A focus on comprehensive health ministry
Silver Spring, Maryland, United States—Top leaders from the Health Ministries and Ministerial Association of the Seventh-day Adventist Church met March 4–6, 2013, at the church’s headquarters to examine how the two entities can encourage a comprehensive approach to mission and evangelism.
“This is all counsel we’ve had from the beginning,” said Jerry N. Page, secretary of the Ministerial Association. “We just want to have it reemphasized,” he said, referring to the Adventist Church’s historical emphasis on healthful living.
Health Ministries director Allan Handysides concurred. “Our church cofounder, Ellen White, gave advice that the church’s work could be more effective when the health professionals and ministers are working hand-in-hand,” he said. A comprehensive approach, Handysides said, would also help ensure that the church’s teachings on healthful living are more consistent throughout the world.
Over the next few months, leaders plan to define a core philosophy of health and prepare for the implementation of comprehensive ministry at local congregations for the coming years. For now, this represents the first step in a process of what many summit attendees said was the first top-level meeting of its kind in their church career, and it harkens back to what the denomination was first founded on.
In the coming years, leaders said possible methods of supporting the health emphasis could include bringing back a combined master of divinity and master of public health degree at the church’s Loma Linda University in California, releasing a modern and abbreviated adaptation of White’s 1905 book The Ministry of Healing, and developing training resources for Adventist schools. Leaders emphasized, however, that the future direction would not be limited to just a few resources or events but a whole renewed approach.
“We want to use Christ’s methods of developing relationships and meeting people’s needs before we try to share the gospel with someone,” said Mark Finley, assistant to the president for evangelism and organizer of the summit.
Finley said the highlight of the summit was public outreach during the meetings. For two evenings, the group modeled health evangelism, inviting the public to attend health lectures and cooking demonstrations in the world church headquarters’ auditorium.
“We were blessed to be able to model comprehensive, total health evangelism,” Finley said. “I think this is a real model for the future.”
[Ansel Oliver/ANN]
Hope channel ukraine
Kiev, Ukraine—The March 2013 launch of Hope Channel Ukraine gives the Seventh-day Adventist Church its fourth full-time satellite channel in Europe, along with growing Internet channels potentially laying the ground for future satellite transmissions.
The March 1 opening caps a nearly five-year application process for a license to operate. In August, Hope Channel Ukraine became the first Protestant TV channel officially granted broadcast distribution rights across the eastern European country and former Soviet Republic.
The network can now broadcast on some 600 cable networks, potentially reaching up to 60 percent of the country’s population. There are roughly 45 million people in Ukraine.
Daniel Reband, who oversees TV production for the denomination’s Euro-Asia Division, based in Moscow, said, “Having lived under communism and experienced for many years countless obstacles to sharing our message, I can hardly believe what I am seeing.”Hope Channel Ukraine currently operates a Ukrainian- and a Russianlanguage studio in the capital, Kiev, and in eight other cities.
For years, church members in Ukraine financially supported the development of the media ministry outreach, said Kandus Thorpe, Hope Channel vice president for international development. There are roughly 60,00 Adventist Church members in Ukraine.
The channel joins its three other sister satellite channels on the continent—Hope Channel Europe, based in England; Speranţa TV in Romania; and Hope Channel Germany.
The Adventist Church also operates six Internet Hope Channel broadcast channels in Europe: Bulgaria, Czezh Republic, Hungary, Italy, Norway, and
Poland.
Hope Channel Ukraine is the 14th full-time satellite channel in the global Hope Channel network.
Hope Channel Philippines is set to launch as the network’s next satellite channel in August. The channel already operates online. Similarly, the Internet-based Hope Channel Indonesia is scheduled to also make the transition to a satellite channel later this year. Also upcoming is the launch of Hope Channel Africa.
[ANN Staff]
