In a world whose population is expected to reach 8.5 billion by the year 2025, the Seventh-day Adventist Church needs to develop a new generation of leadership to serve this future age.
In a world whose population is expected to reach 8.5 billion by the year 2025, the Seventh-day Adventist Church needs to develop a new generation of leadership to serve this future age.
That’s the word from church leadership during a session of the 2003 Spring Meeting in which church vice president Gerry Karst and Mike Ryan, special assistant to the world church president for strategic planning, delivered a summary of research into the kind of world Adventism will confront approximately one generation from now.
By 2020, Ryan said, only 12.5 percent of Seventh-day Adventists alive will have been baptized members of the church in the year 2000. The movement, which is adding five new churches and five new congregations each day, will need leadership attuned to the spiritual and ecclesiastical unity of the church, supported by contextualized materials that make the church meaningful to local cultures.
A motion was proposed—and later passed—under which the church would convene a symposium just prior to the 2005 World Session in St. Louis, Missouri, to emphasize a shared vision, a common mission and commitment to a core message for church leadership. Also, the church will ask its International Board of Ministerial and Theological Education to assess existing curriculum on leadership with an eye towards incorporating the conclusions of the St. Louis symposium.
Three other issues were presented at this portion of Spring Meeting for leaders to consider. One is the need for contextualized materials—literature and other items that will cultivate growth, nurture of members and church unity. World regions would be requested to define a beginning minimal core of materials for each “new work” area; and that specialized study centers be supported with workers who can help develop such materials.
In the quality of life area, the church is being urged to ask church regions to place a “generalist” in mission areas where strengthening of local programs is needed, as well as develop materials for that generalist to use.
At the same time, the Office of Leadership Training would be asked to work with all levels of the church to identify leadership skills needed in the next 20 years, as well as work with departments and schools to develop training courses and curricula addressing those specific needs.
Bertil Wiklander, president of the Trans-European church region, said that while the leadership symposium is an important step forward, the differing styles of leadership in his region—from highly collegial and consensus-based in some areas to others seeking specific, top-down direction for their localities—means “the church needs to give more attention to [local] culture” when formulating leadership development plans.
In an interview with ANN, Wiklander added that “it is not just the [2005] symposium, but also what happens leading up to it that will be important” in charting a leadership course for future years.
Roscoe Howard, secretary for the church in North America, told ANN that new leaders would have to understand the need for a “mental shift” from a “monocultural” view when dealing with an increasingly diverse world church.
There was little surprise to hear Patricia Jo Gustin, director of the Institute of World Mission at Andrews University, a Seventh-day Adventist institution, speak about the issue of contextualization addressed in the document. She said the church needed materials that are “developed for specific groups—Buddhists, Hindus, Muslims, the whole Chinese culture, [and for] secular people. We have almost nothing.”
She added, “Imagine trying to give Bible studies or do any other presentation and all you have is something that’s written in another language, another culture, and you have nothing to give people in their hands that they resonate with, that answers their questions about life. It’s extremely important.”
