THE INSTITUTIONAL financial crisis is looming larger every day both in government and in private sectors.
What has caused this predicament? and what signal should come in loud and clear to church leaders and members?
The first thing we discover is that the devaluation of the dollar is not the cause of the problem, but simply helped reveal the problem a little sooner than anticipated.
"We are putting Band-aids on our institutions to keep them healthy," says Harlan F. Lang, a fund-raising expert writing in Fund Management, July-August, 1972. "The most deceiving factor in all this is that all institutions survive terrible illnesses. Appearances are truly deceiving. Many are sicker than they seem to be" is his studied assessment. He notes the growing opinion that private institutions will have to be government financed to survive, but he points out that government institutions are also in a similar situation.
The fact is pointedly made that "few of us have enough information to realize the importance of the changes affecting our non profit institutions." "Uncertainty has led to apprehension and particularly intellectual debates over the future of the economic order," said United Nations Secretary- General, Kurt Waldheim, in Geneva, July 4, 1972, observing that pessimism, sweeping the world, was threatening the very existence of the economic order throughout the world.
Some believe that to discover the real cause of institutional, government, or administrative problems, we must go deeper than the need for adequate funding. Richard T. Whalen, a Nixon aide writing in Newsweek, July 10, 1972, on the subject, Running Out of Money, gives a companion summary: "Can you imagine a surgeon saying, 'I don't know where to cut'—then using the knife anyway? That's what we're about to do." Whalen emphasizes that in his opinion "The answer is not smaller government, but smarter and more responsive, directly accountable government."
Institutionalism has lost much of its influence with the public because it represents establishment and status quo. It has tended to ignore public interests while perpetuating a brand of professionalism out of touch with current human needs.
Many see it lacking the ability to organize (its size) and function, ever demanding more buildings, more equipment, more workers who become isolated from the life and actions of the populace despite their good intentions and programs.
Institutionalism has also tended to ignore and often resist others who reach the community without receiving their imprimatur. Adventists should not now find themselves in any such problems of financial and public support if spiritual counsel especially given was studied and heeded.
Persistently, Ellen G. White called for small institutions, whether they be schools or health institutions, making constant con tact with the community through a total program, physical, mental, social, and spiritual. Church members were to be the community agents creating goodwill, rendering practical service and bringing spiritual uplift.
By personal labor reach those around you. Become acquainted with them. Preaching will not do the work that needs to be done. Angels of Cod attend you to the dwellings of those you visit. ... By visiting the people, talking, praying, sympathizing with them, you will win hearts. This is the highest missionary work that you can do.— Testimonies, vol. 9, p. 41.
Recently in California a large number of government mental health institutions were closed, not because of few patients but the inability of government to serve the increasing sickening society. What was the alternative? A top State government medical officer told me at a chaplains' meeting—"They will have to ultimately be treated in the home." This is in no way an isolated opinion. The long ignored home and the centralized institution will undoubtedly take on new meaning in the near future.
There are not enough health professionals or therapists to contact homes; most medics for in stance have declined home visits for years. It means that the time is ripe for Adventist members to step into the breach with the divine blueprint.
Many have no faith in God and have lost confidence in man. But they appreciate acts of sympathy and helpfulness. As they see one with no inducement of earthly praise or compensation coming to their homes, ministering to the sick, feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, comforting the sad, and tenderly pointing all to Him of whose love and pity the human worker is but the messenger,—as they see this, their hearts are touched. Gratitude springs up, faith is kindled. They see that God cares for them, and as His Word is opened they are prepared to listen.—Review and Herald, May 9, 1912.
An Adventist Community Plan is one of the answers with the placing of modern, professionally prepared material into the hands of our members to give "Home Help—for Alcohol, Tobacco, and Drug Problems." This temperance visitation ministry, aided by the lay activities and youth departments, is offering our people a head start to show what Adventists can do to compensate for public institutions that are hopelessly inadequate and frustrated in their efforts.
This doesn't mean our institutions will be replaced—rather such ministry will give community sup port, restoring purpose and meaning to many of our institutions. Already the Five-Day Plan to Stop Smoking is creating such community understanding for our institutions.
"Often intemperance begins in the home . . . right principles in regard to temperance could be implanted."— The Ministry of Healing, p. 334. This is true preventive medicine.
With the abundance of intemperance in the land, Cod has given us a message—an answer—indeed "something better" to offer.
It is of little use to try to reform others by attacking what we may regard as wrong habits. Such effort often results in more harm than good. . . . We must offer men something better than that which they possess, even the peace of Christ, which passeth all understanding.— Ibid., pp. 156, 157.
Temperance is therefore a total message of victory, a spiritual message dependent entirely upon Christ. "In the family circle and in the church we should place Christian temperance on an elevated platform."— Temperance, p. 165.
It is not necessary to be an expert or a professional to give the message of temperance as the answer to these problems through Home Help or other temperance-witnessing programs. Home Help, along with practical aids—super 8mm films, the loan of long-playing records, books, and magazines—provides an effective means of witnessing.
Every church member can extend this message of deliverance through Christ to a needy world living in intemperance. "Let those who have their Bibles and who believe the word of God become active temperance workers. . . . We want everyone to be a temperance worker."—Ibid., p. 236.
Thus our members working, cooperating in temperance, lay activities, and medical missionary work in the home, supported by the institutional program will safeguard our institutions, strengthen our outreach, and fulfill the plan that: "The Lord's people are to be one. There Is to be no separation in His work. . . . In God's work, teaching and healing are never to be separated."— Testimonies, vol. 8, p. 165.
It could be that Home Help visitation and similar approaches are just the answer needed to meet the institutional crisis of our day.
