“Revelation of Hope” meeting
New York City, New York, United States The drenching rains of Tropical Storm Andrea failed to dampen the enthusiasm of people who attended the initial “Revelation of Hope” campaign meeting Friday evening, June 7, 2013. The meeting is one of hundreds being held in metropolitan areas during June as part of the Seventh-day Adventist Church’s “Mission to the Cities” campaign.
Officials of the Atlantic Union and the two area conferences say that 1,100 people have already been baptized during the months leading up to the event. The NY13 campaign—which features 160 different evangelistic events across the region in June alone—is expected to culminate on June 29 at the Nassau Coliseum with a rally attended by more than 15,000 people. The overall effort includes the participation of the Atlantic and Columbia Unions, as well as the Southern New England, Greater New York, Northeastern, and New Jersey Conferences.
Pastor Ted N. C. Wilson, president of the Seventh-day Adventist world church, served briefly at what is today the historic Manhattan Seventh-day Adventist Church some 40 years ago when he first began his ministry. He returned to the church to open the three-week evangelistic series. Calling himself a “New Yorker at heart,” Wilson told the audience he had “started ministry right here.”
In his message, Wilson declared: “The Bible is amazingly accurate. The Bible is filled with hope for the future.” He added, citing Amos 3:7, “Surely the earth’s events are not going to ‘sneak up’ on God. Unlike the dismal predictions of human beings, the Bible gives us hope.”
[Mark Kellner/ANN]
Adventist elected president of Swiss Bible Society
Aarau, Aargau, Switzerland Delegates of the Swiss Bible Society elected Seventh-day Adventist theologian Reto Mayer as the organization’s president during their May 24 meeting, making him the first Adventist appointed to the post in the society’s 58-year history.
Mayer, associate treasurer of the Adventist world church’s Inter-European Division based in Berne, Switzerland, has served as the society’s vice president since 2005. The Adventist Church joined the society in 1982.
“I hope that people see [the Bible] as an invitation from God, inviting them to live a personal relationship with Him,” Mayer told the Swiss Bible Society in a May 24 interview. “The distribution of the Bible is close to my heart, so it’s a pleasure for me to participate in this work.”
The Swiss Bible Society was founded in 1955, succeeding the former coalition of Swiss Bible Societies. This organization promotes standards for translation, production, and distribution of Bibles in Switzerland and the Principality of Liechtenstein, and works with more than 146 national Bible societies united as the global United Bible Societies to bring the Bible in easy and modern language and form closer to the people.
[Herbert Bodenmann/APD/ANN/tedNEWS]