Baptists today experience great freedom to practice their faith in America, but they need to be reminded of what our Swedish forefathers suffered because of their faith. Algot E. Strand’s account deserves our attention.
The first chapters of that [Swedish Baptist] history have been written in prisons and by those who have suffered the confiscation of homes and possessions.They have been written by persons who have been confined in prisons upon a starving diet—many of them serving life sentences.
It was the fugitives of that time and the exiles from their fatherland who sought homes in this country and found them in the deep forests of Minnesota and upon her wide prairies.
The religious liberty of this country inspired the first Swedish Baptists of the state, for they felt that they were martyrs on account of their faith. They felt that they were strangers in a land far from that of their birth—strangers in language and customs—but they had their old Swedish Bible and their hymn book with them.
Strand praised these people for their “unmistakable faith in the Word of God.” A number of them had memorized many chapters from the Bible. He goes on to say that “state prisons of Sweden were the first theological seminaries for the Swedish Baptists.”
When these believers arrived in America, some to Minnesota, they organized churches, but they often had to ride 15 to 20 miles in an oxcart to get to the service. Most of the ministry work in Swedish Baptist churches in their early days was done by laymen, but Amory Gale, a Minnesota missionary, would often assist the Swedes. They didn’t understand when he spoke English, but they always understood his great loving soul and considered him as one among them. The fact that he was an American was special to the Swedish immigrants.
Ensuing posts will discuss the organization of a few Swedish and other Scandinavian Baptist churches.
A History of Swedish Americans in Minnesota by Algot E. Strand, 1910. Chapter 12.
