Celebrating Cultural Diversity of our Church

For the past eight years we had celebrated cultural diversity of our congregation. Today as we enjoy sights of different country flags being brought into the sanctuary, tastes of food from various places, sounds of praise in diverse languages we ought to also reflect on our duty to further the Gospel Mission.

Earlier this week news networks reported on the census from Jamaica where the Seventh-day Adventist Church is the largest religious denomination. A total of 322,228 individuals or 12 percent of the total population are reported to be Adventists. The second largest category is “Pentecostal” with 295,195 represents a cluster of denominations and independent congregations, as does the third largest category “Churches of God” at 246,838.  Jamaica is part of the Inter-American Division with the largest membership – 3.5 million.  Adventist education plays very important role in church growth in this region.  Today we see people from Caribbean and Central American countries leading the flag procession.

Second largest church is in South Africa.  Adventist churches in Africa were reorganized in 2003 because of the rapid growth.  South Africa region has 3 million Adventists, followed by the East-Central Africa with 2.8 million believers.

The fourth largest church is in South America, with Brazil leading the work.  Over 2 million Adventists worship there. 

Southern Asia, mainly India, has 1.5 million members.  However given the large population of the territory, the saturation ration is much lower than in above mentioned regions.  North American Adventist is sharing 6^th & 7^th place my membership with South-Asia Pacific (Philippines & Indonesia) with about 1.2 million.  However, the North American church still sends most missionaries, and provides substantial financial funding for the world mission.

West Africa has only 900,000 believers with Ghana being the main centre.  Muslim population in many countries is impeding the growth of mission.  And Adventist influence is not as felt as in Eastern and Southern African countries.

North Asia Pacific (China, Japan, Korea, Mongolia) are growing rapidly, with 700,000 Adventists present.  Chinese believers meet at homes and many churches are led by women.

Australia, New Zealand and Pacific islands are 10^th out of 13 world Divisions by membership, with about half a million believers.  The largest segment of church, 60% are living in Papua New Guinea.

Three world divisions operate in Europe. They were reorganized this year in October.  Largest with 200,000 believers, Inter-Europe includes Western & Southern countries, Mediterranean basin.  Euro-Asia with 150,000 members covers the territory of former Soviet Union and Afghanistan.  Trans-Europe is the smallest division, with 80,000 members, covering the Scandinavia, British Isles, Balkans & Baltic.

A new development took place this year at the annual session – a Mission Field unit was created, called MENA – Middle East & North Africa, where less than 4,000 Adventists are present among a half a billion population.  This region is predominantly Muslim and the work of the Gospel is dangerous.  Our local diversity in London is a tool for mission, as we connect people from all around the world and influence our neighbours, some from un-entered or under-represented regions. Majority of Adventist church today comes from the southern hemisphere, from tropics.  Adventist majority today is not White Anglo-Saxon, nor European. It’s time for mission responsibility to turn.