Wilhelm Busch

Wilhelm Busch (27 March 1897 – 20 June 1966) was a German pastor, youth evangelist, writer At the same time he was preaching evangelising sermons all over the country and abroad.

During the time of National Socialism he adopted the uncompromising position of the German Confessing Church against the influence of the Third Reich on the life of the Church. On one occasion in 1937 he was arrested right after evangelising in the church of St. Paul in Darmstadt due to Nazi authorities feeling upset over the capability of the Christian movement to attract the attention of the general public with Biblical messages and counter their own aspirations to control the masses. During the sermon, state officials tried to avoid a public uproar in the crowded Church and let him preach. After having been captured, an SS commissioner presented him official orders expelling him from the territory of Hessen. As he refused to accept due to his commitment to perform Biblical work among people as a pastor, he was immediately taken into custody. During my life, I have passed through periods of various hard trials. Because of my faith I have been thrown into prisons on more than one occasion. Not because I had been stealing silver spoons or had committed some other crime. In the Third Reich, Nazis didn't like youth pastors like me, and that's why authorities kept throwing me into these pretty sinister places. After World War II Busch renewed his activities as a youth pastor and itinerant evangelist with the slogan "Jesus our destiny" becoming the central topic of his ministry even after his official retirement in 1962.

He was a Christian pacifist.

Busch's pupils in the post-war era included Ulrich Parzany who said he was strongly affected by Busch's "clear, illustrative and bold proclamation of the gospel". He died in hospital in Lübeck on 20 June 1966 while on the trip home after evangelising in Sassnitz on Rügen.

Literary works Jesus Our Destiny It is based on a compilation of his radio speeches. A common theme in his speeches is the centrality of Jesus to Christian doctrine. Published after his death, this book has been translated into major world languages and attained a worldwide distribution of several million copies. The title "Jesus Our Destiny" comes from the main topic of big Evangelization that pastor Busch held in Essen in 1938. Kleine Erzählungen 1-5 (stories). Stuttgart, Quell-Verlag 1958 (new ed. 2005).