Calvary Chapel Scandinavia: A love revived in Scandinavia

Love took center stage at this year's Calvary Chapel Scandinavia conference as nearly 140 people gathered over 4½ days to study the second half of 1 Corinthians.

As July turned to August the congration of Calvary Chapel Scandinavia turned the pages of 1 Corinthians from July 29th to August 2nd, going through the second half of 1 Corinthians, completing the journey through this epistle that had begun at last year's conference.

Guest pastors Alex Kruse (CC Siegen, Germany), Kyle Eckhart (CC Szegen, Hungary), Kurt Ibbotson (CC Leipzig, Germany), Darrel Wilmoth (Calvary Front Range in Colorado, USA) and Mark Walsh (CC Bible Institute in New Zealand) all joined local pastors and ministry leaders to teach the 11 main sessions and added workshops.

During each teaching session God used His Word to stir up the Scandinavian congregation to a more love-filled life and service for Jesus.

"Throughout the whole conference God really showed us the purpose of the gifts He has given us through the Holy Spirit. It was good for both new and experienced believers to revisit God's own intructions on how the gifts operate and function, and how each person has one or more gifts that can be used to edify the body of Christ. And most importantly, we saw that the gifts are all about love; for God and one another. How and why we use our gifts is all about love," says Joel Wickström, one of the conference organizers and pastor of Calvary Stockholm.

Knit together in record-time

It was the 17th consecutive Calvary Chapel Scandinavia conference, and over the four and a half days of the event nearly 140 attendees and day guests came together from the Scandinavian countries to pray, worship and study God's Word at the castle-turned-school venue in Ekebyholm outside Stockholm.

"Whenever these Scandinavian conferences take place it is always such a special congregation that forms. In a matter of hours, people who have never met mix with people who have known each other through years of ministry and form a well-oiled, functioning church body of believers who love and serve each other. And whether we are born and raised in Scandinavia or visiting from America or elsewhere, we are all knit together in record-time by our love for Jesus and the people of Scandinavia. These conferences are really a wonderful testimony in and of themselves of the unity that can only be found in Jesus Christ," says Joel Wickström.

Served well by incoming teams

This year the worship leader throughout the conference was pastor Mark Walsh from CC Bible Institute in New Zealand, who attended his fourth Scandinavian conference since 2005.

The children's ministry was once again run by a team from CC Leipzig in Germany, led by pastor Kurt Ibbotson who also taught a main session this year.

Another mission's team from Front Range Calvary in Colorado served the Scandinavian body greatly by running all meals and practical work during the conference. As in previous years, this team was led by pastor Darrel Wilmoth who also taught a main session at the conference.

All teachings from the 2015 conference (incl. workshops) will be available online soon.

Stay tuned on this blog in the coming days for announcements about available teachings plus additional articles, photos and videos with reactions from guest speakers and more.

Click here to see the official conference video (or here to see a special TV news report about the conference) or click below on your video of choice. If you want to download the official group photo from this year's conference, just click on the photo below.