A Place to Call Home

Yuxin (YOU-shin) is a girl from China. She likes to play the piano and she became very good at it. She became so good that her family decided to send her to a famous music school called the Prayner Conservatory in Vienna, Austria. Austria is a long way from Yuxin’s home in China—more than 7,000 kilometers (4,000 miles)!

Her mother was worried that Yuxin might get homesick being so far away, so she encouraged her daughter to “Find the spirit of home” in Vienna, meaning that she should find a church where she could worship.

Yuxin and her mother are Christians, and they used to worship together in a Sunday-keeping church in China. But one day when Yuxin’s mother was reading the Bible, she noticed that the seventh day of the week was God’s holy day. She shared what she had learned with Yuxin, who was surprised. She prayed, “Please God, tell me if this is really true or not.”

Soon, Yuxin visited a Seventh-day Adventist church and talked with the pastor. “Maybe this is right,” she thought, but she wasn’t willing to become an Adventist yet. You see, Yuxin was eating pork, and wasn’t ready to give that up.

Church in Vienna

But when she arrived in Vienna, she found the International Seventh-day Adventist Church on the internet and contacted Pastor Felix. The pastor picked up Yuxin from the metro train station and brought her to church. Yuxin was so excited to be at the Adventist church!

She came to the vespers programs on Friday evenings, and church on Sabbath. It didn’t take long for Yuxin to feel at home in the Adventist church. “Everybody is so warm and friendly,” she said.

Yuxin kept learning more about the Bible, and about Adventists. She says, “The preaching really touched me. It was wonderful. And God gave me the power to give up a lot of things—like eating pork, and going shopping on Saturdays. Now I understand and I gave them up.”

Taking It Home

Last May, Yuxin was baptized into the Seventh-day Adventist Church and is eager to take back to her home country what she has learned in Vienna. When she returns home, Yuxin plans to share with her family and neighbors the Bible truths she has learned in Vienna, and hopefully start an Adventist home-worship group. “They need to know why Adventism exists, and what I learned here. God really told me the truth, and now I can also tell them.”

Yuxin is one of many students from all over the world who have come to the International Adventist Church in Vienna. They like coming here because it is like a second home for them.

More and more people have come to this church that meets in a very old building. They need a new and bigger place to worship. Part of our Thirteenth Sabbath Offering this quarter will help this church family to have a better building closer to the city center. Thank you for bringing your offerings this Thirteenth Sabbath so that we can help the Adventists in Vienna to have a new place to worship.