| WORLD REPORT

 

We need many new church plants in our division to reach different types of people,” said Don Schneider in his opening comments to attendees of the North American Division Committee year-end meetings November 5. Schneider, 
president of the Seventh-day Adventist Church in North America, shared inspiring stories of how evangelism, personal witnessing, and church plants are leading people to Jesus.

 

“It’s working,” said Schneider. “We’ve had more baptisms this year than we’ve had in years. And more people like Jeannie Ramos are reaching out to their communities through the ministry of church planting.”

 

PRAYING FOR POWER:  After inviting NAD year-end meeting attendees to pray for the Holy Spirit's power in opening new churches, division president Don Schneider prays with church planter Jeannie Ramos. In 2003 Ramos helped start a church plant called FaithStep in Hagerstown, Maryland. “Our goal was to reach the down and out,” said Ramos. “Some of the people who attend are homeless, and many struggle with addictions.”

 

In an interview with Ramos, Schneider laughed as he recalled her being concerned about his visiting FaithStep dressed in a suit and tie. “The people we minister to dress very casually,” said Ramos. “When we started this church, we resolved to create an environment in which they’d feel comfortable.”

 

“When you ask people at FaithStep how they’re doing, no one says, ‘Oh, I’m fine,’” said Schneider. “They say, ‘I’ve been doing pretty good—I’ve been clean all week.’ Or, ‘I fell off the wagon last week but I’m back on now.’ FaithStep is a very real place.”

 

Marti Schneider, Schneider’s wife, shares his passion for church planting. Marti is director for programs of the Seventh-day Adventist Church’s Office of Adventist Mission, which helps start new groups of believers in unentered areas around the world. She coordinates SEEDS and ChurchWorks conferences, challenging people to plant congregations and expand their horizons as they spread the gospel. “New churches aren’t simply new worship centers,” Marti said. “They are outreach centers, planted for the purpose of reaching new territories or new people groups for God.” (To learn more about SEEDS conferences, visit www.nadei.org.)

 

In closing, Don Schneider challenged attendees to make church plants a priority. “We start 100 churches every year,” said Schneider. “But we need more. Do you know where you can find a McDonald’s from here? Go out on the street and travel north, south, west, or east. You’ll find one. Then go another mile or two and you’ll find another. What if we had that many Seventh-day Adventist churches? We all need to be thinking about how to make this a reality.” 

 

 

 

On the weekend of November 27, 28, 
2009, the North France Conference of Seventh-day Adventists—numbering more than 8,000 church members—celebrated the official opening of the House of Hope, a spiritual and cultural center located in Paris.

 

Purchased in 2005, the House of Hope facility was reconstructed in order to comply with regulations for public buildings and allow access for people with disabilities. The costs for the purchase and reconstruction of the House of Hope totaled $3 million. The money was supplied from the building funds of the North France Conference and a special offering given by 16 million Adventists around the world.

 

HOUSE OF HOPE: Façade of new Seventh-day Adventist church in 
the historic Latin Quarter of the fifth district of Paris, FranceThe House of Hope is a meeting place to promote cultural diversity and help people discover the ways of God and of other people. Every Sabbath morning, four separate Adventist congregations share the facilities: the French-speaking Church of Hope, the Romanian church, the Portuguese church, and the Hispanic church. A Baptist congregation rents the facilities on Sunday mornings. Each of these congregations has 80 to 100 members. The building has room for more than 300 visitors. During the week the center offers a variety of biblical, social, educational, and health programs in collaboration with a variety of partners.

 

During the opening ceremony on November 27, the deputy mayor of Paris, Jean Tiberi, said, “It’s good that a church like yours is open to society. It’s a good thing to have created a cultural and spiritual center, and I am delighted that a house like yours is situated in the Latin Quarter of the fifth district of Paris.”

 

The minister of the Baptist comm-unity that will use the center, Roger Abotsivia, expressed his hope that other similar “houses of hope” will be erected in France. He also thanked the center’s director, Philippe Leduc, for leading this initiative in the heart of Paris.

 

The president of the Adventist Church in the Euro-Africa region, Bruno Vertallier, stated, “We want to live together with Christian hope in the heart of the city, instead of the stress our society usually suffers.”

 

On Sabbath, November 28, Adventist pastors from the Paris region gathered at the center for a dedication ceremony. Officials from the Euro-Africa Division of Seventh-day Adventists, Franco-Belgian Union Conference, and North France Conference presented messages of exhortation and gratitude. The “Crescendo” choir and others performed musical selections.

 

 

 

Adventist World, the international paper for Seventh-day Adventists, is rapidly adding new languages in print and online to serve more and more of the 16 million baptized members of the Seventh-day Adventist Church around the world.

 

Six months after the online launch of a German-language edition, an estimated 25,000 Adventist Church members in Germany and Switzerland began receiving Adventist World monthly, in print, in their own language. The launch came in partnership with Advent-Verlag, a church-owned publishing house based in Lueneburg, near Hamburg, Germany, which is launching a new denominational magazine for its membership area at the same time.

 

Capitalizing on this development, the Austrian Union Conference plans to launch a new magazine, with Adventist World inserted, to be distributed throughout Austria.

 

These are important developments in the German-speaking territories. “We at Advent-Verlag are excited on behalf of our readers in the German-speaking territory,” said publishing house editor Eli Diez-Prida. “We have always published short news about the work in our magazine. But now the relationship and the identification with the world church will be promoted much more. A broadening of the national and even of the European horizon will be very beneficial to all of us.”

 

Among the countries of Germany, Switzerland, and Austria are about 45,000 German-speaking Seventh-day Adventist Church members.

 

Another important milestone was reached when the first online Vietnamese edition of Adventist World was launched in October 2009. The move comes about a year after the Seventh-day Adventist Church received official recognition by the government there.

 

This development opened up new perspectives for the 14,000 Vietnamese members in the country, who for several decades felt marginalized from the world church as very little material could reach them. In addition, according to govern-
ment sources, more than 300,000 Sabbathkeepers gather in home churches throughout the country. These believers will also benefit greatly from being able to better identify with the world church by having access to Adventist World in their language.

 

Two additional versions of Adventist World were introduced on the Web in January 2010. The new editions target Romania, with about 100,000 Seventh-day Adventist members, and Urdu, Pakistan’s dominant language, with about 12,000 Seventh-day Adventists. Although the latter group is comparatively small, “it is a group worth supporting,” according to Claude Richli, director of marketing and associate publisher of the magazine. “These people live in a strongly Muslim environment and need to be better connected with their brothers and sisters worldwide for support and encouragement. In addition, we know of non-Adventist Christian readers in Pakistan who long to strengthen their Christian faith and who would find our material of great interest to them if it were presented in their language.”

 

Together with these new developments, Adventist World will be published in seven languages in print editions and 11 different language editions on the Web, including Russian and Chinese. Online versions of the magazine can be accessed at www.adventistworld.com.

 

Launched in 2005 as an initiative of the General Conference of Seventh-day Adventists, Adventist World’s mission is to “uplift Jesus Christ, uniting Seventh-day Adventists everywhere in beliefs, mission, life, and hope.” Editorial offices are located in Silver Spring, Maryland, United States, and in Seoul, Republic of Korea.