Current Events
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How should the church respond?by Rajkumar Dixit, New Hope Adventist Church
The killing of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin has opened a deep wound in the national consciousness, once again bringing the thorny issue of race to the forefront. Diverse congregations are hard to come by. In his 2006 book, People of the Dream, sociologist Michael Emerson defines a multiracial congregation as one where no one racial group represents more than 80 percent of the congregation. Using that standard, Emerson has found that only 8 percent of all Christian congregations in the United States are racially mixed to a significant degree: 2-3 percent of mainline Protestant congregations, 8 percent of other  Protestant congregations and 20 percent of Catholic parishes. The church where I serve, New Hope Adventist Church in Fulton, Maryland, falls in the top 3 percent of all U.S. congregations for being multiracial and multicultural. We chose to address the Trayvon Martin story with a sermon series called, I AM, focusing on what the Bible teaches about race and equality (a topic I've written about more extensively in my book, Branded Faith). We hope it will be a starting point to discuss some of the challenges we are facing in our area. Attending a diverse congregation can be a tricky decision. It may require tempering some of one's preferences, as well as comfort level, in exchange for a diverse community. We have found, anecdotally, that many people who begin attending New Hope have made a conscious decision to do so because they want their family to experience worship in a diverse setting. So what does the church have to share in this climate of racial tension in America? How should the church respond to a national issue that is bringing back pain and old open wounds? Should we stand still and observe as spectators? Or do teach and challenge based on biblical lessons? What are the implications of events that raise racial and ethnic tensions to your multi-ethnic congregation? Are you doing anything to address it? Discuss this topic on our Facebook page. 
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Social Networking
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 First of three articles about Facebook
Part 1: Mark Zuckerberg wants you to share by Pablo Gaitan, Senior Pastor, South Gate church, Southern California ConferenceI want to talk about the relationship between social media and us pastors. Specifically, I want to call your attention to three characteristics of social media avenues (especially Facebook), which have the potential to build up your ministry, or tear it down forever: the inevitability, the share-ability, and the ability of Facebook. Facebook, today, is inevitable. Its inevitability is shaping the life of this age. It is shaping the way people do life. We all are being shaped by it. You included. We are being drawn into a social revolution. In fact, you and I are part of the last generation who will remember life before social media. Because, along with Mark Zuckerberg - or rightly said, thanks to him - we have entered to an age where the social fabric of life has been modified once and forever by Facebook (or its social networking associates Twitter, Foursquare, MySpace, etc.) These days, Facebook is a " permanent fact of our global social reality." It has more than 800 million users worldwide with 200 millions in the US alone-half of whom visit their page at least once a day. Of millennials (ages 18-29), 75% have created a profile on a social networking site. From these demographics, 48% check Facebook as their first mission of the day. Ridiculous? Mind-blowing; a generation totally wired. With these numbers, chances are your church members are Facebook's users, too. In my former church, 97% of my people were part of Facebook. I cannot recall a pastor under the age of 40 who does not have a Facebook profile. One more last example about Facebook's reach: A group of young adult pastors of Southern California Conference planned an event for our millennials. We did not have a large budget; therefore, we cut our expenses by not printing hard copies of our promotion items. We publicized it only through Facebook and social media three weeks before our event. The turn out? 1200 people showed up. Crazy! Free. Quick. Effective. The bigger Facebook gets, the harder it will be to say, no to the authentically wonderful things it brings - and its undesirable components as well, which we'll talk about next time. Discuss this topic on our Best Practices Facebook page.Next issue: Care what you share. |
| Reading for Pastors | A major change in the tithe-source formula at the GC: still not completely clear, but it appears the NAD portion will go down by 2020, the other divisions will pick up more.
So now Blue Like Jazz isn't a Christian movie? Though it was made from a Christian book? (Is this another instance of Christians trying to distance themselves from Christianity?)
Ten ways churches fail their pastors. Quote: "The believer who lifts his/her pastor to the Father in prayer will not know the difference that intercession made. They will not be in the study when the preacher senses the Spirit opening a passage or enlightening his mind with a great idea or directing him to a supplementary text. They have no way of knowing the way their prayers kept him safe on the highway, blessed him in a witnessing or counseling conversation, or gave him extra energy for the day."
Another highly hyped Bible translation? The Voice never uses the terms Jesus Christ, angel or apostle. Quote: "Much of The Voice is formatted like a screenplay or novel. Translators cut out the 'he said' and 'they said' and focused on dialogue." (So many Bibles, and so little common sense Christianity!)
USA Today seems like an odd place for a treatise on "the harrowing of hell", but here it is! Quote: "That question has spurred centuries of debate, perplexed theologians as learned as St. Augustine and prodded some Protestants to advocate editing the Apostles' Creed."
In tears of grief, lines between faiths blur, says Stephen Prothero. Quote: "We may live as women or Muslims or Americans or conservatives or rich folk or artists or New Englanders, but when we die we die like human beings do."
Rick Warren's Easter interview. "What comforts is the presence of God, not the explanation of God."
Adventist Media Ministries is apparently making some big changes. Read more here. LifeTalk Radio appears to be a casualty.
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| To the Point | April prepares her green traffic light and the world thinks Go.
~Christopher Morley
It was one of those March days when the sun shines hot and the wind blows cold: when it is summer in the light, and winter in the shade.
~Charles Dickens
Everything is blooming most recklessly; if it were voices instead of colors, there would be an unbelievable shrieking into the heart of the night.
~Rainer Maria Rilke
I love spring anywhere, but if I could choose I would always greet it in a garden.
~Ruth Stout
Spring is when you feel like whistling even with a shoe full of slush.
~Doug Larson
If we had no winter, the spring would not be so pleasant; if we did not sometimes taste of adversity, prosperity would not be so welcome.
~Anne Bradstreet
That God once loved a garden we learn in Holy writ.
And seeing gardens in the Spring I well can credit it.
~Winifred Mary Letts
In the spring, at the end of the day, you should smell like dirt.
~Margaret Atwood
In the spring I have counted one hundred and thirty-six different kinds of weather inside of four and twenty hours.
~Mark Twain
Spring has returned. The Earth is like a child that knows poems.
~Rainer Maria Rilke
The sun was warm but the wind was chill.
You know how it is with an April day.
~Robert Frost
The first day of spring was once the time for taking the young virgins into the fields, there in dalliance to set an example in fertility for nature to follow. Now we just set the clocks an hour ahead and change the oil in the crankcase.
~E.B. White, "Hot Weather," One Man's Mat
First a howling blizzard woke us,
Then the rain came down to soak us,
And now before the eye can focus -
Crocus.
~Lilja Rogers
You can't see Canada across lake Erie, but you know it's there. It's the same with spring. You have to have faith, especially in Cleveland.
~Paul Fleischman |
BP Update
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Best Practices Goes Weekly  Best Practices, the email newsletter from NAD Ministerial, will soon be going weekly according to publisher Ivan Williams. "I'm excited about the expansion of the Best Practices newsletter family to include special editions for ministerial directors, and pastoral evangelists. The expansion will allow us to deliver very specific resources for our different pastoral roles. "
Starting in May the new lineup is as follows:
First Week: Best Practices for Ministerial Directors
Editor: Ivan Williams
Second Week Best Practices for Adventist Ministry
Editor: Loren Seibold
Third Week: Best Practices for Adventist Evangelism
Editor: Shawn Boonstra
Fourth Week: Best Practices for Adventist Ministry
Editor: Loren Seibold
Fifth Week: Best Practices for Adventist Worship
Editor: Nick Zork
Read and Discuss entire article.
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| News, Ideas & Reminders | A reminder: You are free to republish pieces from Best Practices in your own newsletter or blog, with attribution to the Best Practices newsletter and the author of the piece.
PlusLine website has disappeared. Apparently combined with AdventSource website. (Strange that they didn't set up a forwarding link.)
Jack Blanco's The Clear Word now available in audio format, read by Lonnie Melashenko.
You are aware that there's an app for Ellen White's writings for both Android and iPhone/iPad?
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| Upcoming NAD Events |
Do you have an event you'd like to invite NAD pastors to? Send details to BestPractices@Ameritech.net. ASI - Mid-America Union. Apr 19, 2012 - Apr 22, 2012, Ramada Plaza Denver North, 10 E 120th Avenue, Northglenn, CO 80233. "Practical Evangelism". Featured speakers: Shawn Boonstra, Associate Director NAD Ministerial, and Don Mackintosh, Director NEWSTART Global Weimar Health Evangelism. Visit ASImidamerica.org for details. April Special Days: April 21, Literature Evangelism Sabbath April 28, Education Sabbath May Special Days:May 5, Community Services Sabbath
May 12, Youth Sabbath
May 19, Single Adults Sabbath April 21, 2012. NAD Pathfinder Ministries introduces a Pathfinder team challenge on immersion in the Word of God. This year the books of Mark and 1 Samuel are those being studied.
Women Clergy Conference. April 23-26, 2012, Berrien Springs, MI 49103. Conference for women clergy in North America. Contact Esther Knott
ACS Reach Out Symposium for Northern California. April 29-May 2, 2012, Leoni Meadows. Contact Michael Sparks.
Andrews University Family Celebration Weekend. July 19-22, 2012. Call the Religious Education Department at 269-471-6186
Nonprofit Leadership Certification Program
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| Best Practices is a publication of the NAD Ministerial Department. Editor: Loren Seibold. Publisher: Ivan Williams. You are free to republish pieces from Best Practices in your own newsletter or blog, with attribution to the Best Practices newsletter and the author of the piece. |
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