Monk’s Cell Escape Room Calls Attention to God’s Message in the Bible

Bulgaria Seventh-day Adventists’ initiative celebrates the power of God’s Word.

June 24, 2023 | Bulgaria | Fani Bachvarova, Bulgaria Union of Churches Conference, Inter-European Division, and Adventist Review

Have you ever imagined that the entertainment option popularly known as an escape room could be used as a mission tool?

Meet Anton Partinov, operator of the mobile escape room COEXODUS, at the end of another recent visit to the game in Sofia, Bulgaria. Partinov shares about his encounters and conversations with people across that nation since he took over this initiative two years ago.

“The work is interesting because I travel all over the country, I meet a lot of people, and I have a great opportunity to testify about God to interested people,” Partinov said. “And there are quite some of them.”

We enter the escape room with Partinov to show us its secrets and mysteries. The room represents a monk’s cell in a monastery near Mount Sinai. As soon as we enter the room, the atmosphere and background music transfer us back millennia, when monks were inscribing transcripts of the Bible. One of these transcripts is hidden somewhere in the room, and players have to find it by going through riddles and completing tasks to proceed to the next level of the game until they discover the Bible.

“There is great symbolism behind it, as people seek God their entire life,” Partinov said. “The game is very well received by visitors, and we manage to establish a good connection with them.”

Once the game ends, Partinov guides people to think about the Bible’s contents and the messages in God’s Word. There are often discussions with the participants about God, the Bible, and their role in our lives.

The escape room was created under the project 150 Years of the Bulgarian Bible, and the main idea of the initiative is exactly this — to direct people’s attention to the Bible. Part of the project’s activities is run by the Bulgarian Union of Churches Conference, supported by Adventist-Laymen’s Services and Industries (ASi) Bulgaria, and comprises various cultural events. Project partners are the National Literature Museum under the Ministry of Culture, Sofia University St. Kliment Ohridski, the Center for Slavic-Byzantine Studies “Prof. Ivan Duychev,” and others.

The mobile escape room is touring Bulgaria for the third consecutive year, and about 800 players visit it each year. The operating periods are from April to October, and so far it has been placed in more than 10 cities around the country, staying in each town for a month. The next stops of the escape room are in Kazanlak, Shumen, Targovishte, Montana, and Berkovitsa until October 2024, organizers announced.

The original version of this story was posted on the Inter-European Division news site.