October 24, 2011 – Miami, Florida, United States…Libna Stevens/IAD
Seventh-day Adventist leaders from throughout the Inter-American Division (IAD) want to bring the gospel to the unreached areas of its vast territory. This was the main focus during the opening ceremony of the first-ever territory-wide Adventist Mission Summit held last night.
The ceremony, which took place at the IAD church headquarters in Miami, Florida, United States, set the tone for the next three days of meetings as top leaders, hungry to plant churches in isolated populations as well as the large modern cities, will create new strategies to accomplish new goals.
“We know you have been struggling in your union to reach the unreached in your unions, but we want to come together to find ways of helping you,” said Pastor Israel Leito, president of the church in Inter-America, as he addressed dozens of regional Adventist Mission coordinators and church presidents.
The unreached in Inter-America represent some 100 people groups such as the Hindus in the Caribbean, the Mayans in Guatemala, the Aztecs in Mexico, the Arabs and Amerindians in Venezuela and more. Among these groups, there are some 700 languages represented in about 1,000 areas, church leaders said.
“No more running away from the difficult, we will look for the most difficult places in Inter-America and attack those places with the truth,” vowed Pastor Leito as he challenged leaders to establish action plans to reach those in need of salvation.
The summit will feature a number of speakers from the Adventist Mission Office of the Adventist World Church who will share the new structures and policies, explain the mission context, teach urbanization and church planting, focus on funding for the IAD’s Global Mission project, how to witness to specific people groups, outline mission marketing strategies, and more.
“We want to make a turn for the better in fulfilling the mission of the church,” added Pastor Leito as he reflected on the how much more needs to be done even in Inter-America, which has one of the largest Adventist memberships in the world.
“It is time to move with the changing world and define our mission to face the time in which we live,” he continued. “We must know the Lord of the mission because without Christ in our hearts there is no way to accomplish this mission.”
Pastor Telemaque, Adventist Mission director for the church in Inter-America and organizer of the event, encouraged those present to work together in the coming days to find a church-planting nexus.
“It’s about how the Word, the world and the church can come together to strategize for effective church planting,” said Telemaque.
“God’s perspective is to reach every tribe and every nation, planting the gospel in the hearts of men and women,” emphasized Telemaque.
Church leaders from Inter-America’s 21 unions or church regions dressed in the garb representative of their people groups to be reached marched during the opening event and committed to fulfilling the mission of sharing the gospel further.
Inter-America’s Adventist Mission Summit will conclude on Oct. 26.
To view the opening program of Inter-America’s Adventist Mission Summit, click here
For more information on Inter-America’s Adventist Mission Office, visit http://adventistmission.interamerica.org/
View photos of the opening ceremony here
