Helsinki Vineyard

-         My dad showed great interest in various cultures and spoke seven languages fluently, but still he was a racist. Black people who came our house had to go around to the back door. My dad was interested in their issues, but he treated them as if they were stupid children. That is how stereotypes began to gain a hold on my life.

Alexander became a Christian during his high school years and immediately became colour blind also. He didn’t care about skin colour - the most important thing was to tell about Jesus to all people. He prayed for black people in the streets and made his father angry. Alexander joined the Pentecostal Church and was eventually trained as a pastor.

-         But I became blind to how racism was controlled by politics (apartheid) as a young Pentecostal preacher – I concentrated on the salvation of souls and did not want to get involved in politics. I preached white sermons to white people. Now I know that if you don’t see the sufferings of your nation you are offering the nation to Satan on a golden plate. Christians have to appeal to the consciences of governments.

-         When I was sent to Rhodesia (Zimbabwe) as a preacher of the Assemblies of God, my eyes started to open to the pain which has been caused by white racism and colonialism. My eyes were further opened two years later in Cape Town where a white clerk wanted to register the little baby of a coloured family as a black. The reason was that the baby’s skin colour was darker than that of the parents.

Later the baby would have been ”sent back” to the black area thousands of kilometres away. The action of the young white clerk would have determined that child to the lowest class in the apartheid system, which included poverty and marginalization. Happily a symphetic white clerk preventented the action.
 
-         That incident was pure demonic evil, says Venter. Racial discrimination divided people from their birth and robbed them of their humanity. Non-whites were nothing and they were treated even worse than animals.  

There is no racism in the Kingdom of God

Another turning point was becoming familiar with John Wimber, the founder of the Vineyard Movement. His theology was based on the Kingdom of God, the message which was Jesus’ central theme. This view is a bit different from the Pentecostal theology that puts the emphasis on how the Holy Spirit was acting in the Book of Acts. Lutherans, on the other hand, are putting the emphasis on the righteousness by faith found from Paul’s letter to the Romans.

-         There is no racism, sickness, pain or death in the Kingdom of Heaven. Nationalities or languages are not wiped away but they are one in diversity. This new era has already arrived on the earth in Jesus’ ministry. The Kingdom has come and that is why we have to work so that the world would see the Kingdom in our churches. 
 
On the other hand – the Kingdom has not come in its totality – only God is able to bring that about at the end of the world. That’s why we can’t force the Kingdom to come by violence. Now we live in a tension “already – not yet”.

-         The church should be the agent of the Kingdom in this world. The task is to expose darkness and bring light. If the church loses its salt, the nation will be overcome by darkness. 
 
John Wimber came to South Africa from California with a group of young people in 1981. Many people were healed and hundreds became Christians. Alexander left the Pentecostal Church and started the very first Vineyard in South Africa. Now there are about 30 Vineyards.

Joweto – a community of reconciliation

Alexander was not happy with a church that only included whites. Once a black man stood up and started to criticize him when he preached about the Kingdom and justice.

-         He asked ’Are you not just another white English liberal, a hypocrite trying to patronize black people by saying nice words to us in front of the whites? If you mean what you say, then come to Soweto and meet my friends and see how we live.’

White Alexander went to black Soweto. He was shocked about the poverty and hopelessness of Soweto.

-         I felt God saying ’ Where is your brother?’ It struck me: ‘ My black brother! God was clearly asking me about my oppressed brother, my poor brother, my angry brother, my AoG brothers and sisters who died in the Soweto riots.

-         Am I my brother’s keeper? God, don’t get political on me now! I haven’t killed anyone, let alone a black man! Are you crazy?

-         Yes, you are your brother’s keeper. His blood cries out to me from the ground. In fact, his blood is on your hands.  

Those words nailed him. Alexander had just touched the pain of black people in Soweto and he knew what God meant. Thought patterns of the white elite were rooted out of him during the next years.

Very often the athmosphere of the meetings had to be purified with honest discussions and dialogue before they started worshipping God with songs. Journeys into Soweto brought confusion: these Christians were dealing with basic questions of life and death, with daily political oppression, with police raids and poverty. Alexander realized that his spiritual interests about worship, evangelism and church growth seemed meaningless in the face of their suffering.

-         I went to the Johannesburg Vineyard now and then to preach there. The church was white and I irritated people with my sermons. Some pastor colleagues were deeply concerned about how politized I was.

Some Soweto meetings were so angry that people went out. Very often the meetings ended up with people falling on their knees crying out to God for mercy.  

-         We concluded that only Jesus, through the blood he shed for us, could make us one, and could heal and unite us.

One night in 1985 a black man confessed the sins of his people – the worship of black nationalism, revenge and violence. Alexander publicly confessed the sins of Johannesburg – white prosperity, gold, arrogance, priviledge and power.

-         We wept as we spontaneously came up with the name Joweto, the joining of Johannesburg and Soweto, an alternative kingdom community.

Joweto Vineyard was driven by the vision of the Kingdom of God where all barriers between people were broken. It would be a foretaste of the perfect Kingdom which will come on earth at the end of the world. It was based on repentance and love. It was a non-racial vision of a new emerging South African identity.

Alexander taught the whites who wanted to be involved in this community to strip off their privileges and pretensions. They had to become as servants, not masters. This new community created working places for black people. They noted that working together united blacks and whites in a new way.
The Joweto community lasted for ten years and it was closed down in 1995 because it had run its course under apartheid. A member of the community founded Zone 3 Vineyard a week after the burial of Joweto. Alexander moved to Johannesburg and he has led the church in a multicultural direction. The Joweto project produced good fruit and now most South African Vineyards are multicultural churches.

Evangelicals connected with justice

Alexander has written a book “Doing Reconciliation” about his experiences. It includes stories of apartheid, theological analysis and tips for doing reconcialiation. Alexander has some advice for Finns based on his experiences in Joweto.

-          Plant a church that includes all colours and languages, reconciling people who are divided. Use the tales of people’s lives in small groups – let people talk about the pain of being “different” so that others will hear it. That will cause more empathy.

-         Keep small groups multilingual as long as possible even though you have to use translation. You may change that when the church grows more.

The apartheid regime was broken when FW de Klerk took over the presidency. He released Nelson Mandela from prison and arranged the first free elections in April 1997. God did a miracle in South Africa. Just before the elections Mangosuthu Buthelesi – the leader of 6 million zulus – refused to take part of this process. South Africa was on the edge of civil war. It was well known that the zulus, mainly represented by the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP) were responsible for black-on-black violence covertly supported by the apartheid government.

A Christian leader, Michael Cassidy, invited the zulu leader Buhthelezi and Nelson Mandela for negotiations which were held in April 1994 in the changing rooms of a large football stadium in Durban. There were also 25 000 Christians there who prayed for the success of the negotiations. The prayers were answered. They reached an agreement and the elections were peaceful. That was described as the South African miracle of peace. A bloody massacre in Rwanda started during the same month. Hutus killed tutsis and called them cockroaches. 800 000 tutsis were killed. A UN offical said that he now recognises the existence of God, because in the extreme violence he saw the hand of evil – he shook shook hands with the devil.

-         My prophetic explanation is that the demon of genocide crossed the border to Rwanda and caused destruction there. In South Africa we closed the door to the demon because Christians became involved in politics. Don’t abandon your country’s politics, because if you do, they’re in danger of becoming accursed. 

 
Ari Puonti