Jamaica: Vision One Million celebration draws thousands of visitors throughout Adventist churches

April 7, 2012 – Mandeville, Manchester, Jamaica…Nigel Coke/JAU/IAD

Thousands of visitors including government, and business leaders joined Seventh-day Adventists across Jamaica in what the Church dubbed “Vision One Million” celebrations on Mar. 31, 2012.

Congregations welcomed visitors with special gifts and warm fellowship, including the more than more than seven hundred and sixty new believers who were baptized into the church.

The main site for the celebrations in the Jamaica Union (JAMU) was the Falmouth Adventist Church in Trelawny where Dr. Myrna Costa, vice president of the church in Inter-America was the main speaker.

In referencing Romans 5:15 she said, “Jesus does not give us His grace and say, ‘What will you do in return?’. He gives us grace to save us. He wants us to accept His grace that is freely given to all of us. He died for us and He wants us to serve Him because He forgives us and He just wants us to love Him back. “

Costa then challenged the members to make a difference in the lives of those with whom we come in contact to “show our appreciation of the grace that God bestows on each one of us.”

In a brief address at the Falmouth Church also, Pastor Everett Brown, president of the church in Jamaica said the Church, collectively, must catch the vision and recognize the end times.

“The Church has embarked on an initiative to prepare the people of God for the second advent of Jesus Christ,” added Brown. “God’s church, as described by John in the book of Revelation, is in a state where she needs to be prepared in order to finish the work that God has entrusted to her so that Jesus Christ can come.”

At the Cedar Grove Adventist Church in Mandeville, Manchester, hundreds of visitors came out for the celebration almost equaling the number of members in attendance.

“We praise God for His bountiful blessing,” said Judith Forbes, first elder for the Cedar Grove Church.

According to Forbes, approximately three hundred members attend every Sabbath, yet on today, said Forbes, “all these members had to sit on both sides of the Church outside and view the service via close circuit television while close to three hundred visitors took their place inside.”

“We are happy that twelve persons were baptized coming out of a two-week evangelistic series by Elder Bancroft Barwise, Treasurer of JAMU,” added Forbes.

The Mandeville Adventist Church also in Manchester renamed their ‘Vision One Million’ celebrations ‘Mission 500′, which set a target to have 500 visitors in Church on March 31. It also included an anti-violence march and the distribution of the book, ‘The Great Controversy’ in collaboration with other Churches in Mandeville.

“What we wanted to do was to reach 500 persons in and around the Mandeville area for our morning service,” said Church pastor, Greg Baldeo. “We had nearly three hundred and that I believe was fantastic even though our goal was not met.”

Later in the afternoon, the members took to the streets to impact another 200 or more persons with the gospel. The Pathfinder Marching Band, pathfinders and members in that order left the Church and marched to the Park with banners bearing anti-violence message, which Baldeo said was very timely for Mandeville. Approximately 360 copies of The Great Controversy were given away.

At the Andrews Memorial Adventist Church in Kingston several government officials including the Minister of Justice, Senator Mark Golding were on hand to celebrate the day. Each visitor received a copy of ‘The Great Controversy’ which was the main gift for the day.

“One aspect of our ‘Revival and Reformation’ initiative in East Jamaica is ‘The Great Controversy Project’ where we will seek to place fifty thousand copies of the book ‘The Great Controversy’ in fifty thousand homes,” said Pastor Adrian Cotterell, president of the Adventist Church in East Jamaica.

“Beginning today, and as part of our initiative in the celebration of Jamaica’s fiftieth anniversary as an independent nation, we will distribute these books up to Aug. 4, when we will have the annual ‘Day of Prayer for the Nation.'”

‘Vision One Million’, which is part of the World Church’s ‘Revival and Reformation’ initiative, was launched across the Inter-American Division (IAD) and JAMU on Sep. 3, 2011. Its aim is to recruit a minimum of one million, or 75,000 in JAMU, passionate disciples to share the love of Jesus with non-believers and former members of the Church.