The first visit of a Chief Apostle in Africa

The website of the central archives is not new in the sense of having recently been launched. The archives have just been given a good overhaul. Everything has been uncluttered and clearly structured and now presents itself with a new design. What is new, really new, is that users not only have access to already processed material but also direct access to original documents.

From the diary of Chief Apostle Walter Schmidt

As you browse through the documents in the digital reading room it makes you feel as though you are in Africa with him. There is the handwritten itinerary, the route set out on a map of bygone days, lots of photographs, and then the diary of Chief Apostle Walter Schmidt. He only jotted down a few words, but they say a lot about how he experienced this trip.

Walter Schmidt was the first Chief Apostle to set foot on African soil. This was on the morning of 9 April 1965 in Johannesburg in South Africa. When he left the airplane he meticulously noted in his diary, “9.30 German time, 10.30 African time.”

Magnificent singing and many airmiles later

“Highlights: magnificent singing,” he jotted down after his first divine service in Africa on 11 April. Some 7,200 brothers and sisters had gathered in an ice rink in Johannesburg for this first service by a Chief Apostle on African soil. Another 2,700 had assembled in adjoining rooms. During the divine services that followed, brothers and sisters often sat on the floor because the brothers could not manage to cart enough chairs by for everyone.

“Port Elizabeth has five congregations with 3,188 members!” Chief Apostle Schmidt noted in his diary when he arrived in Port Elizabeth on 13 April. A day later, after the divine service, he wrote, “Many of the members had to drive 250 miles.” During his round-trip through South Africa, as well as to Zambia and Zimbabwe (then still Northern and Southern Rhodesia), he served more than 43,000 brothers and sisters and covered a total of 25,000 kilometres by airplane.

Deeply impressed

Many of his entries, like the one on 14 June in Port Elizabeth, come across as clinical and cool, “Special incident: fire in hotel room.” A day later, as he arrived in Cape Town, he jotted down, “Was greeted at the airport by 3,000 to 4,000 brothers and sisters.” His notes on an outing to Table Mountain were as dispassionate, “Ride up Table Mountain, altitude 833 m, length of cable 1,350 m.”

But his journey through southern Africa left a huge impression on Chief Apostle Schmidt. “In South Africa, Rhodesia, and right on into Zambia landscapes unfolded before my eyes the likes of which you cannot see in Europe,” he wrote in an article for a German Church magazine in 1966. And about the people he wrote, “They love their country, their traditions and customs, and maintain their own lifestyle. Despite all poverty and humility they maintain their tribal dignity.”

The same belief and love

Chief Apostle Schmidt was 75 years old when he set out on this trip to Africa. It had been his wish “to serve my African brothers and sisters in person and get a first-hand look at the congregations, the state of their faith, and the living conditions,” it says in his biography. Chief Apostle Schmidt concluded, “At times it felt like I was back in the days of the early Church. There was a true sense: these are my brothers and sisters in Christ. Wherever I served I received confirmation: the same belief, the same love, one heart and one soul.”