It was in 1961 that the first Baptist family moved to Karlovac. The Vuletic family consisted of mother, two daughters and son with his wife. They built a house and got employed.1964 came the Blazek family with the wish to start a mission work. Next year they bought a small house, joined two rooms into one for a meeting-room while they lived in one room with two little children. It was at the same time bedroom, living room, kitchen and bathroom. Several children came into the town from Christian families to attend school and so in 1967 there were 14 members, after a baptism in between. The Baptist Union sent a pastor, Janos Varga from Sarajevo, but only after two years problems and misunderstandings arose and the owner of the meeting-room closed the church. He withdrow and the others joined the church in Duga Resa, a small group of believers 12 km from Karlovac.

In 1971 the mother, mentioned on the beginning gave ground to build a house for the church. That building was built with great efforts of our church members. Brother Stojan Vuletic made a hand machine for producing bricks and a boat for taking out sand from a nearby river. All work from the foundation to the roof was done without paid skilled workmen.

In 1972 came another pastor, Rev. Josip Sudar but the work went on very slowly and hard.

In 1988 the young pastor Ladislav Ruzicka with his wife Melanija came from Daruvar with great enthusiasm but traveled regularly for two years from Daruvar to Karlovac till the pastor's flat was empty so that they could move in. He overtook both groups, Duga Resa and Karlovac, both with per 19 members. God blessed the work and rewarded his faithfulness especially when he stayed in the building during the war when the whole street was evacuated and big fighting and bombings took place. Five month we couldn't have any meeting there, but he encouraged and prayed with the soldiers. Both churches started to grow and our meeting-rooms became to small to accommodate the people coming.

In January 1996, after a long period through  which we prayed and sought for a new location, we signed the contract and gave advance-money for the building. At that time we had no more money, but we were aware of the need for a church building in the center of the town and trusted God who owns everything in the world.

February the 5^th we started with prayer meetings every evening at six o'clock. First evening only five persons came but the number started to grow. Some were not able to attend these meetings because of illness or the job so they prayed where they were. Our faith was sometimes mixed with doubt but we agreed with the bible verse from 2. Chronicles 20:12 "...For we have no power...we do not know what to do, but our eyes are upon you. "

In cooperation with the Baptist Union of Croatia we sent about 70 letters to different churches in the world asking for help. We hoped for quick answers but only here and there we found understanding and promises. Just very small amounts of money came and the tension become bigger and bigger as the day we agreed to pay the rest of the money was approaching. We were happy to hear that the owner of the building was willing to convey it to our church when we pay at least the half of the money.

March the 17^th 1996 we tried to do everything we could through an offering. In the morning, church in Duga Resa collected 4500 DM and in Karlovac we collected 8500 DM. Some people gave their offer later so the total amount was about 15000 DM. With the money we have already paid it was about 10% of the total price. Because of the war situation for us it was a great amount of money. At that time only a few members had regularly incomes.

It's interesting that after our own offering many problems started to disappear, especially  money problems. We learned much about God's grace and love of our sisters and brothers all around the world. As we have agreed, at 23^rd April 1996 we paid the complete amount to the owner of the building. The most of the money was borrowed and even today we haven't paid everything but in spite of this we felt a big relief. The building was in a very bad condition and full of different rubbish. It took a few months of hard work until it was possible to have services there. As  it was from the beginning of the Baptist Church in Karlovac, most jobs had to be done by volunteering of church members because there was no money to pay professional craftsmen. But God did not leave us alone and we got support in material and physical help first from our brothers from Pembroke and then from seven brothers from Indiana who have already helped to restore the church building in Plaski the year before.

At 1^st of September 1996, four months after we have bought it, we had the opening service in the new meeting-room with 120 seats. We finished the restoration that day at 3 a.m. and we very happy that there were not enough seats because about 250 people came. Two weeks later a baptism took place with 19 persons.

Until now  we have enabled a toilet, a kitchen, a room for the youth and one for the pastor's office and counseling but there are still several rooms we haven't restored as well as the outside walls. We are very happy and thankful  that many new people have learned about God's love in this new rooms.

Pembroke, Wales

Through the war and through our efforts to get a new building, we became very close with the Baptist Church in Pembroke, Wales. Since the beginning, brothers and sisters from that church have helped us through prayers, physically work and with money, although they are not a very rich church and have their own problems with their old church building. It's a great thing to have such brothers and sisters on the other part of Europe and we are very thankful to God for them.

In the late fifties Hilda accompanied as translator a Baptist youth group through the country. They were from different places in Germany under the leading of Karl-Heinz Walter who is now the general secretary of the European Baptist Federation. They traveled through Karlovac, stopped in front of the bridge and started to give  tracts to the passersby but were soon forbidden to do it by the police. From the second world war until 1990 our country was ruled by communism.

Today, forty years later Hilda lives 100 meters from that place. Our church is free to have meetings, concerts in public and a short devotion on the radio twice a day. The Church counts about 80 members.

Thanks!!!

It is impossible to mention everybody as individuals, sisters over 80 in Sveden, churches and Christian organizations such as the "Life center" and EUDIM but God knows everyone who has participated in buying and restoring the church building and thus enabled more people to hear about God. According to the story in Luke 21:1-5, only God knows who gave the biggest offering.

We are thankful to every single person and because of the above mentioned reasons we will mention only the gift of the 25000 DM from the Scottish Baptist Union as the biggest amount of money we received at once and the gift of EUDIM. They gave us 10000 DM and lent another 20000 DM but later they decided to give us that money too. The word EUDIM consists of the first letters of words from 2. Co. 8:14 (in German language) "... your plenty will supply what they need..."

The first cleaning action

On Saturday the 17th of February 1996 the first cleaning action was organized. Soldiers were in the building for four years so you can imagine what it looked like. That day sister Hilda read in her devotion a word from Haggai 1:14, "So the Lord stirred up the spirit... of the people. They came and began to work on the house of the Lord Almighty, their God."
We just experienced this stirring of the spirit and there was big joy and enthusiasm while we cleaned  the walls and floors, the stairs, the toilet and kitchen. After three hours of work there was a big change to be seen on the first floor. Six sisters, three brothers and two friends took part in this first action. The attic where about one hundred pigeons lived for four years with their 'families' and 'seals' two fingers high needed a special action of strong men at the other occasion.