NN June 2024 Page 2

Will Reed – Greeley, Colorado … Five individuals gave their lives to Jesus and were baptized at the Sabbath service at the Greeley Seventh-day Adventist Church in Greeley, Colorado, June 8.

Two couples, Peter and Heather Fenninger and George and Gloria Diaz, and a high school student, Ezekiel Ibarra, made their vows together at Greeley’s church service, led by Michael Shannon, lead pastor at Greeley Church. Shannon referred to the Sabbath service, the result of each individual decision to follow Jesus, as, “a really special day … because we know there’s a celebration in heaven and celebration here as well.”

Anecdotes of each individual’s journey to baptism were shared with the congregation during the service. Shannon shared that sixteen-year-old Ezekiel, whose mother had been baptized early last year, had made known his desire to be baptized several months prior to this day and that it had been a blessing to study with him and his family throughout the previous weeks. Shannon commented, “we have to do everything we can for our young people, to encourage them to give their lives to Jesus.”

Portions of Peter and Heather’s story also were shared with the audience. Peter, who grew up Adventist but was never baptized, and his wife Heather, who did not come from any church background, began attending church after they witnessed Peter’s uncle return to membership at the Greeley Church through a Profession of Faith.

They began studying and felt called to publicly give their lives to the Lord through baptism. Peter’s father, who was in attendance to support his son and daughter-in-law, shared how proud of them he was of them after the baptisms and remarked, “I am so glad my son [and daughter-in-law] made the right decision.”

George and Gloria Diaz made the public decision to follow Jesus after recently coming back to church. They had been watching online for quite some time but decided it was time to come back in person after speaking with Pastor Shannon at a memorial service last year. George had been baptized before but wanted to accompany his wife, who had never been baptized, on this day.

Attendees of the Sabbath service were further blessed when two more individuals made the decision to be baptized during an appeal by Pastor Shannon following the five baptisms. The members of the Greeley Church give praise to God that the church is growing and pray that more people continue to find Jesus in this community.

—Will Reed is principal and sixth through eighth grades teacher at Adventist Christian School in Greeley, Colorado. Photo by Jim Johnson.

WHEN OUR ASPIRATIONS AND OUR GOALS MEET

In this installment of our series, working our way through the Rocky Mountain Conference’s (RMC) voted aspirations and goals for this term, I find that two of our aspirations and one of our goals can be discussed together. This is especially true in light of a new initiative recently announced by our leaders at the North American Division (NAD). This new initiative is designed to see a renewed emphasis among our members in spreading the Gospel, and even to provide some additional funding resources above and beyond what local conferences are already giving their pastors and churches for outreach endeavors.

The name of the initiative is “Pentecost 2025.” The aspirations for our conference are “that our churches will matter to our communities” and “each able members committed to Christian service.” I’m zeroing in on one goal today: “reaching our communities for Christ through evangelism, outreach, and community service.”

These are converging at a good time. We all recognize our world is more unstable now than we’ve ever seen. It’s easy to sense that if ever there was a time to renew our efforts to share what we know of the love of God and His means of salvation for a fallen world, it is now.

I remember a phrase my driver’s education teacher drilled home to us just before our bunch of eager 15-year-olds were given access to the steering wheel of a car: “aim high in steering” we were told. His advice turned out to be sound. If we looked far down the road instead of what we were seeing just in front of us, we found that we drove smoother, straighter, with more confidence, all while still very aware of what was happening immediately around us. Aiming high also kept our destination in mind, even when we’d not quite arrived yet.

It’s too easy in church life to focus on the details of our various tasks and ministries. As good and important as those tasks can be, at times, we can be in danger of focusing on those things so much we forget why we are doing them. Just like aiming high in steering, while we do every ministry task, we need to be focused our ultimate goal—to share the love of Jesus to this dying world.

How Our Goal Shapes Our Aspirations

The goal I mentioned earlier, that of reaching our communities for Christ through evangelism, outreach, and community service, is aiming high. This should be our joy and our focus in our faith life. As we do that, our aspirations will quickly embody what needs to happen in us in order to meet our goal: that our churches will matter to our communities, and that each able member is committed to Christian service.

Not that many years ago, I heard a haunting question: “if your church closed its doors tomorrow, would your community even notice?” I’m sure you’ve heard it, too. So, what would your answer be to that question? Would your community notice? Why would they notice? What would they miss about you if you were suddenly not there anymore?

Which brings me to the second aspiration for today of “each able member committed to Christian service.” If a church’s disappearance wouldn’t be noticed in a community, that can only mean that there was little or no loving Christian service going on!

Our churches are not our buildings—our churches are our people—you and me! I want to matter enough to those around me that they’d miss me if I was gone. In order for that to happen, I need to be personally invested in my community and in my neighborhood. Are you?

I was invited to preach at one of the smaller churches in our Union when I was serving at Mid-America Union, and my Biblical discussion for that day was outreach and discipleship. I asked a rhetorical question to which I was certain I already knew the answer. The question was, “do you actually know the names of any of the people who live around this church?” I was never more happily surprised to be wrong in my assumption! They actually interrupted my sermon to answer my rhetorical question with a real-life answer. Turns out they knew every family’s name in their entire neighborhood surrounding their church!

Why Your Commitment to Knowing Your Community Matters to the NAD

I think what the NAD is asking of us in Pentecost 2025 is to truly be the church where we live. They are asking for renewed commitment to matter and be invested so that our voices will be trustworthy for skeptical ears to hear of God’s redeeming message of grace and love.

The two things about the NAD’s initiative that I especially appreciate is their emphasis on prayer in the run up to action and the fact that they are hoping that the vast majority of the evangelism will take place and will be done by local church members and leaders. That means they are banking on the good relationships you have already established with your friends and neighbors.

They are asking each church seriously to pray and consider if they are willing to be involved. And then pray for a rich harvest of souls from our communities. Prayer is key here, just like it was at Pentecost in the days following Jesus’ ascension into heaven. Pray for the Spirit to be loosed among us. Pray that our internal divisions will cease so that our church families will be safe places for new members to join. Pray that the Lord will prepare those of us ready to give the message and those ready to hear the message will be brought together.

Our leaders at NAD are hoping that 3,000 or more evangelistic outreach events will take place during the same general time frame across North America. I’m hoping that the Rocky Mountain Conference will be among the conferences taking this challenge seriously and that churches, laity, youth, and local ministers, all over our conference, will commit to aiming high this coming year.

To help us prepare for Pentecost 2025, the NAD will open an on-line registration process on July 1 that will provide information on materials and training that you can use to prepare to help your church to aim high. RMC ministerial director, Mickey Mallory, will coordinate our involvement in the initiative. Communication will be provided, including the registration link and more information, so please watch for that.

“This is a great opportunity for your churches and schools, laity, and pastors, to take advantage of resources offered, and even funding, to help with proclamation events,” Mallory said.

Will this renewed thrust be successful for the Kingdom in the RMC? That will depend on our own willingness to pray and to fulfill our aspirations to matter to our communities and for each of us to be committed to Christian service. It’s a willingness to be praying for. It’s a task worth joining. It’s a message worth sharing.

Will you join us in aiming high?

—Mic Thurber is RMC president.

Becky Manning – Denver, Colorado … Bob Reynolds, lead pastor at the True Life Community Seventh-day Adventist Church (TLC) in Denver, Colorado, will retire on June 30 after serving more than 50 years in church ministry. Personable, fantastic, incredible, a great team, good teacher, reliable, tireless, relatable and humble are just some of the words the TLC family used to describe Bob and his wife, JoAnn Reynolds.

Born in Hamilton, Illinois, to a father who was both a heavy smoker and an alcoholic, and a Seventh-day Adventist Christian mother, Bob was the middle of six children. He states he was an average high school student who didn’t think college was for him. He felt he needed to stay home to help care for his family since his father was dying from bronchial emphysema.

However, as mothers often do, Bob’s mother had a different plan for her son. She believed God had something else in mind for him and encouraged him to attend college. And so, it was then that God brought a pastor named Leon Murphy to the little Adventist church Bob attended with his mother.

Bob describes Pastor Murphy as an “older man with white hair, a soft, gentle voice and a friendly personality.” For those who know Bob, he could have been describing himself.  Pastor Murphy approached Bob’s dad twice, telling him that Bob should go to college. Each time, his father refused. But Pastor Murphy did not give up, and on the third try, his father agreed. But there were more obstacles to overcome.

Union College then and now Union Adventist University (UAU), in Lincoln, Nebraska, was 350 miles away, and Bob had never been more than 50 or 60 miles from home. Pastor Murphy provided the necessary transportation, and, within a week, Bob was working on campus and settling into college life.

Sadly, just 10 days after he arrived at UAU, Bob received the news that his father had passed away. He boarded a train to take him home, thinking all the while that he would stay there to help his mother. His faithful Christian mother would have nothing to do with that idea and told Bob, in no uncertain terms, that he was going back to college, and so he did.

The summer after his freshman year, Bob worked in Illinois and met his wife, and future life partner and faithful helpmate, at the local Dairy Queen. JoAnn, an only child, had been raised Presbyterian. Bob gave Bible studies to JoAnn for two years, and she was baptized in 1969, just one month before they were married.

JoAnn went on to become a registered nurse and, during Bob’s senior year at UAU, he became convicted that God wanted him to enter the ministry. To that end, he attended the Seminary at Andrews University in Berrien Springs, Michigan, and graduated in 1972.

Bob went on to serve as youth pastor at the Hinsdale Seventh-day Adventist Church in Hinsdale, Illinois. During that time, he was asked to serve at three churches in Southern Illinois. He was ordained in the Illinois Seventh-day Adventist Conference in 1975.

Subsequently, Bob served as Youth Pastor at Denver First Seventh-day Adventist Church, after which he chose to teach at Gem State Academy in Caldwell, Idaho, where he taught for three years. Beginning in 1981, he spent the next three years as the Youth Director for the Idaho Seventh-day Adventist Conference.

From there, Pastor Bob was called to become Youth Director for the Ohio Seventh-day Adventist Conference, serving there for one year. He then returned to the Rocky Mountain Conference (RMC) to become its Youth Director. In 1987, Denver First Church called on him to become their Youth Pastor, where he worked the following 13 years.

Bob and JoAnn and their two daughters were faced with difficult decisions and challenges during those years. Yet, it was during this time that Bob and several others felt called to begin a church plant. It was named True Life Community Seventh-day Adventist Church, and in 2001, with a congregation of 25 people, the first service was held. Little did Bob and JoAnn know how their “plant” would grow in the years to come.

Since its inception, TLC has blossomed and grown into a congregation of over 160 members. Not only has the church increased its membership, it has also formed many ministries: Jude’s Bassinets, who have provided baby items to over 130 new mothers; the Pantry Ministry, providing food and other necessities to the community all year long, but especially during the Thanksgiving and Christmas season; Christmas for Kids provides gifts for children in the community; a Prayer Ministry, which provides spiritual connection for its members and the church at large by using prayer partners; a weekly Book Club for both men and women, a thriving music ministry which utilizes the talents of many of the TLC members, and several adult Sabbath School classes which provide meaningful spiritual food to their members.

I Corinthians 3:7 says, It’s not important who does the planting, or who does the watering. What’s important is that God makes the seed grow.

“Pastor Bob and JoAnn planted the seed for TLC. Their faithful, loving leadership has nurtured its growth. God has truly blessed their years of dedication. Your TLC family will continue doing the watering, yet we know that TLC is thriving because God is making it grow. What a legacy!” remarked Becky Manning, TLC member.

An open-house retirement celebration for Bob and JoAnn will be held on June 30 from 2:00-4:00 p.m.in the Fellowship Hall of Lifesource Adventist Fellowship at 6200 East Hampden Avenue in Denver, Colorado. All are welcome.

—Becky Manning is a member of the True Life Community Seventh-day Adventist Church. Photo supplied.

Scott Cushman – Lincoln, Nebraska … Dr. Vinita Sauder is retiring this summer after leading Union College as president for 10 years. After months of prayerful searching, the university’s Board of Trustees chose Dr. Yami Bazan as Union’s 30^th president. Bazan has most recently served as associate dean for Student Affairs at Loma Linda University. In this interview, the two presidents discuss the joys and challenges of Adventist higher education.

SAUDER: Many of us on campus first got to know you in November when you spoke for a Power Pac weekend. We had just lost a student in a tragic motorcycle accident that week, and you were here with us through a very difficult time. My question is, before you came in November and got thrown into the deep end, so to speak, what did you know about Union?

BAZAN: I’d always heard about Union from friends as a little gem in the middle of the country with this beautiful spiritual life and passion for service and missions. I had been to campus maybe twice before, but it had always been a fly-in, go to a meeting, fly-out sort of trip.

Having spent time with the community for those five days this past November, I went into the interview knowing this is a really special place. I didn’t know much about Union or Lincoln or Nebraska, but I had felt God’s presence on this campus through the students, the faculty, the church and even the Pathfinders.

SAUDER: You said in one of your sermons that you love God’s challenges and making a difference. This job is a challenge every single day. There are joys too, but it’s challenging now in Adventist higher education.

BAZAN: Challenges and joys — I want to hear about those. Let’s start with some of the happiest moments you’ve had while serving as president.

SAUDER: Many of my happiest stories start with talking to students.

I remember one year during registration, a mother and daughter came to my office. The daughter was an English major and her mother described her as an introverted bookworm. She was so concerned her daughter wouldn’t get out of the dorm and make friends. But I started seeing the daughter in the middle of every activity. I saw her at Handshake, vespers, kayaking and just hanging out with other new students. It was amazing. She had zero trouble making friends. That’s the magic of the community we have here at Union. And it has been a blessing to me to meet the shy girl at registration and see the woman she has become.

I love listening to students and parents. Whether it’s building a new athletic fieldhouse or remodeling residence halls, major initiatives on this campus start with simple conversations with students.

BAZAN: The students definitely blessed me!  When I was on campus in November, a student would walk me back to my room after each meeting and pray with me. I thought the chaplain had assigned him to help me, but no, he was just being kind and making sure he prayed over me, all on his own.

SAUDER: We call it the Union Spirit.

BAZAN: I experienced the Spirit before I knew about Union. Many of the people who have already made the biggest impact in my life have been Union alumni.

So many people have reached out to share their Union story since I accepted the job. My mentor in Adventist higher education, Dr. Sue Curtis, messaged me and let me know she is a Union grad.  Also, my mentor in academia, Dr. Barbara Favorito, texted me as soon as she found out and let me know she is an alumna. And Dr. Norman Powell, who has been dear to me since he was my elementary school principal, immediately messaged me and said, “Union is where Roxy and I met. You’ll love it there.”

Those are the joys, but we can’t forget the challenges. What are the greatest obstacles you see Union facing?

SAUDER: In the last decade, the Adventist colleges and universities in North America have seen an enrollment decline of 24% on average.

That’s a real point of pain for our campuses. Union is right in the middle of the pack for that, but being the median isn’t where we want to be when it comes to enrollment losses.

It’s a challenging time right now. Nationwide, there’s a lot of talk about the value of higher education, and due to inflation, there is rising pressure on the family pocketbook.

These external forces make it even more important to maintain our unique spiritual environment, which sets us apart from public universities. We have so many students starting Bible study and prayer groups, asking faculty and staff to be their spiritual mentors, and taking the initiative to deepen their own walk with God.

BAZAN: My desire is to make Union a resource so valuable to our churches and our families that students are attracted to come.

We need to go to where they are and bring them into the Union experience by thoughtfully engaging with them. One idea is Public High School Bible camps. When I worked for the Southern California Conference, I led out in junior high Bible camps, and Union could do something like that to connect with the kids who aren’t in the academy system.

A lot of us in academia are so used to the big campus churches that we forget our conferences are made up of a lot of tiny communities too.

The gift of having worked at a conference office before coming to higher education is understanding just how open and welcoming those small churches are, and also how little our church members know about Adventist higher education. They’re not at a university church. They don’t know what’s happening on campus.

When I was at La Sierra, a group of 20 or so of us who loved speaking started traveling to any church that would have us. It was equally eye opening for us to learn about them as for them to hear about the university and Adventist education.

SAUDER: There’s such a good, tight relationship here already that you can build on. My first year as president at Union, Tom Lemon was the board chair. He told me “Union College is the apple of the Mid-America Union’s eye.” He said the school is crucial to the functioning of the entire Mid-America Union.

A lot of choices the team here faces have no perfect answers. I wish everyone could see how hard we work and pray to do the right things. Taped in the drawer of my desk is a handwritten note from John Kerbs, a president who retired 26 years ago. It’s The Living Bible’s paraphrase of 1 Chronicles 28:20: Be strong and courageous and get to work. Don’t be frightened by the size of the task, for the Lord my God is with you; He will not forsake you. He will see to it that everything is finished correctly.

I hope that message will be as comforting to you as it has been to me over the years.

BAZAN: It’s very encouraging for me to come into this position knowing that God goes before me.

Through you, I know He has sent someone down this road before me. I’m blessed to have a guide such as yourself Vinita!  You’re like Elijah to my Elisha. I’m grateful God has so graciously led my path in a variety of ways to be able to serve, whether it’s been education, ministerial and leadership. I’m so happy to be starting this next chapter, president of Union Adventist University, with your mentorship. My prayer is that God may continue to pour His blessings over this very special place.

—Scott Cushman is director of Digital Communication at Union College. Republished with permission from the OUTLOOK Magazine “Feature Stories” website. Photo supplied.