Last week I shared with you the 6
strategic goals set by the Adventist Church in North America. As we reflect on
the need to seek the lost, to bring prodigals back we must be willing to
embrace sinners coming to Christ. We
cannot afford to have an inauthentic, judgmental Christianity. The fellowship in our church must be genuine,
or it will turn people off and away.
Tonight at 7 pm we will come together as a
church in the Business session to discuss our future direction, our goals and
plans for 2013, and further to 2020. In
preparation for the specific goals we will share I invite you again to reflect
on these 6 goals:
1) “Retention of
young adults … through a revitalized campus ministries program along with
[local] church activities that engage their interests and energies.” are we connecting with students at Western, Fanshawe? What are we doing to bring back a lost
generation of our kids born between 1980 and 1992, who are not in worship
anymore?
2) Extending
“Adventist education [to] everyone using innovative online modalities to
increase enrollment of school-age children and youth” as well as “enable the
local church to serve as a key community learning center.” what would it take to get our grades 1 through 8
children into discipling environment of Adventist Church School? What classes can we offer to community in our
facility, parenting, budgeting, cooking?
3) Expanding “the
potential and practice of women clergy” including “better member education,
increased mentoring and [improved] recruitment, support and affirmation” from
Church administrators. are we ready to embrace priesthood of ALL believers,
regardless gender, age?
4) “Evangelism
and outreach specifically targeted to large cities and native-born [North]
Americans.” In the NAD territory four out of five residents live in the
metropolitan areas and three out four are native-born, not immigrants while
Adventist growth is concentrated among immigrants and local churches are more
likely to be in non-metropolitan communities. notice the explanation: today’s natives of
Canada are also white european descendants who lived here for a few generations. Are we reaching Canadian population with the
Gospel? With London being 15th
largest city in Canada how can we get involved in urban ministry?
5) Develop “a
coherent media strategy with an emphasis on social media” instead of
traditional television, radio and print formats. how can we improve the use of internet media for
communicating the Gospel? could we invest in purchasing better video cameras to
broadcast our teaching services? Are we
tapping into youth networking to witness?
6) Continue to
evangelize “emerging immigrant people groups” where the Adventist Church has
had the most significant response in the last three decades. how can we invest into relationships with new immigrant
communities coming to London?
It will be good for the concept of the priesthood of all believers to be expounded upon theologically. I believe that the priesthood of believers is a misrepresented concept taken to justify creating women clergy. The church is not even suppose to have a clergy (male or female) in the first place. The practice of ordination is a Catholic practice adopted by Protestant denominations. By institutionalizing the church, we are creating offices that Jesus himself did not establish. Priesthood of believers has nothing to do with us having various church programmes and committees. The only offices I see established in the new testament church are: EVANGELISTS, PROPHETS, APOSTLES, PASTORS and TEACHERS (Eph. 4:11). So far, most denominations only ordain pastors who are expected to play all these roles or specialise in one of these roles.
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