GC Bulletin 7: Home At Last

Home At Last

JOHN M. FOWLER Reporter

Almost Home! The words were staring at me from the opening day of this first General Conference session of the new millennium. But today the stare had a sting, an urgency. As Review reporter I took my seat in the front, long before the crowds gathered and the music began. The motto forced me to meditate. What do these words really mean—personally and corporately? Are they a response to our pioneers’ heart-beat song, so well conceived in the question of redemptive history: “How far from home?”

How could we say “almost home” when in my home division of Southern Asia alone less than .03 percent of the people know what “home” is all about, let alone the way to that home? How could we be sure that we are nearing home, when all the 11.3 million Seventh-day Adventists in the world are about 1 percent of the population of China, and the rest of China and the world may not be aware of what we are talking about in Toronto’s SkyDome?

Perish the thought. Ponder the powerhouse of God which alone can enable to take the message of the soon coming Saviour to the end of the earth so that soon every knee shall bow and every tongue shall confess that the Master of the home is soon to gather His family for history’s great reunion.

I shared a little of that powerhouse today, when I joined a 24-hour non-stop prayer vigil organized by Ruthie Jacobsen. About 20 people in one group were praying for the church, its mission, its unity, and its session in the SkyDome. “That moment of prayer is what meant the most to me,” said Sarojini Koilpillai, a recent returnee from an ADRA appointment in Sudan. “I felt a closeness to God.” When that closeness is felt, we are Almost Home.

Surge in Southern Asia
“The sari,” Billy Graham once said, “is the most graceful dress in the world.” But it was not the grace and the elegance of gold-embroidered silk saris that caught the attention of the 20,000 saints crowding the floor and galleries Wednesday evening. Southern Asia Division’s mission parade and report brought shouts of praise through the crowd. The report showed how church growth has mushroomed in once inaccessible people groups in the subcontinent. Ron Watts, the reelected president of the division, an Indian at heart and in commitment, reported that while the church had an accession of 55,000 new believers from 1990-94, it registered a phenomenal baptism of 140,000 during 1995-1999. That amounts to almost 1,000 baptisms per month, unheard of in the division’s history. Whereas the church baptized 5,000 new believers in 1999, it doubled the figure in the first six months of the new millennium. During this quinquennium Southern Asia has registered the highest growth percentage in the world. And this is just the beginning. With the help of an awakened laity, a committed evangelist-teacher working force, the division hopes to have a total church membership of 1 million by the next General Conference session in St. Louis.

Southern Asia Division has grown in other areas as well. For nearly 100 years of its history it had only one college. But in the last three years a new vision has leaped into action to provide Adventist education in as wide a range of professions as possible. Four new colleges have opened their doors for an education that will prepare for meaningful vocation and community service, enlarging the influence of the church. “We are committed,” says Samuel Gaikwad, president of Spicer College, “to turn education into an instrument of forging a path for the expansion of God’s kingdom through young people who will take the gospel into the nearly 600,000 villages of India.” It is such a vision, seen in this session a hundred times in thousands of faces, that makes the world church affirm its enduring hope by saying Almost Home.

Explosion in Inter-America
Wednesday evening’s explosion of joy and fulfillment in what the Spirit can accomplish came to us from Inter-American Division. What a giant of a division, its growth matched only by an increasing vision to reach even higher, and reach it quickly! “We have conducted 20,000 evangelistic crusades in the last five years,” says division president Israel Leito, with his trademark perpetual smile. The smile carries through as leaders of division departments march to the podium and wave to the audience as a symbol of their commitment to keep the church growing by 10 percent every year, soon surpassing a membership of 3 million.

Along with joy, color, and excitement, there was something historically notable: the division has registered during this quinquennium the lowest apostasy rate in its history—just 2.3 percent. With that sign of careful pastoral nurture and well-prepared baptism, the church in Inter-America seems to be well grounded and matured.

Although I rejoice in that report, I cannot but share a personal disappointment. From all the sessions I attended since 1966, I always took home an inspiration from the Inter-American Division delegates singing that great song “Beyond the Sunset.” But this time it was not to be. Perhaps the delegates were giving me a message, anyway. It is well past the sunset. We are Almost Home.

A Day of Fellowship
If the night sessions were filled with drama and fulfillment, the day pointed to our spiritual need and fellowship. Thursday morning’s devotional began where the church first experienced its power: Peter’s Pentecost sermon. Richard Liu, retiring secretary of the Northern Asia-Pacific Division, pointed out that the church cannot have its power without continually turning to the Word, to Jesus, and to the Spirit. “Silver and gold have I none,” the church might say as Aquinas once said, “but what good is it, if we cannot say, ‘in the name of Jesus’?” With Jesus as the anchor of our hope and the source of our strength, surely we can say, We are Almost Home.

This session is preoccupied with heavy agenda items, many including constitutional issues and Church Manual issues. Discussion is lively, cross-cultural, and represents democracy at its best. Anyone who says that the church rigs its policy making mechanisms needs to spend only an hour to discover how skilled parliamentarians, able chairpersons, and careful secretaries provide for wide- ranging discussions on issues on which the church administration has worked for months and years.

One particular issue shows how that democracy works. The administration through its constitution and bylaws committee proposed that all associate auditors be appointed by the board of the auditing service. Eric Korff, director of the General Conference Auditing Service, proposed an amendment that the appointment be made by the GC session. The amendment was opposed by Robert Rawson, the GC treasurer, and the original proposal defended by Athal Tolhurst, GC undersecretary. Others spoke in favor of Korff’s amendment, and finally it was voted. Just one example of what a great united family and democratic movement we have—another great symbol of maturity, illustrating that we are nearing that abode of perfection: Almost Home.

Rushing out of the SkyDome to write my report, I happened to meet Neal C. Wilson—the living statesman of the church. He attended the GC session for the first time in 1950 as the president of the Nile Union. For 49 years he has served on the GC committee, and led the church as its world president from 1978 to 1990. I asked him what he thinks of issues that faced the various sessions of the church. His analysis was simple: “We have moved from doctrinal clarity, to cultural diversity, to global mission. Now the challenge is inclusivism and holding on to the prophetic mission. We are not just a church. We are a prophetic people, awaiting the fulfillment of a promise.”

As long as that promise burns within each Adventist heart, we have not only the right to say “Almost Home,” but to be occupied with the task the Master gave, so that soon we will join with Annie Smith’s consuming hope:

Then standing on the sea of glass, hopefully skipping St. Louis, we can shout and sing, “Home at last, thank God, we are home at last.”

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