“When God’s people gather, representing our worldwide Church family, we have a real celebration. And I believe we have one of these celebrations today,” said Erton Köhler, president of the General Conference, at the beginning of his annual pastoral message on October 10.

Addressing more than 300 members of the General Conference Executive Committee (GCEXCOM) gathered at the world church headquarters in Silver Spring, Maryland, United States, Köhler called Adventist leaders to renew their biblical-mandated commitment to the God-mandated mission for this time.

“This Sabbath and this Annual Council are a great opportunity to strengthen our unity and strengthen our commitment to be a church always grounded in the Bible and focused on the mission,” he told Adventist leaders from around the world.

Our birth certificate

Köhler based his message on the biblical book of Revelation chapter 10—which he called “the birth certificate of the Seventh-day Adventist Church” and “the moment we were called for mission.” He connected it with Revelation 14, where, according to him, God “delivers the message to be preached” by the Adventist movement.

The message is delivered by an Angel with an open book, Köhler reminded Adventist leaders. “The birth of the Adventist movement is linked to an open Book, to an open Bible,” he said. “It is a call for mission.” Because “our church was born opening the Book and studying prophecy. And sharing this message with the world.”

He emphasized that the message of Revelation must be proclaimed “with a loud voice,” something that implies “a call for boldness in mission,” going “beyond the ordinary for Jesus.”

Köhler also emphasized that the message of Revelation 10 is connected to Revelation 14’s call to worship the Creator. “From the very beginning, the Adventist movement was called to be a voice for creationism,” he said. “The creationist message is an Adventist message.”

A sense of urgency

In that regard, Köhler said, Revelation 10 should inspire us with a sense of urgency in everything we do. “We may feel discouraged or complain about the apparent delay [of Jesus’ second coming], but our calling is to make the most of the time we still have and prepare more people for Jesus’ return.”

The decisions made during Annual Council are not merely administrative, Köhler reminded Adventist leaders. “Mission plans, policies, reports, budget allocations, and structural choices, must be our response to the reality that our window of time is closing,” he said.

At the same time, Köhler reminded leaders that Revelation 10 states that John eats the Book before he is commissioned. “You cannot proclaim what you have not consumed and digested,” he said. “Mission without deep understanding of God’s Word is empty.”

Beyond disappointment

But then, those who ate the Book suffered what is known as the Great Disappointment, when Jesus didn’t appear on the day they were expecting Him.

God “sent a small group of disappointed people to prepare the world for His second coming,” he said. “It’s a calling that began with disappointment and will end in glory and power.”

Köhler also emphasized the key message of Revelation 10:11—you must prophesy again about many peoples, nations, tongues, and kings—which he called “a recalibration that did not silence the church but it commissioned [it],” he said. “Out of the bitterness came a deeper understanding, a more precise message, and a renewed mandate to prophesy again to the whole world.”

“The message of the second coming is not yet completed. It must be proclaimed again, with fresh urgency, until Jesus comes,” he said. “The blessed hope that inspired and committed the 19th-century generation now must be proclaimed once again by the 21st-century generation.”

It is a mission which has no geographic boundaries, Köhler emphasized. “No ocean is too wide, no border is too closed, and no culture can be too resistant,” he said. “Our mission is global!”

Moving forward together

Based on this call to reach the world, Köhler made an impassioned plea to move forward all together, integrated, as the church seeks to establish an Adventist presence in areas where the blessed hope is not being preached, and using all media for mission, to proclaim the soon return of Jesus. In this sense, Köhler said, “the question is whether we are fully embracing this calling or whether we are reducing the strength of our commitment.”

In that regard, “this Annual Council is not just a business meeting, but a time for personal and institutional recommitment,” Köhler said. “Let’s use everything we have and everything we are for mission. . . . Let’s make mission the priority of God’s Church by the power of the Holy Spirit,” he pleaded.

Köhler closed by reminding GCEXCOM members that the mission is much greater than we are, “but the same Jesus who gave us the vision, will also give us the provision we need to be bold in His mission.”

Against that background, he said, the key question is, “Are you in?”

Leaders respond to the call

Köhler’s appeal carried into conversations with church leaders after the Sabbath message, with several pointing to the need to move beyond affirming mission as a priority and examine how that priority shapes leadership, resources, and the work of the church.

For Ivelisse Herrera, treasurer of the Inter-American Division (IAD), one of the strongest points was Köhler’s emphasis on the urgency running through the prophetic message of Revelation. The apparent delay of Christ’s return, she said, exists in the human perception of time, not in God’s purposes.

“The message of Revelation is one of urgency, not delay or time for distraction,” Herrera said. “That is why it is important for us to understand that our reason for being as a church is the call to proclaim the return of Christ to every nation and people.”

Herrera said the message reinforced the direction IAD leaders have established for the coming years, including strengthening communion with God, Adventist Christian identity, unity, and total involvement in mission. She pointed to OneVoice27, Impact 2028 Every Church One Church, among the initiatives through which the division intends to put that emphasis into practice.

“That is the way Inter-America must show our sense of urgency in fulfilling our calling,” she said.

Getting everyone together

The question of how to bring different parts of the church together around mission also resonated with G. Alexander Bryant, president of the North American Division (NAD). Bryant said Köhler’s statement that “mission is a remedy for God’s church” stood out because mission can provide common ground even amid differences.

“No matter where you are, no matter where you are on the theological spectrum, we all can meet at mission,” Bryant said. “It keeps us focused on what we need to do. And it also keeps everything in its proper perspective.”

For Bryant, that renewed focus also raised a practical question about integration. He said conferences and unions in North America are involved in numerous mission projects around the world, sometimes without knowing that other church entities are working in the same places.

“What if we came together?” he asked, pointing to the possibility of greater impact when church entities coordinate their resources and efforts. NAD’s “Together in Mission” emphasis, he said, aligns closely with Mission Refocus and has prompted leaders to reconsider how they can integrate their work more effectively.

Rowing, not rocking the boat

Harrington Akombwa, president of the Southern Africa-Indian Ocean Division, said one line from Köhler’s sermon remained particularly vivid for him: “You cannot rock the boat when you are busy rowing.”

For Akombwa, the illustration captured the idea of mission as a remedy for the church. When members are actively engaged in the work of the gospel, he said, they have less room for unnecessary disputes and criticism and more reason to work alongside one another.

Akombwa also connected Mission Refocus with the need to direct resources toward places where decades of church work have produced little or no Adventist presence. “The work will not finish in our territory until it finishes everywhere, until we enter every place,” he said.

Also at a local church level

The call sounded different at the local church level, but carried the same urgency for Sujin Kwon, a pastor from South Korea. Kwon pastors a small congregation of about 40 regular attendees, many of them older members. He acknowledged the difficulty of reaching new people in a community where the population is declining and many younger residents move to larger cities.

Kwon said his congregation has lost many of the children and young people who once attended as they grew older, but he believes the church must again make an intentional effort to reach younger generations.

“We have to do it again,” he said.