Abstract
Most of the churches in Indonesia are the fruits of the missionary work which began in the early 15th and 16th centuries. They were geographical and ethnic churches, due to the condition of the Indonesian archipelago. Denominationally they derived from Reformed and Lutheran traditions, and a bit of the evangelical. But theologically most of them inherited the so-called pietistic motivation: a motivation which had brought those missionaries to the country. With the rise of nationalism and the influence of the ecumenical movement in the early part of this century those geographical and ethnic churches in Indonesia arrived at a common experience and entered into a common consciousness of being one Church in one country with one responsibility for the whole people of Indonesia, which is one nation. Many of those churches became independent from their respective mother churches in Europe and other countries, and sought to find their own ways in exercising their calling and mission, and their
own identity in the new reality of an independent Indonesian nation.