eneral Conference (GC) treasurer Robert Lemon (pictured above) started his report at Spring Meeting by praising God for all the bountiful blessings that the Lord bestowed on the church.

Lemon said that despite the long, protracted downturn in today's economy and the lackluster performance in the stock market, gross tithe (the total amount of tithe collected on Sabbath) was still increasing because of the faithfulness of Adventist members around the world. Gross tithe totaled $1.14 billion in 2002, up 2.5 percent over 2001.

Total tithe income to the GC also increased slightly in 2002, up by $795,926 or .8 percent over 2001. Undertreasurer Steve Rose noted that tithe income from the overseas divisions increased by nearly 19 percent to $5,950,602 in 2002. At the same, tithe income from North America decreased by 1.74 percent to $67,315,445.

The reason for the decrease, Rose explained in is that the Adventist Church is in the middle of a five-year transition period where overseas division are doubling the percentage of tithe sent to the General Conference from one to two percent and the North American Division is decreasing its percentage from 10.72 to 8 percent.

Unfortunately, world mission offerings decreased in 2002. Mission offering from overseas totaled $24,121,598 or about 95 percent of the previous year, while offerings, from North America totaled $22,067,538, or 98.4 percent of the previous year.

Rose pointed out that the GC had an operating gain in 2002 of $4,038,980, but that because of the decrease in the value of investments, due to the current investment market, an unrealized loss in value of investments was recorded in the amount of $5,783,980, giving the GC a net decrease to the fund balance of $1,745,881.

In other financial matters, Rose reported that expenses for the GC's in-house operations were kept well below the expense cap. Operating expenses for 2002 totaled $24,879,758 or nearly $2.5 million under the cap.

Lemon noted that despite the difficult financial challenges that the church faces today it is imperative to find ways to take advantage of the emerging opportunities to spread the gospel.