Brankovac Evangelical Church - Mostar
They found a suitable building in 1984, and since then the church has been meeting in the birth house of Aleksa Šantić in Brankovac. Up until the war, which started in 1992, there were around 20 believers, from Mostar and the surrounding area as far as Čapljina. But over that period about 200 people visited the church, and most of them heard the Gospel for the first time. The members of the church back then were like a family, they met together often, visited each other for lunch, and, although few in number, they were great in unity. They carried out various forms of social and humanitarian work, visiting old-people's homes and orphanages, and helping the suffering people in Ceausescu's Romania. Their spiritual activities, aside from prayer meetings and services, included giving out books, appearing on radio shows, theatre productions and performances of spiritual songs. People rarely missed the regular meetings, and travelled long distances, to what are today neighbouring countries, to attend seminars and other events. They did all this with great joy and sacrifice.
In 1992, during the war, the church building was almost completely destroyed. A good number of believers ended up all around the world; those who remained carried on meeting and ministering in another location in the city, in a rented TV repair shop. This was a new beginning, and, because of the war, a lot was done to deliver humanitarian aid to those in need. The city was divided into what is today known as East and West Mostar. The church building was on the East side of the city. A few believers visited it in 1995, and from then the spiritual and physical renewal, and return to Brankovac, slowly began.
With the return to the ruins, building began, and so did various ministries such as children's camps and sport on a new sports court, as well as normal church activities. The distribution of aid, through the church's humanitarian organisation 'Agape' was one of the largest ministries, and extremely necessary given the widespread poverty of the time.
By 1997 the conditions in the building were fairly good, given the standard of the time; and there were lots of believers, from Mostar and around the world, working together for the renewal of the church, and also the city - healing the wounds of war.
Since then the church has continued its work, and, when the new law on religious groups and churches came into force in 2007, the Brankovac Church became a legal entity, under the wing of the Evangelical Church in Bosnia Herzegovina, the denomination to which we belong. As the work on the church building was completed activities intensified; prayer meetings and services, work with children and youth, language courses, and many other activities. In answer to current needs, and in line with the calling of the church, EC Brankovac has continued with its tradition of care for those in need. At the beginning of 2014 we bought a piece of land in Humilisani so that today this work includes not just giving out aid, but also a vision for sustainable humanitarian work through the "Centre for Care" project, in which the church works this agricultural land and uses the harvest for humanitarian aid. The future brings the responsibility to, in every age, find ways to share the love of Christ for all people, and pray sincerely "May Your kingdom come, and Your will be done, on earth as in heaven".