Inter-America: Executive Committee leaders take actions during special video conference meeting

May 23, 2009 – Miami, Florida, United States….[Libna Stevens/IAD]

Seventh-day Adventist top church leaders from throughout Inter-America participated in a special video conference executive committee meeting on May 20, 2009. Major church region leaders and committee members took action on several items through an online video conference from the Inter-American Division (IAD) headquarters office in Miami, Florida.

“We had to resort to video conferencing, as there were many items that could not wait to be voted until year-end committee meeting,” said Pastor Israel Leito, president of the church in Inter-America. IAD's Executive Committee meets twice each year, but due to the recent travel health concerns over the Influenza A(H1N1) or swine virus, this spring committee meetings were cancelled.

Committee members approved survey reports on several territorial church adjustments in three unions, or regions, of Inter-America: a new mission in the Colombian Union and in the North Mexican Union, and a mission in the Haitian Union obtained conference status. The new missions and conference are evidence of a growing church in Inter-America, church leaders said.

Several division-wide events were approved for a later date. Among these were:

Year-End Executive Committee meetings will be held Miami, Florida, Oct. 30 – Nov. 6, 2009.

IAD's 2009 Youth Bible Bowl final competition will be held in Guadeloupe, and re-scheduled for Dec. 12, 2009.

Biblical Research Institute and Stewardship Biblical Conference for church leaders, stewardship directors and Theology professors from throughout the IAD territory, will begin in Jerusalem, Feb. 15-28, 2010.

IAD's Festival of the Laity has been re-scheduled to be held in March 9-13, 2010, in Panama City, Panama. The festival is expected to attract over 1,000 delegates from the division territory.

IAD's Super Bible Bowl is schedule to be held in Miami, Florida, on May 20, 2010. Contestants to the super Bible bowl will include the five top winners since 2005 who will be tested on the Bible books previously studied: the Gospels, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Solomon, Isaiah, and Revelation.

Church leaders also voted the upcoming Follow the Bible division-wide programs and schedules. The initiative, created by the Adventist World Church, includes a special large Bible which will complete its journey throughout the world divisions next year (see www.followthebiblesda.com).The large Bible will makes its journey throughout Inter-America from Nov. 6, 2009, to January 10, 2010. More information will be available soon at www.interamerica.org.

Executive leaders also touched up on the strategies in place to work with spreading the gospel in the largest cities in Inter-America.

“We have taken the strategy from the General Conference on giving more attention to our big cities and adopted it to our territory,” said Pastor Leito. Last year the church was reorganized in Mexico to include a headquarter office in Mexico City.

Efforts are underway to establish a larger Adventist presence in Bogota, Colombia, a city bursting with more than 11 million people, said Pastor Leito to committee members. “We are workings with the leaders to establish a union office in Bogota as a strategy to fulfill the mission to spread the work there.”

Committee members also approved the appointment of Belkis Archbold as associate health ministries department director, as well as approval to place a call for Juan Carlos Nino of the Colombian Union to serve as programmer for special projects for the Inter-American Division's treasury department.

With over 3.1 million members throughout its 17 major church regions, the Inter-American Division had a record number of 223,778 baptisms last year.

For news updates and upcoming division-wide events, visit www.interamerica.org