“Awake, strengthen what remains, which is at the point of death.”
In his own words, Brother Andrew remembers how Open Doors started and why it began with a question.
That first step came from a curiously placed magazine in the cellar of the missionary training college in Scotland, where Brother Andrew was finishing two years of study. The glossy, four-colour publication was promoting a worldwide socialist youth festival in Warsaw.
“I read of a youth organisation of 96 million members; [I had] never heard of it. We were struggling with the church getting small groups together for catechism, service or entertainment. 96 million—it blew my mind. They have a big festival every 2 or 3 years somewhere in the world. I looked at names [of the places]—they sounded very unfamiliar to me, like closed places to me. And there was one coming up soon.
“So I wrote to them and said: “I read about what you are doing. I would like to attend one of these manifestations, but I’m a Christian. Can I come? If I do, I will behave as a Christian.” Period. I thought, I’ll never hear from that anyway. But there was a [return] letter: “You’re welcome. You can come as a Christian—do what you want.””
But Brother Andrew would not go empty-handed.
“I must go there with Scriptures”
“And then the idea was born: I must go there with Scriptures. So I ordered from the Scripture Gift Mission gospels, tracts and New Testaments in a number of Communist country languages, sent it, and I organised my trip. I did not tell anybody.”
While watching the final parade of Communist Youth at the festival, Brother Andrew gained the perspective he needed from his Bible.
Brother Andrew with a few of the thousands of Bibles he collected in many languages. It was his practice to read through the entire Bible at least once and often twice each year. He alternated reading the Scriptures in Dutch, German and English.
“I watched that huge parade—so militant, so assertive, so aggressive, so seemingly strong—and God said [to me], “Every knee shall bow, every tongue confess, that Jesus Christ is Lord.” They were chanting and singing, and I thought, Your knees too, guys.”
At that point, Brother Andrew read the verse Revelation 3:2, which became the inspiration for Open Doors’ ministry.
“Awake, strengthen what remains, which is at the point of death.”
“Then I understood I had to go to the Christians. I had no idea how to get there; well, [maybe] in that one city, OK. [But] after that, I had no money, no contacts, no language. But something was aborning in my heart, and I said:
“Lord, yes. But how?”
When he returned from that first trip to Eastern Europe, he began to ask God for an answer. And, slowly, it started to form: He began a new ministry he decided to call Open Doors.
