BY JONATHAN GALLAGHER, United Nations liaison director for the General Conference

n his opening address to the 2003 Annual Council on October 10, General Conference president Jan Paulsen repeated his conviction that "mission must be top of our agenda," and that with such a mission, "nothing is routine."

Speaking to more than 200 administrators, pastors, and lay members, Paulsen said, "Our primary business is to tell others, all others, including the difficult-to-reach people in the 10/40 window and people in the highly secular post-modernistic world. It is our first business to tell them all about Jesus and his return; and what it means to live at this late and uncertain hour in history."

Global Evangelism
Consequently several new initiatives are in progress that reflect the priority of mission- Go 1 Million, Sow 1 Billion, 2004 Year of Evangelism. To strengthen this emphasis, Paulsen asked that a Center of Global Evangelism be established, together with the appointment of a director of world evangelism.

Delegates should see this new service "as an attempt on our part to be creative and offer a broad range of ideas for witness and evangelism aiming both at ministry and laity," he said, noting that "the center will work with the [Adventist church's 13] divisions to offer workshops and training programs in evangelism. It will seek and develop effective ways by which particularly the younger half of our world membership can define their use of time and resources in favor of witness and evangelism. It is becoming increasingly clear to me and my colleagues that laity holds the key to the finishing of the work."

In case some saw the service as an administrative takeover by the world church, Paulsen affirmed the importance of true local evangelism that is more than projects and slogans, concluding that "the comprehensive, lasting growth, which contains decisions based on understanding that brings people of mature commitment into the church, is an evangelism which grows out of the local 'soil.'"

Challenging young people to seize the evangelistic initiative , Paulsen told them, "Don't just sit there! Do something useful for God. Go and plant a church!"

Higher Education
Education is a challenge, and Paulsen noted the upcoming report of the Commission on Higher Education. He pleaded for wisdom and thought in formulating responses to the needs of the Adventist education system, saying "only that which you find attractive and helpful will actually work. Anything else is just frustration. So, I ask you to help us not to walk away from this one, but to find a workable system."

The president also took the opportunity to address the continuing creation-evolution debate, and the church's response of providing high-level discussions involving scientists, theologians, and administrators. While this topic would not be addressed until Annual Council 2004, when a full report would be on the agenda, Paulsen reaffirmed the church's biblical stance.

"We see the Bible not as a mere cultural product, but as a book in which God speaks to us," he declared. "We hold it to be reliable and trustworthy. And in its account we are told that God created this earth, and the living things upon it, and He did it in six literal days. That is the testimony of Genesis 1 and 2, and this is the position we hold as a church. We say: 'That is the origin of the earth and life on it as we know it today.' I know of nothing that is about to move us as a church away from that position."

Pastoral Message
As the session moved into Sabbath, Paulsen switched to a pastoral role and examined how Adventists should live while in "enemy territory."

"God had at no time the intention that faith-hostile forces of a secular world, with its values, would be allowed to so encircle men and women that the rays of hope and the sound of the promises could not reach them," he affirmed. "God is in the business of finding, reaching out for, loving, and saving people who are lost and who have no future without God's help. Secular society has never recognized that 'rights' and 'wrongs' has anything to do with God. They are just social and cultural choices. The Bible makes the distinction. The appeal is to make a choice which in fact constitutes crossing over from death to life" (John 5:24). The sad reality, said Jesus, is that men have come to love darkness instead of light because their deeds are evil (John 3:19)."

"The paradox of the gospel," he stated, "is God's uncompromising love for people simply because they are human beings, and His insatiable drive to reach people 'caught in enemy territory' and bring them hope."

In a plea from the heart, Paulsen wrapped up his message with a call for friendly churches with a positive quality of life. He spoke with concern at the lack of love and compassion sometimes shown by Adventist Christians, and recounted a personal incident.

"It troubles me when a couple, professionally well-accomplished and well-employed, sits down in my home and says: 'I find our church on the whole very unfriendly,'" he said. "It does not bother me that they say this to me; I am glad they know me well enough and feel free to say that. But it bothers me that this is what they experience. I ask myself: Is this so, and is it widespread? Is it an unfair over-generalization? We are all social beings, and whether you are in or out of the church, people need friends. We don't function well without that."

Quoting from Ellen White, Paulsen asked that all Adventists remember their responsibilities to love and care for others, and to make them friends:

"With earnest heart, let us inquire, Who is my neighbor? Our neighbors are not merely our neighbors and special friends, are not simply those who belong to our church or who think as we do. Our neighbors are the whole human family." (Sons and Daughters of God, p. 52)

"I am concerned about the quality of life found in our churches," Paulsen said. "And I say to myself: If our communities were to be known, by those who despair, who suffer from loneliness, or who are ill and are gripped by fear, as a haven, a place of healing, a place where you find friends, would we not then more truly reflect the qualities of life that Jesus Christ expressed? Is there not magnetism in this to draw people to Christ?"

Calling for a renewed spirit of compassion and friendliness as the means to draw others to trust in God, Paulsen invited all Adventists to ask if people are drawn to us as they were to Jesus.

"We will, I believe, be a more complete witnessing instrument in the hands of the Holy Spirit, when our teaching of the truth and standards of living, and our public evangelism, are complemented by the atmosphere and spirit of compassion and friendliness coming both from our church fellowships as well as from me as an individual.

People who carried pain, anxiety, and sorrow were drawn to Christ. Are they to me and my church?"