Denis Fortin

21 Dec

A LIFE-CHANGING WITNESS

In

If you could only sense how important
you are to the lives of those you meet;
how important you can be to the people
you may never even dream of.
– Fred Rogers

Who are the people we meet? And how important are we to them?

Typically, Seventh-day Adventists have not had a good opinion of the ecumenical movement and have not cultivated any relationship with other churches. We have been taught an end-time scenario that has created in us fear and suspicion of other Christians. We are told that Sabbath keepers will be persecuted by their Christian neighbors after a Sunday law is passed. They will come at night and arrest us, take over our possessions, and even kill many of us. Catholics and mainline Protestants are the ones we should fear the most.

I remember listening to a group of Roman Catholics discussing this scenario (they had heard about it) and they were totally incredulous, dumbfounded that they would ever attempt such a thing. “We are no longer in the Middle Ages,” they said to one another. They did not know I belong to a church that teaches this.

I think that our witness to people around us is often impaired by our improbable eschatology.

I have attended a fair number of ecumenical meetings. For many years, I represented the Seventh-day Adventist Church on the Commission on Faith and Order of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the U.S.A. Although we are not a member of the National Council or the Commission, the organizers of the Commission have routinely extended an invitation to non-member denominations to send a (non-voting) representative to their meetings to offer points of views and helpful insights into the theological and cultural topics and issues the Commission is asked to address.

I remember attending the October 2009 meeting of the Faith and Order Plenary Commission of the World Council of Churches, which took place in Kolympari, on the Island of Crete in Greece. A special request had come for a Seventh-day Adventist theologian or church leader to attend the meeting.

Just before lunch one day during this meeting, the general secretary of the World Council of Churches asked if I could eat lunch with him. I gladly agreed—not knowing what was in store for me!

During the great conversation we had, he asked if the Seventh-day Adventist Church would be willing to join the World Council of Churches. Before I replied, he said that they had been observing our church and had seen great things happening. We have a vast network of hospitals and schools. We care about the lives of people where we establish churches. We are growing while many churches in the Council are declining.

And then the general secretary said something about the Sabbath; that, although our observance of the Sabbath is odd when looking at the rest of traditional Christianity, it seemed nonetheless to be an aspect of the Christian message that others need to hear about. And if we were on the Council our Sabbath observance would not be an issue. Our presence on the Council would bring an unheard voice from an important sector of Christianity. He said our witness and our experience were needed; others needed to see and hear what we believe and do.

I was sad to have to say that I did not foresee my church joining the World Council of Churches in the near future. My response surprised them, and it seemed they thought that their invitation would be a welcomed gesture.1

It has been many years since that conversation happened, but I still wonder about what was said about us. These Christian leaders wished that Seventh-day Adventists would be more involved in relationships with them so we could share our experience, and witness what we believe.

This conversation has helped me shape a more positive understanding of my faith in relationship to other Christians and what really matters.

I’d like to say that we ought to be this kind of Seventh-day Adventist Christians who will witness positively of their faith to the rest of the Christian world, to the extent that others will say to us that our message is a blessing to them.

In my perspective, there are three essential values of the Seventh-day Adventist faith that make a difference in our lives and in the world in which we live. Beyond the special doctrines and beliefs we hold, these three essential values really make a difference. The world awaits our witness of these important values.

The Sabbath as Day of Rest

Which day of the week is the biblical day of rest?

Honestly, most scholars I know no longer challenge the fact that the biblical day of rest is the Saturday Sabbath and that the early generations of Jesus’ followers kept this day. History shows that the change of day of rest for most of Christianity happened in the third and fourth centuries for various reasons.

A hundred years ago, our Seventh-day Adventist pioneers debated over and over with other Christians which day of the week is the biblical Sabbath. For most of the scholarly world today, this is no longer a point of contention.

Although there are a lot of people in the world who don’t know which day of the week is the real Sabbath, and, frankly, most don’t care, it seems to me that much of western society is ready to hear about the benefits of the Sabbath as a day of rest. Many books and articles have been published recently on the need for a Sabbath day in our lives.

Our society is stressed. Almost every week I see articles on my news feed about tips for a less stressful life or about how to live a more meaningful life. The daily cycle of work, eat, and sleep seems to take away meaning and satisfaction from so many people.

For decades, Seventh-day Adventists have known a divine solution to this unpleasant reality. The value of the Sabbath is a blessing we need to share with this restless world.

God’s Ultimate Solution to Mankind’s Problems

Despite all good government interventions and programs, it is obvious that our world is not only restless, but it is also, for many people, hopeless.

Jesus predicted that at the end of time, just before his return, our world would be overwhelmed with conflicts, natural disasters, and disease. Nations and agencies are doing their best to overcome the social damages created by these events but, in the end, our world does not seem to be getting any better. Perhaps, one day, all will be well. But that is very unlikely.

Seventh-day Adventists have been conscious of this reality since our very beginning. And we have done our best to respond to human needs in times of crises. Our generosity of time and money through local community services or through our international Adventist Development and Relief Agency (ADRA) have touched the lives of millions of people. We have shared the gospel with our hands and feet as Jesus invited his followers to do (Matthew 25:31-40).

As stewards of the world entrusted to humanity at creation (Genesis 1:26, 28), Seventh-day Adventists have also been conscientious to help save our planet for the next generation—if time were to last longer than we expect. Our participation in recycling programs, saving energy, and reducing our carbon footprint are helping. But in the end, we have a sense (from our reading of Scripture) that the ultimate response must come from God.

God has promised that he will recreate our world after the return of Christ. And that is good news. Seventh-day Adventists expect this ultimate intervention of God.

So, while we collaborate in making our world a better place for all people, we also look to the future when God will fulfill another promise.

Part of our name witnesses to this dimension of the Christian faith. The glorious hope of the return of Christ.

In fact, our name Seventh-day Adventist witnesses to both of these human needs: we believe that the Sabbath provides now rest for a restless humanity while we hope for the advent of Christ for a hopeless world.

Wholistic Lifestyle

A third essential aspect of a most positive witness Seventh-day Adventists offer is our biblical understanding of wholistic living.

Life is a gift of God, and we believe it is our obligation to live in ways that will glorify his name and uplift humanity. To that end, Seventh-day Adventists have encouraged a healthy lifestyle, eating wholesome food, exercising, living in a good environment, and abstaining from substances and lifestyles that can cause harm. The recent interest in blue zones, in which centenarian residents of Loma Linda, California, is showcased, is evidence that this aspect of our message gives a most positive witness to the rest of the world.

Along with this we have also established schools and universities, hospitals, and clinics to benefit people and attend to their needs. And leaders of other churches have noticed this positive influence we have had on our communities.

Adventists have a beautiful vision with its biblical focus on rest, hope, and life that we can share with the rest of Christianity. We should value the positive witness these essential qualities generate. To me they are the ones that matter the most. And we should heartily witness about them in whatever context we can. In fact, some Christians are anxious that we bring out such a witness.

Denis Fortin is a professor of Historical Theology at the Seventh-day Adventist Theological Seminary at Andrews University, Berrien Springs, Michigan. Email him at: [email protected]

1  In the 1960s and early 1970s, leaders of the Seventh-day Adventist Church and of the World Council of Churches discussed whether our church would join the Council, and, for various reasons, we came to the conclusion that we could not.

 

29 Mar

IS CHANGE GOOD FOR THE CHURCH?

In

By Denis Fortin … Should a church change over time?

In 1995, George Knight published a book whose title caught attention—The Fat Lady and the Kingdom. It was obviously not politically correct, nor very considerate, but the point was made, nonetheless.

Could a big, institutional church still claim to fulfill the mission of the kingdom of God? The title indirectly pointed to the fact that our church has changed over the years. We have become “fat” with the excess weight of institutionalism.

Knight’s book was a collection of ten articles or presentations he had done in the five or so years before its publication. All had to do with Adventist identity and relevance. Sensing the church was at a crossroads, 150 years since the Great Disappointment (in 1844), the book sought to address many current issues and offered some suggestions. The book sought to open up some possibilities as Adventists contemplated an uncertain future.

The book was published 26 years ago, but I find its evaluation of the institutional church still relevant and its message still daunting. The implied critique of church institutionalism in the title was deliberate. Have we become too big to fulfill the mission of the kingdom of God? Can a big institution remain committed to the ideals and motivations of earlier generations, of those who dreamed and built the movement? Does a big church become too focused on perpetuating itself? Knight feared that this was a very real threat in the mid-1990s.

What about now? Is this still a threat today?

Of all institutions in modern society, churches are among the most resistant to change. The impulse to remain faithful to tradition is very strong. In fact, it is almost impossible to resist this impulse. “Faith of our Fathers! Holy Faith! We will be true to thee till death,” sings the familiar hymn.

One threat in particular is the church as an institution, the way it functions, how it follows a predictable routine of procedures, practices, and methods. Think about your local church and your local conference. How predictable are their monthly and annual schedules of board meetings, retreats, camp meetings, youth meetings, budget planning, etc., etc. Any good elders, pastors, and conference administrators have their calendars filled many months in advance with meetings, official committees, and assemblies. Each of these events requires planning and preparation. Our church is a well-lubricated institution with anticipated timelines.

While a well-functioning organization is certainly a blessing of God and an evidence of the guidance of the Holy Spirit, here lies the main concern as well. The institution does not really need much divine intervention any more to run smoothly. Someone has said that if the Holy Spirit were to be withdrawn from most of our churches, 95 percent of what we do would go on and no one would know the difference.

In one of his chapters, Knight introduced a model of church institutionalism borrowed from David Moberg, a sociologist who studied the church as a social institution in America. After studying the life of many churches, Moberg offered a theory of the life cycle for a church divided into five stages. Knight used this model and compared it to our church. The findings were candid and alarming.

Moberg’s life cycle of a church begins with Stage One, the incipient organization. This is the stage when a religious group starts its experiment and emerges on the religious scene. The excitement is palpable, and people join this new movement with much enthusiasm and fervor. It has a clear mission, shapes its beliefs, affirms some standard of membership. According to Knight, this first stage is easily recognizable in the first twenty years of the Seventh-day Adventist movement, from 1844 to the formation of the General Conference in 1863.

The second stage of this life cycle is the formal organization stage. At this stage in the life of a church, its leaders formulate their goals to attract new members and develop their beliefs to preserve and propagate what they see as orthodoxy. The group begins to develop its own symbols and rituals. Their lifestyle and behavior make them stand out from the surrounding society. They may even establish some parallel institutions like schools and hospitals. Again, this stage is easily recognizable, according to Knight, in the period of 1863 to about 1901 in the Adventist church. We honed our conference and General Conference governance system. We established colleges, sanitariums, publishing houses, and all kinds of societies to accomplish our God-inspired mission.

Stage Three is maximum efficiency. The church organization has become more efficient, and leaders are successful managers. All the various parts of the institution make progress, growth by good management is easily observable, and statistics show progress. The mood is upbeat, and the sky is the limit. For Knight, the Seventh-day Adventist church reached this stage between 1901 and about 1960. This was the “full-steam-ahead period” when we established a presence and duplicated our parallel institutions in dozens of countries.

By the time a church organization reaches Stage Four, it is well into formal institutionalism. A kind of bureaucracy has been well established, and leaders are more concerned with guarding their own interests than maintaining the earlier dynamic intentions of stages one and two. Stability and continuity are primary, not upsetting the apple cart. Whatever worked in the past and works now is not to be tampered with. Knight believes that our church reached that stage sometime in the 1960s. If a church enters that stage it has two options. Either it stems the tide of bureaucracy and institutionalism by doing some radical reorientation of its objectives, structures, procedures and policies and somehow goes back closer in time to stage three, or it nonchalantly edges its steps toward the last stage. This is the crucial moment and perhaps a point of no return.

The fifth stage is the disintegration stage. The over institutionalism, formalism and bureaucracy produce the unintended indifference to the needs of its members—the institution matters more than the people. This situation causes people to lose confidence in the church. People leave the church. For those who stay, there is often a lack of wholehearted commitment. The denomination will continue with career leaders with vested interests and with a membership admiring the good old days. Knight believed that back in 1995, some geographical areas of our church had already reached this stage.

Moberg’s study and Knight’s essay point to one constant factor: whether we like it or not, all churches—whether at the local congregation or the denominational level—change over time. As a church ages, its leadership and processes are routinized and bureaucratic structures increase. Structures or programs put in place to address a problem are kept in place even after the problem is solved or is no longer an issue. As time goes, the number of needless structures increases and over time they themselves become a problem. The over institutionalism and formalism of a church may be the causes of its disintegration (Stage Five). In some ways, this is an “institutional disease.”

Back in 1995, Knight said, “Nearly everyone seems to agree that radical administrative and institutional reorganization, consolidation, and reform are imperative, but few appear to be willing to put their best judgments into action. The result is that a great deal of money and effort is expended in defending the existence of the status quo when these resources might better be used to develop new structures and methodologies to reach the movement’s original goals.”

In reality, the level of institutionalism we have reached in 2021 is an indication of our success, but it can also be an indication of secularization, of routinization, of no longer really needing the Holy Spirit to function smoothly.

Can we stem the problems inherent in an aging church? Yes, certainly. While a church may naturally follow a pattern of unperceived changes over the years and not realize that it is progressing from Stage One to Stage Four and inching toward Stage Five, to reverse this trend, a church has to consciously become proactive to change this pattern if it wants to remain relevant to the original mission of the kingdom of God. It requires leaders, lay and church-employed, who are willing to evaluate constantly and critically a church’s goals and to bring church structures and programs into line with these goals. But this suggestion, in itself, almost sounds too institutional, too mechanical, too management-by-objectives.

The underlying point though is that a church that does not change and adapt to new cultures and environments will become likely irrelevant. And the reverse is just as possible. A church may become focused only on itself rather than on a world to save.

The greatest need of the institutional church will always be to depend on the guidance of the Holy Spirit and sense the direction He is taking the church. To be open and sensitive to this guidance is the best solution.

— Denis Fortin, PhD, is professor of historical theology and former dean of the Seventh-day Adventist Theological Seminary of Andrews University. He serves also as teaching pastor of the One Place Fellowship on the campus of Andrews University. Email him at: [email protected]