God's Promises for Harvesters
Abstract
The leadership for this theological forum has convened a broad cross-section of Seventh-day Adventist Church theologians, other professors who teach various aspects of the sacred Word, and also many ministerial secretaries. I commend the planners of this forum for their attempt to keep all that is done in this forum on a meaningful, practical, biblical level. I also commend them for inviting ministerial secretaries to be present. While the Bible truths to be pondered and plumbed may be deep, they need always to be understood and applied in the context of the crucified, risen, and coming Jesus. Jesus' life and His death testify to the necessity of keeping all we do in the context of the Good News going to every nation, kindred, tongue, and people.
To remind you again of the intent of the Great Commission which remains before us as a church, I will reference briefly a meeting which took place five weeks ago in Virginia. Andrews University Department of Missions professors, the Institute of World Mission leadership, and the General Conference Secretariat representatives met to take a serious look at the mission of the church. Together we studied the book The Church Is Bigger Than You Think by Patrick Johnstone. In the center of this book, considerable attention was given to the largeness of the task of reaching the people living within the 10/40 Window. As you know, 65 percent of the world's population lives in this part of the world. Most of the world's one billion Muslims live in this rectangular portion of the world between the tenth and fortieth parallels. The 10/40 Window territory includes Northern Africa, the Middle East, India, and China. Within this territory are countries which have outlawed Christianity. Eighty-five percent of the world's poor live in this section of the world. How should we, as harvesters, relate to this sacred responsibility? This will be one of the considerations before us during the 2000 General Conference Session as we meet in Toronto, Canada.
