Decision to rescind Bishop Jakes' invitation to share presentation at PELC

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Regional_C​aucus_Form​al_Stateme​nt_2_.pdf

The Regional Conference Presidents, with full support of the Pastoral Evangelism and Leadership Conference (PELC) planning committee, has made a decision after much deliberation and prayer, to pull back on our invitation to Bishop Jakes to share a leadership presentation at this year’s PELC.

Our invitation to Bishop Jakes to speak at PELC is a continuation of the sixteen-year, successful outreach to ministers of other faith communities for the purpose of they’re having direct exposure to Seventh-day Adventist and our unique journey and mission.

The Lord has used these seasons of close contact to break down barriers and prejudices---providing greater understanding to those who have not always grasped the special calling of Seventh-day Adventist. Many, if not all, of our clergy colleagues of other faith communities have come away from their time in this unique setting among Adventist pastors with a greater appreciation and regard for our church. There is no doubt that God can and will in the future use strategically some of these contacts for His own purposes on behalf of our people.

While it should be noted that Ellen White directly encouraged reaching out in collegiality to “ministers and men of Influence,” unfortunately, there have been those who were sincerely unaware of the counsel that Ellen White provided relative to these endeavors. This clearly represents a time to inform as we move into the future.

But what’s been most disturbing has been those in the Adventist fellowship who were aware of the mission-driven strategy of PELC’s clergy outreach, but chose to mischaracterize and malign it by using tactics and methods that were clearly ungodly, notwithstanding their perspective.

There were inaccuracies put out that purported to speak with fact that Bishop Jakes was coming to teach evangelism at PELC, preach sermons to Oakwood University students, and even bring the Sabbath sermon at the University Church. None of this was remotely true, but some for their own purposes advanced this story.

There was one particular web site put up by a group of anonymous individuals that so mischaracterized this outreach to clergy, that people were emotionally caught up in these anonymous individual’s perspective without realizing that Mrs. White encouraged the exact opposite to what this website was espousing.

Our concerns heighten when misinformation strategies were deployed targeting Oakwood University students, and those anticipating attending Oakwood University.While Oakwood University is not linked to PELC at all, and has no purview over the speakers invited, we felt, given the impact on the University, that it was prudent not only to go in a different direction with our Non Adventist speaker this year, but to use this as a
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time to inform and dialogue about what it means in the 21st Century to reach out to clergy of other faith communities, in affirmation of Ellen White’s direct counsel in this regard.

We invite and encourage leaders on all levels of the church to speak strongly and decisively regarding ideological groups who use “attack” methodologies against their brothers and sisters to advance a point of view. This is ungodly behavior and must be termed as such. Silence in these regards only invites more of the same.

God is working in ways we don’t always immediately see, and thus our hope is that those who have been the most strident in advancing their views, will take time to reflect on the fact that we must take advantage of every opportunity to reach every one we can, even those who might on some points initially disagree with us.

The Pastoral Evangelism and Leadership Conference will continue to be firmly focused on evangelism and our passion in reaching everyone we can, as well as encouraging the same passion among our members: neighbors reaching neighbors, co-workers reaching co-workers, doctors reaching doctors, teachers reaching teachers, lawyers reaching lawyers, and pastors reaching pastors.

The Regional Conference Presidents’ Caucus
July 2011

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