that will remain:
5. Work only from an adequate understanding of the people
and their contexts;
6. Work with complete ethical and financial integrity.
In 1992, the European Leadership Consultation on Evangelisation
held at Bad Boll, was designed to develop a consensus on some
strategic directions for all concerned with the evangelisation
of Europe. The
Bad Boll Commitment ,
signed by many of the participants, expressed the hope that
"the Lord of the Harvest may be giving us together a new pan-European
wineskin in which the new wine of the Gospel of Christ may
be offered to our peoples". The Commitment
went on to
identify five strategic concepts, including:
1. the "neighbourhood" as the focus of our outgoing
activity,
2. "coverage", or the comprehensive targeting, of all
the neighbourhoods of our countries,
3. "cooperation" among evangelical fellowships and
organisations in a given region,
4. the "mobilisation" of all the members of the congregations,
and,
5. the need to develop a "Christian mind" in all we
think and share, as we confront the ideological vacuum, materialistic,
hedonistic consumerism, and various versions of new religions.
Meanwhile, other new movements and alignments had entered
the European arena, both east and west, including March for
Jesus, the AD2000 & Beyond Movement, New Eastern Europe for
Christ, Discipling A Whole Nation (DAWN), and The Coalition
for the Evangelism of Europe (CEE - an informal fellowship
of organisations including Agape, BME, GEM, OM, YFC & YWAM).
Each of these initiatives contributed in some unique way towards
the strategic directions identified at Bad Boll, and was developing
its own network of contacts or representatives throughout
the continent. Often the same people were being approached
by different movements, and some began to feel that without
a coordinating framework, the European landscape could become
"crowded, competitive, and confused".
This perceived need for coordination and the desire shared
by some to formulate a cooperative action agenda, led to the
first European Round Table meeting in Lettenbuck, Germany,
in late 1992. Initiated by the European Evangelical Alliance,
the Lausanne Committee for Europe, and the CEE, this gathering
of some 20 representatives of pan-European evangelistic networks
and movements aimed to build relationships and trust through
understanding and sharing, as a foundation of progress toward
the goal of a united effort for the evangelization of Europe.
An inventory of issues needing action was drawn up at this
Round Table.
At the second European Round Table convened in Prague
in December of 1993, the following proposal for a framework
of cooperative evangelical action emerged, which drew from
the insights and contributions of all the above-mentioned
gatherings and movements.
The proposal was entitled Hope for Europe.
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