Miami, Florida, United States—During the Seventh-day Adventist Church’s first Urban Ministries Summit, May 7, 2012, in Inter-America, the church leadership pledged to better connect with the more than 36 million people living in three of the region’s largest cities: Mexico City, Mexico; Bogota, Colombia; and Caracas, Venezuela.
Experts from the Office o f Adventist Mission and international authorities on urban evangelism met in Miami to train more than 100 church leaders from the Inter-American Division (IAD) on best metropolitan ministry practices. “Our intention for this summit is to equip church leaders with the knowledge and skills necessary for unique focus on the cities,” said Samuel Telemaque, Adventist Mission coordinator for the church in Inter-America.
For a church with more than 150 years of existence, “our methods have not been working in the large cities,” said Gary Krause, Adventist Mission director for the world church. Krause suggested that Adventist churches and institutions located in urban regions should serve as centers of influence in the community. “Instead of expecting them to come to us, we go to them like Jesus did,” Krause said. Evangelism is not a spectator sport, Krause suggested. “Jesus mingled, showed sympathy. He ministered to needs, won confidence, and bid people to follow Him,” he said.
Participating in marathons, health summits, and urban evangelism series have connected with residents of Bogota over the past several years. In Caracas, one Adventist outreach group performs cultural presentations in plazas. Other ministry teams reached the community through health outreach, a church-planting movement, and even a vegetarian restaurant.
Krause encouraged summit attendees t o challenge local leadership to commit to identifying the needs of the community. Then, local leaders should join forces with church ministries to ensure that centers of influence are created within each urban community. “Those churches involved in the community are the ones that are growing and in contact with the world,” Krause explained. [Libna Stevens/ANN staff ]
Implication of aging ministers could challenge future staffing
Silver Spring, Maryland, United States—A recent review of pastoral demographics in the United States reveals that nearly 50 percent of Seventh-day Adventist ministers will reach retirement age within ten years; a discovery that is prompting ministry officials to examine potential scenarios to address the coming dilemma. Namely, will the denomination hire a new crop to replace retiring ministers or will it urge much of its experienced, aging workforce to continue working longer than previously planned? Each option has its own advantages, and church leaders say they are exploring a mix of both possible solutions.
Retirement age is considered 66.5 for the year 2022, according to the U.S. Social Security Administration. The choice of whether to retain ministers past retirement age into their late 60s and early 70s keeps experienced ministers on staff, church leaders say, but it leaves several generations between pastors and the young adults and teens to whom they minister. How leaders address the situation could affect everything from hiring requirements and remuneration policies to seminary tuition and the cultural needs of the region’s diverse congregants.
“We’re going to be looking at how we can have top-level quality pastors in this opportunity that’s presenting itself,” said Dave Gemmell, an associate director of the Ministerial Association of the Seventh-day Adventist Church’s North American Division (NAD). What’s certain is that leaders will explore how to renew recruiting efforts, sponsor more graduate students for theological training, and develop the recently formed Board of Ministerial and Theological Education.
Church leaders noted that the above statistics on retirement age do not include “regional” conferences or church administrative units that oversee historically African American congregations in the central and eastern United States (U.S.). There are nine regional conferences within the division’s total of 58 conferences and one attached field. About 25 percent of NAD members belong to regional conferences, according to statistics from the office of the NAD executive secretary.* Addressing future staffing challenges in the U.S. also presents opportunities to examine other factors in hiring pastors. Ministerial leaders say they would like remuneration practices to better reflect a candidate’s training. Currently, wages are similar for a pastor who has a doctorate in ministry compared to a pastor who doesn’t have a college degree. That fact could lead NAD officials to consider making an adjustment in salary policies.
Denis Fortin, dean of the Seventh-day Adventist Theological Seminary at Andrews University, says a trend in the past decade is the increased hiring of pastors who do not have a master’s degree in theology, and sometimes no college degree at all. Seminary leaders say an increasingly educated membership deserves educated pastors. “Why would the ministry not need good, solid education when other professions in North America require good, solid education whether it’s a lawyer or someone in the medical field?” Fortin said.
The seminary graduate program has about 350 to 400 students enrolled, depending on the semester, with approximately 100 graduates each year. Church leaders estimate that about 200 pastors per year will be needed to fill future vacancies. [Ansel Oliver/ANN]
* Statistics for this survey were gleaned from records in the NAD Retirement office. Regional conferences operate under a separate retirement structure and comparable stats are not available as of yet.
