Gary Krause reiterates the importance of showing God's love in practical ways
Former PMM to Taiwan, Chung HaeSub, relates some of his struggles and victories in the field.Connecting with people in their community, showing God’s love in practical ways, and building a sense of belonging should be the focus of outreach in urban areas, a Seventh-day Adventist official from the denomination’s world headquarters said yesterday.
Gary Krause, an associate secretary of the Adventist world church and director of the church’s Office of Adventist Mission, urged leaders from the church’s Northern Asia-Pacific Division to continue following Christ’s model of mingling with people and reaching them with examples from their own culture.
“Church itself is not a destination, but it’s a place to get people to where they need to be spiritually,” Krause said. “Often, though, our focus is how to attract people to church instead of getting out into the community where people are.”
Krause delivered his remarks as the key presenter for the division’s Council on Evangelism and Witness, held a day before the church region’s annual business meetings at the administration’s headquarters in Ilsan, Goyang, South Korea. The meeting included some 40 church leaders from China, Japan, South Korea, Mongolia and Taiwan.
Krause also used the occasion to mark 20 years since the denomination released a global strategy for offering outreach in many un-entered areas, including India, the Middle East, Russia, China and growing urban areas. Many of his themes touched on the church’s 2005 outreach initiative Hope for Big Cities.
He revisited church co-founder Ellen White’s call for members to offer outreach in urban areas. The worldwide denomination has historically spent much of its resources on rural areas, Krause said. In 1950, he said, about 30 percent of the world’s population lived in urban areas. He said that figure is expected to increase to 60 percent by the year 2030. Already, about 75 percent of people in developed countries live in urban areas.
Krause showed a model for outreach that emphasizes creating a sense of belonging for potential new members. The method, he said, has been demonstrated in many world regions as more effective than soon pushing potential new members for Bible studies and an immediate change in behavior in order to become a church member.
The day highlighted several of the mission movements in the division, including the Pioneer Mission Movement (PMM), a church planting initiative. Already in the past eight years, about 60 pastors have served in the program in other countries.
One of several guest presenters yesterday was Pastor Chung Hae Sub, who served in the PMM program in Taiwan. He said he struggled for the first seven months of his ministry there, with few people showing interest. Eventually, though, he helped establish a community center, teaching Korean culture and language, as well as exercise and health programs. The center led to several people joining Chung’s small congregation. He said he later became well known, with people stopping him on the street to offer greetings.
Chung, who now serves as a chaplain at Sahmyook University, said he originally entered the PMM because he had little experience approaching people. “Many times pastors push their members or deacons to reach out to people. I wanted to have that experience myself,” he said of his six-year commitment to the program.
Several leaders at yesterday’s meeting highlighted the need for contributions of lay members to drive church mission. Still, several challenges remain.
“Members are very busy,” said James Wu, director of the church’s outreach to Chinese people of the world. He said members come to church once a week, but they have little time to contribute to mission activities during the week.
Ken Osborn, NSD treasurer, said the denomination doesn’t need to ignore successful outreach methods of other Christian churches. “We need to be careful that we don’t become so insular that we adopt the attitude that we can’t learn anything from other Christian groups,” Osborn said.
Krause agreed, saying the Adventist Church wouldn’t just accept what other groups are doing, but would carefully examine what outreach methods could be adopted.
CEW is part of the Northern Asia-Pacific Division’s Annual Council, which meets through Monday, November 1.
Source - Ansel Oliver, Adventist News Network
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