Columns

NAD Year-end Meetings—Sunday Morning

30 October 2011 | Charles Scriven

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Sunday morning delegates to North American Division year-end meetings addressed the Great Controversy Project, a favorite initiative of the General Conference President, Ted Wilson. The project involves raising the money and finding the will for mass distribution of Ellen White’s famous book, and many NAD leaders appear to have mixed feelings about it.

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NAD Year-end Meetings—Day I

28 October 2011 | Charles Scriven

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“Hope and Wholeness.” That, in a phrase, is what the North American Division has embraced as its mission.

Friday morning the North American Division year-end meeting began with a reading of world Adventism’s current mission statement, an admirable if somewhat conventional document of about a paragraph in length. Then NAD President Dan Jackson introduced a summary version that would express, for North America, the kernel of the world church’s statement.

A Primer on Contemporary Catholicism

26 October 2011 | Donna Haerich

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It was my mentor, Dr. Jack Provansha, who introduced me to Hans Kung, a Catholic theologian from the University of Tubingen. (1) Having read Kung, (and not being struck dead by lightening) I went on to read other serious Catholic theologians such as John Wijngaards, Karl Rahner, Edward Schillebeeck, Anthony Tambasco and more devotional writers such as Father John Powell. I discovered the novels and the ‘who-done-it’s’ by the Catholic sociologist, Andrew Greeley and found these to be a great source for understanding the cultural context of Catholicism.

The Great Adventist Mythology

20 October 2011 | Loren Seibold

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In the first church where I served as a pastoral intern, Carmen and I always chuckled when we heard in Sabbath School classes the assertion that before the time of the end Billy Graham would accept the Sabbath and join the Seventh-day Adventist church. I don’t know the origin of this story (I suspect Emilio Knechtle who was, I think, acquainted with Graham) but it was stated as a fact. It was mentioned frequently, and never questioned: people simply nodded as though it were something every Adventist knew.

To Bear Witness to the Truth

13 October 2011 | Herold Weiss

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The other day I found in a second hand book store a copy of Felipe Fernández-Armesto’s Truth. The title and the author caught my attention so I bought it, and I am reading it. Fernández-Armesto does not pretend to tell his readers what truth is. His purpose is to show how through the centuries human beings have searched ways to distinguish truth from falsehood. He has written a history of the search for truth.

Must We Be Silent?

6 October 2011 | Keith Burton

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“Then they will reply, ‘Lord, when did we ever see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and not help you?’ And he will answer, ‘I tell you the truth, when you refused to help the least of these my brothers and sisters, you were refusing to help me.’” (Matthew 25:44-45)

Could Baby Jesus Solve Quadratic Equations?

29 September 2011 | Rich Hannon

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Consider this thought experiment:

You are placed in a time machine and transported back to Bethlehem shortly after Jesus’s birth. You enter the stable and see Jesus, Mary and Joseph, and perhaps a few shepherds. Approaching the baby you kneel and gently ask Him (in your native, modern, non-Aramaic language): “Dear Jesus, What are the solutions to the equation: 3x⁴+ 20x² + 50 = 2x⁴ + 5x² -4?”

What response do you think you might get?

The Upper Room, Part II*

22 September 2011 | Donna Haerich

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Throughout his ministry Jesus deliberately and intentionally broke and challenged societal stereotypes and cultural taboos. He spoke to women publically; he encouraged women to speak out publically. He taught women equally with men; he gave them the Spirit of understanding and freedom to study. The apostle chosen by him to take the news of the resurrection to the disciples was a woman. “Go and tell,” he said to Mary.

Primary Sources

15 September 2011 | Loren Seibold

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This past spring Navy chaplain Lieutenant Commander Nathan Solomon learned that the Taliban had convinced local Afghani citizens that the Afghan soldiers deployed alongside Americans on a base in Helmand province weren’t Muslims. It wasn’t true, of course. But the rumor was destabilizing, for the purpose of the joint deployment is to build the citizens’ trust in the Afghan military so they can eventually be left in charge.

No One Has Ascended into Heaven

8 September 2011 | Herold Weiss

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The prophets of Israel gave to Western Civilization its orientation toward the future. They were the ones who diagnosed the need for a radical change from the status quo, and predicted that this change would come in the future. Traditional societies were anchored in the annual natural cycle. Life was to be lived in conformity with the constant repetition of the vital cycle in nature.