THE SECONDHAND STORE

The second hand store an NMS (Det Norske Misjonsselskap) is a voluntary organization, rooted in the Church of Norway. The organization consists largely of voluntary involvement from people and congregations who pray, give of their time and raise money for the work. 

HISTORY

1842 : NMS is founded in Stavanger

1843 : NMS sends its first missionary, Hans P. Schreuder, to Zululand (today: South Africa).

1845 : Mission Journal published. A media era began: Magazines for children, young people and adults. Page: Mission films, slide shows, TV and radio broadcasts, books.

1904 : Women were given the right to vote in the NMS for a full nine years before women were given the right to vote in political elections in Norway.

1912 onwards : In 1902, the first attempt to establish an independent church in a mission country was rejected by the then Secretary General Lars Dahle. Now the process was restarted. But Western colonial powers expressed opposition, and some of the missionaries also expressed skepticism about moving too fast.

1940-1945 : NMS was the only Norwegian mission organization taken over by the Germans. Then the organization went underground, which created problems for the payment of salaries to the employees in the mission fields. King Haakon 7 heard this and personally gave a large monetary gift which, together with support from both Sweden and the USA, meant that the payments could still continue.

1945 : In 1945, the missionaries had been "trapped" in their workplaces for a long time. Some up to 12-13 years. It is almost impossible to get a ship's apartment home to Norway due to large numbers of soldiers who were also going to their homelands, and world tonnage was halved. Then NMS acquired its own aircraft (DC 3) for missionary transport!

1950 and onwards : The process of realization when it came to making the churches that NMS had been involved in starting and operating independent begins. Fridtjov Birkeli will be an important driving force. First out was the Gazan-Lutheran Church, which was constituted in 1950.

1970-1994 : New understanding of the mission's development work as a diakonia. The development work is not an addition to the actual mission work, but an expression of the mission's uniqueness.

1968-1972 : Growing recognition that Europe is also a mission field.

1980 : The number of associations decreases for the first time.

1992 : NMSU becomes a separate organization.

2000 and onwards : Several reorganisations in NMS. The goal is to get more out of limited resources and to arouse mission interest and mission commitment in new ways and among new cohorts.