With an expansive reach across global Seventh-day Adventist Church departments, entities and lay member organizations, the Three Angels’ Messages Project Committee presented an exciting report at Wednesday’s Annual Council Session about projects being implemented over the past 12 months.
Bringing together personal and corporate evangelism, communications and digital ministry, children’s and family ministries, youth ministries and even publishing, the committee is purposed to encourage the world Church to proclaim its unique, end-time message found in Revelation 14.
Committee chair Mike Ryan and General Conference (GC) vice-president Artur Stele co-presented the report, saying that they were incredibly proud of the enthusiastic uptake of the committee’s vision by the world Church.
“It is not a little more than one year since the Three Angels’ Messages Committee was organized and began its work,” Stele explained. “We have celebrated [those] who have partnered with us in making a fresh, strong emphasis on the messages that actually defines us as Seventh-day Adventists.”
“I think it’s an exciting time that we have come to in this report,” continued Ryan, “to be able to have our partners share what is taking place—not just what their plans are, but the implementation of those plans. We have moved to the implementation stage!”
Personal Evangelism:
Beginning with a report from the church in New York, Angel Smith—a seminarian at Andrews University—shared her experience with their “sidewalk evangelism” initiative, and how giving a Bible study series about the three angels’ messages via Zoom converted even her close family.
“It hasn’t been easy to share the three angels’ messages with my family,” said Angel, “[But] every night we did the series my mum was there, and she would even stay on afterward to ask questions. The studies are laid out in a simple way, and they come straight from the Bible.”
Angel is just one of hundreds of ministerial students or theology majors that the Church aims to use in their goal of reaching 100 cities with the message of the three angels.
Communications, Digital and Print Evangelism:
Experienced evangelist Mark Finley shared how he was sharing the three angels’ message through digital and print media. His new series “Three Cosmic Messages”, created in partnership with the Hart Research Center, Three Angels Broadcasting, Hope Channel, the Review and Herald, and the GC, includes 13 separate television presentations, as well as beautiful graphics and sermons that pastors can present around the world. The team have also produced a book entitled Three Cosmic Messages, which is being circulated in the tens of thousands.
Another book entitled Hope’s End Time Secrets is also being distributed across the globe by GC Publishing Ministries. Director Almir Marroni shared how this has been wildly successful, with dozens of churches across the world handing out books and finding unity as a result.
“We handed out 1408 books today, all in one swipe,” shared Pastor Jerry Duval from Nixa Adventist Church in Missouri. “It’s brought the church back together in unity, it’s something we can all get behind and it’s energized us.”
In an innovative move to encourage church members to engage with and share videos and digital resources developed by both church departments and local members, Williams Costa and Sam Neves from the GC Communications department shared how their new initiative “Adventist Teams” has already enabled 2650 digital missionaries participating in the beta release of the app, to do so.
“Adventist Teams is a digital game where each digital missionary builds a team of dedicated Adventists who are ready to share their best digital content in our church,” Neves explained. “We believe we will discover amazing leaders among our lay members. After all, our dream is that everyone can be totally involved in the proclamation of the three angels’ messages!”
Youth Evangelism:
Hope Channel has partnered with more than 500 young presenters in a new series entitled “Three Angels Message Global Proclamation Project”. Jajuan Sanders, a 3AM Youth Presenter for the series, explained that this project is being shared in a relevant, relatable format for young people.
“I struggle with thinking that the three angels’ messages actually matter, especially to young people to be honest,” he confesses. “But I think they can matter, when you actually think through it. If you're wondering when racism, sexism or classism will end, the three angels’ messages are actually the answer. God is solving everything. Who doesn’t want that? It’s the finishing point, it tells you what’s going to happen.”
The project has been translated into 30 languages so far, and the aim is 70 languages by 2026.
“Sometimes we wonder if there’s going to be another generation that is proclaiming this message, who are excited about it, but I think we can rest assured that this is taking place,” encouraged Ryan.
Children’s, Family and Women’s Ministries:
In the children’s ministries space, Linda Koh from the GC Children’s Ministries department shared two creative initiatives to help teach children the message of Revelation 14: A “Creation Detectives” comic book, and an animated series about the three angels’ messages.
In addition to this, elementary schools, secondary schools, and home-school communities have been implementing a new “Three Angels’ Messages for Kids” curriculum, with 23 Conferences in North America, 5 Unions, as well as institutions in Germany and Austria requesting and implementing the program. Evidence of students undertaking creative and research projects was highlighted by curriculum and creative director Sandra Doran, who also showed how students have made the personal decision to follow Jesus as a result.
The GC Women’s Ministries department has created a series of 12 Bible study lessons that women can undertake face-to-face or online, with a focus on how the three angels' messages can help them to understand God’s expectations of them—as wives, mothers, sisters, workers or homemakers.
Finally, Willie Oliver from the GC Department of Family Ministries presented a unique perspective on sharing the three angels’ messages, through the lens of Malachi 4:5-6, “See, I will send the prophet Elijah to you before that great and dreadful day of the Lord comes. He will turn the hearts of the parents to their children, and the hearts of the children to their parents; or else I will come and strike the land with total destruction.”
A principle resource supporting this focus is the newly-published book Where are the Elijahs? By John B Youngberg, with copies being distributed to all of the division and attached field Family Ministries directors.
“Essentially it is about encouraging families around the words of the ‘6 R’s’ of the Elijah message,” explained Oliver. These include building stronger Relationships, Redemption through salvation in Jesus, Repenting from sins and turning away from idols, Rebuilding broken family relationships, praying for the latter Rain of Revival, and asking for His Restoration in our lives.
Hermeneutics:
In order to make sure the materials and resources created by churches and church departments under the Three Angels’ Messages Committee initiative are theologically accurate, Frank M Hasel, associate director of the Biblical Research Institute (BRI), shared how a new book Biblical Hermeneutics: An Adventist Approach can help.
“Twelve respected Adventist scholars have written 14 interesting chapters in which they tackle many important aspects of biblical hermeneutics from an Adventist perspective,” he explained. “We encourage you to use the resources to educate yourself, your elders and church members.”
In addition to the book, BRI has also produced 14 videos with practical illustrations that are available on the BRI website and YouTube channel, in multiple languages. Philippe Buch, a young theology student living in France, said he enjoyed the presentations and decided to share them with his family and friends on Facebook.
“I really liked the videos on Adventist hermeneutics because even though I was raised in an Adventist family, they allowed me to more profoundly and clearly understand the core reasons for my faith, and that my faith is biblical and Bible-based. It’s not just beliefs, but it makes sense from a logical and theological point of view too,” he said.
Questions and comments:
Following the presentation, Ted Wilson, president of the Seventh-day Adventist World Church, invited church members to ask questions or make comments about the Three Angels Messages Project, highlighting some exciting developments and perspectives:
“I just wanted to say that the White Estate board this last month approved the new compilation of the Three Angels’ Messages by Ellen White,” said Dr Merlin Burt, director of the Center for Adventist Research. “There has been very careful work put into this translation and it is our prayer that it will have a very positive impact on the church.”
Robert Folkenberg, president of the Chinese Union Mission also shared how the three angels’ messages are relevant to our church and wider society, “I believe that the proclamation of three angels' messages in a clear and precise way is an antidote to two challenges we are facing. Externally, there is prevalence around the world of relativism—'You believe what you want to believe, I’ll believe what I want to believe, it’s fine’. But the three angels’ message is clear that this is the truth. But there is also the tendency within our denomination to come and move towards a generic demonization, a generic faith. The three angels’ messages reminds us that we are distinctly called at this time in earth’s history for a distinct mission. In that light, I encourage us to be bold with the details of this message,” he encouraged.