Southern Africa, North America present five-year reports to Session

Seventh-day Adventist evangelistic campaigns routinely draw tens of thousands of worshippers to stadiums in Southern Africa, where church membership has grown to 2.5 million members.

And in North America, church membership has grown to a record high of more than 1 million, including nearly 50,000 baptized in 2009.

South African Adventists play the vuvuzela, a long plastic horn popular in the country, at the beginning of their region's five-year report. [photo: Josef Kissinger]

Those were the highlights of the formal reports presented by Southern Africa-Indian Ocean region President Paul S. Ratsara, North American region President Don Schneider and other leaders from both regions at the General Conference Session on Saturday evening.

In Southern Africa, many of the newly baptized members receive formal training in outreach, while others join comprehensive efforts to meet critical needs, such as assisting children whose parents have died of HIV/AIDS.

Ratsara opened the report from the podium, standing with dozens of members from the region, which covers 23 countries, including Angola, South Africa and Madagascar.

Many held a long plastic horn called the vuvuzela, a sort of national instrument extremely popular with South African fans at the 2010 World Cup soccer matches, where teams have complained about the loud sound, which resembles the buzzing of bee swarms.

"This is the drum in Africa of the 21st century," Ratsara told several thousand in attendance at the Georgia Dome, before the delegation blew the horns.

The region's 20-minute video report focused heavily on evangelism efforts; a building boom of churches, schools, universities, hospitals and media centers; and the positive influence the church is having on the continent.

One segment highlighted the "Fishers of Men" program in Zambia, an outreach campaign that trained 3,000 new members to share their faith the day after being baptized. The program has been implemented in several countries, helping to propel the area to become one of the fastest growing of the church's 13 world regions.

Leaders watch a video report from North America during the Sabbath evening General Conference Session program in the Georgia Dome on June 26. [photo: Josef Kissinger]

The North American region video presentation opened with a scene depicting the Advent movement from 1844 and the origins of the then rapidly growing Seventh-day Adventist Church.

Some of the sepia-toned footage showed a conference room where early leaders talked about church growth -- then cameras switched to a modern conference room where today's leaders proudly rattled off key statistics to demonstrate church growth, such as:

- 200,000 baptisms in the past five years
- More than 300 medical facilities
- 109 academies, 15 colleges and universities, more than 750 elementary schools and nearly 400 early childhood centers.

"Adventist education is evangelism," declared Larry Blackmer, the region's vice president for Education.

The video also featured outreach efforts in the United States and Canada on behalf of Women's Ministries, the Youth Department, Community Services, and Adventist Media Ministries, among other departments.

It also told the story of Southern California church member Judith Miranda, who, along with a friend, knocked on thousands of doors in the tony beachside city of Malibu as part of their personal outreach effort.

The result of the effort was satisfying: The Summer of 2008 saw the opening services of the Malibu Seventh-day Adventist Fellowship.

Church focus on mission still crucial

Emily Beth Bond helps to present an update of Adventist mission projects around the world. The church's Office of Adventist Mission delivered its report to the General Conference Session, Saturday, June 26, in Atlanta. [photos: Gerry Chudleigh]

"God has a plan for this world in which we live, and He's going to see that plan finished," said Gary Krause, director of the Office of Adventist Mission, during a presentation. "The question is, will we participate in that plan?"

The world church voted to launch Global Mission during the 1990 Session in Indianapolis, Indiana, with the goal of starting Adventist congregations in new areas.

Over the past two decades, thousands of new believers have resulted from efforts to reach out to people of various cultures and religions, with congregations emerging in distant places such as Sarawak, Borneo, and Shenyang, China, as well as regions previously unentered. The church has grown from about six million members to more than 16 million, church officials said.

Global Mission pioneers are on the frontlines of outreach efforts, living among people in far-flung areas to share the love of Jesus with them, Krause said.

The department is also developing DVDs on understanding world religions to help church members better comprehend who their neighbors are and share the gospel in a meaningful way, said Ganoune Diop, director of the Adventist Church's global study centers.

"We praise God for the wonderful growth in the church," Krause said. "But we need to face the fact that today on planet Earth, there are more people who do not know Jesus Christ than there were 20 years ago. ...Take this opportunity to make a fresh recommitment to what you can do to support, to be involved in, the mission to tell the world about Jesus Christ."

Kids from around the world stood on stage during the mission report at the Georgia Dome Saturday afternoon.

He pointed to areas still without Christians -- or with very few of them -- including Turkey, Tibet and even Europe, where Christianity has been fading.

"There are huge populations all through Asia, teeming megacities of people. Most of them have never even heard the name of Jesus," Krause said in a video about these as-yet-unreached parts of the world. "Just think what a tremendous difference it would make in their lives to know that there was a God who loves them, who cares for them."

Church delegates also heard a report on Tell the World, a guiding initiative of the world church for the past five years. Designed to coordinate the church's effort to spread its message of hope, the program is central to the church's "identity and heritage," church leaders said in a brief report this afternoon.

"All organizations have a strategic plan; the church is exactly the same," said Mike Ryan, general vice president of the world church, who was among presenters in the Georgia Dome this afternoon. "Tell the World is the strategic plan moving the church forward."

Next Saturday, church leaders are expected to review the progress of Tell the World and announce the emphasis for the next five years.

The Adventist Mission presentation served to update the audience at the 59th General Conference Session on all the church's efforts to spread the Gospel message through mission work.

Also presented during the evening's program was a segment about enditnow, the church's campaign to end domestic violence against women. The campaign, supported by an online petition signed by tens of thousands of people, seeks to mobilize Adventists and others to stop violence against women and girls.

Leaders of the campaign presented the Session's enditnow banner, and world church President Ted N. C. Wilson took to the stage to become the first attendee in Atlanta to sign it.

To sign the banner, stop by section 116 of the Georgia Dome near Gate E.

Victims of Gulf oil spill remembered in worship service

Adventist Church Vice Presidents Lowell Cooper, left, and Armando Miranda offer prayer for the victims of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill during the first Sabbath at the church's World Session in the Georgia Dome, Saturday, June 26. [photos: Josef Kissinger]

The divine worship service during the first Sabbath of the Seventh-day Adventist Church World Session featured an expression of prayer support for those affected by the ongoing BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

The public demonstration came as an Adventist response to calls for prayer by the governors of four of the states bordering the gulf: Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi, and Texas.

Bobby Jindal, governor of Louisiana, the state most directly affected by the disaster, issued a proclamation on Thursday declaring Sunday, June 27 a "Statewide Day of Prayer."

In his own statement Texas governor Rick Perry said, "I urge Texans of all faiths and religious traditions to offer prayer on that day for the healing of individuals, the rebuilding of communities, and the restoration of the entire Gulf Coast environment in the wake of this disaster."

Some 40,000 Seventh-day Adventists meeting in the Georgia Dome for the church's General Conference Session this morning set aside a few moments during the worship service for Lowell Cooper, a general vice president of the Adventist world church, to pray for those affected by the tragedy.

More than 40,000 people attended Sabbath worship at Atlanta's Georgia Dome. Here, worshipers pray during the divine service.

In his prayer, Cooper said, "We think especially at this time of those whose lives are so deeply scarred by famine, war, and disaster. We pray for those in this country whose livelihood is imperiled by the oil spill in the gulf area. Let our collective concern and sympathy give rise to a response that inspires hope and delivers help to those who suffer most."

The idea of bringing this matter before the Adventists assembled in the Georgia Dome came on Friday morning, July 25, from Jan Paulsen, recently-retired president of the Adventist world church, during the morning Steering Committee. In light of media reports of the proclamations made by several governors, Paulsen encouraged those planning the worship service to make this a matter of prayer at Sabbath's worship service.

"The governors of these states have issued a call to prayer," Paulsen said. "Prayer is part of our lives. We need to express solidarity with those who have been so directly affected by this tragedy."

Delegates approve Ng as Secretary and re-appoint Lemon as Treasurer

World church Treasurer Bob Lemon was re-elected to another five-year term Thursday, and Associate Secretary G. T. Ng was promoted to Secretary on the second day of the 2010 General Conference Business Session.

G.T. Ng, with wife Ivy, speaks after his election as secretary of the Seventh-day Adventist Church during its World Session in Atlanta yesterday. [photo: Gerry Chudleigh]

"Never in my wildest imagination will I ever imagine that I would ever be put in this position of responsibility," Ng said, "but the Lord has his way."

He replaces Matthew Bediako, who was elected in 2000.

Lemon, treasurer since 2002, said his appointment "was a real privilege and an honor" to work with treasury staff from around the world. He asked that delegates pray for every Adventist member and worker around the globe.

In brief remarks, he also said, "We need to change the soft currency of this world into the hard currency of eternity."

The biggest challenge facing the church over the next five years, Lemon said in a brief interview after his appointment, is the need to increase involvement among young people.

Membership, financial audits key to Adventist Church growth, leaders say

Seventh-day Adventist delegates voted to accept quinquennial reports from the world church's Secretariat and Treasury departments today at the denomination's 59th General Conference Session.

Adventist world church Secretary Matthew Bediako assures delegates that membership audits, while challenging, lead to ultimate growth. [photo: Robert East]

The world church family, which now numbers between 25 and 30 million when unbaptized members and children are counted, would have seemed an "impossible dream" to early church founders, said world church Secretary Matthew Bediako during his report this morning.

Since the last Session in 2005, the Adventist Church has grown by more than 5 million members, with daily accessions nearing 3,000, Bediako reported.

In 2006, the church received more than 1 million new members, more than during any other year in church history, he said. Also during the quinquennium, two church regions for the first time each welcomed more than a million new Adventists into their churches.

Membership audits spark new growth

While Bediako urged delegates to praise God for recent membership growth, he also cautioned them not to get too comfortable or relax their efforts to spread the church's message of hope.

"Maybe it's not as good as we sometimes portray," Bediako said, citing the rate at which the Adventist Church is establishing a presence in unentered countries -- just two new countries in the past 20 years.

With 20 countries remaining, "at that rate, it will take 290 more years to enter every country," he said.

Many of the as-yet unentered countries lie in a region known as the 10-40 Window, which spans Northern Africa and East Asia, where proselytizing is often illegal.

Growth does not come without "growing pains," Bediako said, transitioning to an overview of recent membership audits. While slack calculations are responsible for some discrepancies, immigration and war also upset membership tallies, leaving records destroyed and people displaced, he said.

Whatever the cause of exaggerated numbers, conducting membership audits is "difficult work," Bediako said, candidly adding, "sometimes it's very embarrassing and discouraging."

But, if "prayerfully undertaken," achieving accuracy is rewarding and often leads to ultimate growth, he said. "Seeing the actual number of members in [regions] where audits have been done challenged us as a church and helped us reinforce our energy on reaching the unreached, reclaiming lost members and nurturing and discipling new members."

"Somebody asked me, 'Why are we doing [audits]? I told them, 'Christ counted His sheep almost daily, and when he found one missing, he went out looking for it,'" Bediako said, referring to a New Testament parable.

The Adventist Church now numbers 16.3 million, said Bert Haloviak, director of the world church's Office of Archives and Statistics.

Haloviak is expected to announce his retirement during Session.

Jurien Den Hollander, a delegate from the church's Trans-European region, applauded the number as a "more realistic" picture of the church, but took the audit concept even further, suggesting that the church also collect statistics on active membership.

Tithes and offerings rise despite economy

The importance of accuracy also featured prominently during the afternoon's financial report, delivered by Adventist world church Treasurer Robert E. Lemon.

God's leading and prudent handling of funds has seen the church through the recent global economic downturn, world church Treasurer Robert E. Lemon told delegates in his financial report for the past five years. [photo: Gerry Chudleigh]

God's leading, judicious handling of funds by church officials and the "faithfulness" of church members have seen the church through "one of the most tumultuous financial periods" in recent history, Lemon said.

Despite a global economic recession spanning most of the past quinquennium, annual worldwide tithe for the past five years grew more than 40 percent, increasing from US$1.3 billion in 2004 to $1.8 billion in 2009. Similarly, world mission offerings during the period grew almost 32 percent, from $50 million to $64 million per year.

Tithe from regions outside North America outpaced returns from North America for the first time in 2008, echoing recent membership growth in regions such as Africa, where about one-third of Adventists now live.

The past five years also marked a "substantial increase" in mission offerings from regions outside of North America, where offerings have remained "fairly static," Lemon said.

While he applauded a recent "major shift" in giving to specific projects, Lemon said such targeted offerings can ultimately strand regions or projects without the necessary resources to sustain outreach after donors turn their attentions to a new project.

Referring to tithe, Lemon urged delegates not to "put restrictions" on God's money.

Holding up an original check for $30 million, marked simply "tithe" in the memo section, Lemon reminded delegates of the so-called "extraordinary tithe" returned to the church in 2007 by a family selling its multinational business. More than 85 percent of the extraordinary tithe is currently allocated, Lemon said, much of it to projects in the 10-40 Window.

Lemon assured delegates that while worldwide tithe for 2009 in U.S. dollars technically dropped more than 4 percent from 2008 totals, returns in local currencies actually increased in most regions. Totals dwindled when converted to a strengthening U.S. dollar.

Nearly 40 percent of tithe and offerings in the General Conference's budget are returned in currencies other than the U.S. dollar, making the church particularly susceptible to currency fluctuations, Lemon said.