NN Mar 2023 Page 2

RMCNews with Miloš Tomić – Arvada, Colorado … What started as a spur-of-the-moment idea in the Rocky Mountain Conference office on the eve of the Covid era, became a nice-sized group of Millennials having worship on their own terms for more than a year now.

Currently meeting in Posner International Development Center in the heart of the Five Points area of Denver, this group strives to create a social and spiritual hub for this deeply diverse neighborhood.

Pastor Miloš says, “This is a startup ministry. If you’re expecting to find a churchy church, don’t. But if you’re willing to approach a spiritual experience with an open mind, you might just find ‘your’ church.” He adds, “We don’t do ‘church.’ ”

“At the very beginning, our core group agreed on one thing—this meetup should resemble [the] biblical blueprint first, and a traditional and cultural one after. But we kind of dropped on the latter two in this development stage of our growth,” comments Pastor Miloš.

Replicating a New Testament experience means there is no pastor to preach, but everyone takes part in a spiritual exploration of the Scriptures. Sometimes we sing and sometimes someone has a testimony, but nothing is set in stone. Very often, Pastor Miloš moderates the discussion with a full mouth and a breakfast plate in his hand.

Consider this a blasphemy? Perhaps somewhere else, but not at FivePoints Life church.

“All we want to do is bring Agape dinners back in style again. If the New Testament church thrived with them, why wouldn’t we?” Pastor Miloš asks.

The best part is that Pastor Miloš is turning 45 in two weeks, and he is the oldest one in this group of worshipers. So much life and amazing energy is reverberating at Five Points right now!

You can find more info on our website, Five-Points.life or our Facebook page facebook.com/fivepointslifechurch

—RMCNews with Miloš Tomić, associate pastor at Arvada Adventist Church. Photo supplied.

By Mickey Mallory

We love our neighbors. We truly believe that God placed us together on the same cul de sac.

While shopping at Costco one November a few years ago, we came across a snowblower for sale and decided to buy it. Even though we had not received any significant snowfalls up until that point, we figured it would be good to have in case that ever happened. Not just for our driveway and sidewalks, but for the neighbors too.

After several months of barely any snow, we finally received our first significant snowfall. We were so excited. We were going to get to use our new snowblower!

Once we started removing snow, we were amazed at how efficient the snowblower was. By the end of the morning, we had not only removed the snow in our own surroundings, but also the snow on several of our neighbors’ driveways and sidewalks.

One of the neighbors, who works as a nurse and whose husband is unable to do much because of a back issue, was especially appreciative. It meant so much to her that we would help her and her husband. She was so appreciative that she baked cookies for us.

Because of their challenges, we adopted their driveway and sidewalk as our own for snow removal. Every accumulating snow, we are over at their house helping them out. It makes us happy to see how happy they are when they go out and see all the snow removed.

It is truly amazing to see how God has used the snow removal to bring us closer together. We now have a close relationship. Whenever there is something that we think they would be interested in, we let them know about it.

Last December, my wife was singing in the choir at the Campion Church for a Christmas program, so we invited Myriam and Scott to come, and they did! I must say it was very special to sit with my neighbors at church.

Now, since they know we are believers in God, they don’t hesitate to text us with prayer requests. The most recent one was that her husband had a scary heart issue and she wanted us to pray for him. So, we prayed for him. Thankfully, he is doing much better. They are so excited about his progress that they invited us to come and visit them at their home tomorrow.

I’m not sure what God is up to, but we are going to continue be helpful to our neighbors. If he wants us to have spiritual conversations with them, he will guide us on what we should say.

As I reflect on how Jesus was willing to come to earth, our cul de sac in the universe, some 2000 years ago and help remove our sin, my heart is filled with love and appreciation. If he did that much for us, why wouldn’t we be willing to reach out and help our neighbors?

—Mickey Mallory is RMC ministerial director. Photo by Rawpixel.

By Nathaniel Gamble

Early in my 20s, when I was home from college for the summer, I sought out one of my pastor friends for counsel. I was still mourning the loss of my father from a few years earlier and struggling to know what God wanted me to do with my life. And I was in a spiritual desert. What I found troublesome was that I didn’t feel close to God—or rather, I didn’t feel God was close to me. Why did it feel like I was more interested in God than God was interested in me?

I hoped my friend would prescribe a spiritual exercise for me to follow. His solution, however, caught me by surprise: “Your problem is that you don’t have any faith.” I was stunned and hurt! After pouring my heart out to my friend, this is all he had to say? His words felt like I was to blame for my own feelings and experience. He pointed out to me that I had all these doubts about God’s goodness, presence, and continuing love and interest in me. “Instead of focusing on your doubts,” he said, “you need to put your trust in who God has been for you up to this point, because that’s who he intends on continuing to be for you.”

What was most offensive about my friend’s advice was the idea that my doubts automatically meant my faith wasn’t genuine. Many biblical figures openly expressed their doubts, worries, fears, and concerns to God regarding how he was dealing with their situations, and God seemed to take them in stride (cf. Jeremiah 20:7-11; Habakkuk 1:2; Jonah 4; 1 Kings 19:1-18; 2 Corinthians 12:7-9; 2 Corinthians 11:24-29).

Similarly, the Bible is filled with questions for God that are concerned with how he is managing things. “How long, O Lord, will you not do something about my situation?,” is a favorite question various biblical passages directly address to God (cf. Psalm 74:1; Psalm 77:7; Psalm 13:1; Psalm 71:9-12; Psalm 6:3; Psalm 80:4; Psalm 90:13; Zechariah 1:12; Revelation 6:10). Our Lord’s cry from the cross, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46; Mark 15:34), is a reminder that Jesus is no stranger to my experience of doubt, pain, and confusion, even in the midst of his continued trust in God.

Reflecting on this material helped me see how my friend was wrong and right. He was wrong in that the courage to express doubts, frustrations, concerns, anxieties, and confusions to God can be the clearest and deepest expression of faith in God. He was right, however, in that I was skeptical and disbelieving in God’s continued goodness and love to me.

You see, the Bible understands faith as trust in who God is for you in your present and future, based on who he has shown himself to be for you in your past. God is not afraid of us expressing doubts or asking questions about where he is in our lives, when he is going to show up, or how all of this is going to work out. The real enemy of faith is not doubt but turning your back on faith and trust in God through faithlessness. Doubt as concern, fear, or confusion is simply faith asking when God is going to take care of the problem. Doubt as distrust and suspicion of God is faithlessness, because it denies that God ever showed up in your life at all, and therefore it decides that God has no intention of showing up now.

Friends, you don’t have to be afraid of your doubts. You can do what prophets, apostles, and so-called heroes of the faith have done in past generations: You can honestly express your doubts to God and give them to him. He already knows them anyway, and he’s perfectly capable of dealing with them in faithfulness to you.

—Nathaniel Gamble is RMC religious liberty and public affairs director. Photo by Pexels.

Tiffany Mogaka – Loveland, Colorado … Pastor Wayne Morrison, guest speaker for the Campion Academy Week of Prayer, February 27-March 3, delivered a powerful message on the unconditional love of God.

The daily meetings resonated deeply with many students. Audra Bennett, a senior student said, “I was so touched by the message last week. I learned that I will always be a child of God, and that path was always chosen for me. It impacted my life by showing me that there is nothing I can do that would make God love me any less,” Audra reflected.

Every evening, Chaplain Carlos Santana hosted a panel with students, pastors, teachers, and other guests to reflect on the daily messages. Santana commented, “The panels were such a blessing for me because many of the questions I received during the week were answered. These answers, especially from students, brought great perspective about the struggle of accepting God’s love. I am grateful that the panels allowed us to practicalize and reflect on Pastor Morrison’s message.”

A pastor in Brighton, Colorado, Morrison visited classrooms, answering questions from students concerning his message. Senior student, Daniel Morales, said, “The Q&A session was great. We had a wonderful discussion about the Bible, and it helped me understand God’s love better.”

Overall, the Week of Prayer was a huge success, bringing a fresh perspective on God’s love and the freedom that comes with being a child of God.

Sam Walton, a junior student, shared that “The Week of Prayer was so meaningful to me that I just had to keep talking about it to the people around me. My favorite message was that we have total freedom of choice, and no matter what we do, God will always love us. I really needed to hear that this past week.”

—Tiffany Mogaka, Campion Academy Student News Team. Photos supplied.

By Karen Nicola

Have you ever asked the question, “How important are tires?” Or “How important is clean air?” Or “How important is love?” Probably not. And why have we not asked those questions? It’s obvious: these things are all unquestionably important!

Someone recently asked me “How important is grief?” As I thought about it, I realized that most people wouldn’t ask that question. Many people live out their response that grief is no big deal. Just keep going. It will go away in time. They might even permit a period of mourning, but then they’d use a great amount of energy to push sorrow and pain far from the demands of their daily lives. Some mask their pain with substances or activity and a cycle of addiction can then develop.

Well, I’m glad someone asked me. As a grief educator, I know that healthy, healing grief is critically important. It makes all the difference in how we will live the rest of our lives.

Did you notice I added “healthy” and “healing” as a description of grief? The other option is unhealthy, unhealed grief. The consequences of the second type of grief negatively affects us until we make a choice to engage with our grief and come to terms of acceptance that is healing and mentally healthy.

A few years back, a client came to my office to explore a better way of grief than what she had been choosing. She was the mother of two young children. Her husband/their father was killed instantly in a car accident. She spent the first four years using alcohol to numb her pain and nearly shutting out her children from her care. Finally, she “woke up,” realizing she could lose so much more if she didn’t do something. She became sober, joined a therapy group that taught her the power of her choices, and started work with me. It didn’t take long until she embraced the importance of her grief work and made significant progress towards regaining health and healing for her broken heart.

Grief is so important that the future of our lives will reflect on taking our grief seriously or not. The choice is yours. Just know that to take no action is to make a choice as well. I hope you make the best choices to seek healthy, healing grief. It will make all the difference for the rest of your life.

For more information about healthy, healing grief visit www.comfortfortheday.com

—Karen Nicola is grief educator and coach. Together with her husband, Steve, they authored Comfort For the Day: Living Through the Seasons of Grief, and presented a seminar at recent RMC Pastors Retreat at GVR^© Karen Nicola, 2023.

AdventHealth – Orlando Florida … AdventHealth and CommonSpirit Health are ending a 27-year partnership known as Centura Health. AdventHealth plans to manage its five Adventist hospitals in Colorado, according to a joint statement issued by the organizations.

Following the transition, AdventHealth will operate and manage the five Adventist hospitals and their affiliated clinics in Colorado, among them Avista Adventist Hospital, Louisville, Colo.; Castle Rock Adventist Hospital, Castle Rock, Colo.; Littleton Adventist Hospital, Littleton, Colo.; Parker Adventist Hospital, Parker, Colo.; and Porter Adventist Hospital, Denver, Colo.

In 2019, AdventHealth transitioned from being a family of health care brands to a unified national brand under the AdventHealth name, except in areas where other agreements were already in place. This provided broader brand recognition and allowed the organization to be more competitive in the marketplace as it seeks to deliver quality care in a rapidly changing and increasingly more competitive health care landscape.

AdventHealth’s legacy of healing in Colorado goes back 130 years following the creation of the Boulder-Colorado Sanitarium (today Avista Adventist Hospital) in 1893, one of several sanitariums that grew out of the Battle Creek Sanitarium in Michigan, which was established by the Seventh-day Adventist church. Like its parent institution, the Boulder-Colorado Sanitarium was focused on promoting healthy living and treating a variety of ailments through a combination of natural remedies, physical exercise, and a healthy diet. Today, Avista Adventist Hospital is part of AdventHealth’s five state-of-the-art facilities, providing a wide range of medical services and compassionate care to its patients. 

“AdventHealth’s presence in Colorado is a true blessing. Their dedicated staff and state-of-the-art facilities provide exceptional health care to our community, and their commitment to whole-person health is a testament to their mission of treating patients with the utmost care and compassion,” said Mic Thurber, president of the Rocky Mountain Conference of Seventh-day Adventists. “I look forward to AdventHealth continuing to be a beacon of hope and healing for our community.” 

ABOUT ADVENTHEALTH

With a sacred mission of Extending the Healing Ministry of Christ, AdventHealth is a connected system of care for every stage of life and health. More than 80,000 team members across hundreds of care sites including physician practices, hospitals, outpatient clinics, skilled nursing facilities, home health agencies and hospice centers provide individualized, wholistic care. A shared vision, common values, focus on whole-person health and commitment to making communities healthier unify the system’s more than 50 hospital campuses in diverse markets throughout nine states. For more information about AdventHealth, visit AdventHealth.com/news.