Gain an understanding of the ministry opportunities in your very own neighborhood! Learn how to reach unreached people by utilizing your current skill set. Place yourself in God’s hands to be able to fulfill His mission: go ye therefore.

ASI Conference 2023: Revived to Witness

<p>Gain an understanding of the ministry opportunities in your very own neighborhood! Learn how to reach unreached people by utilizing your current skill set. Place yourself in God’s hands to be able to fulfill His mission: go ye therefore.</p>

<p>Free sharing permitted under the Creative Commons <a rel="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/us/">BY-NC-ND 3.0 (US)</a> license.</p>

Young Professionals

Rebecca Wong

Practical Christianity

Well let's start with a word of prayer before we dive in today.

Father in heaven, Lord, we're just grateful to be here at a conference like ASI.

We're grateful that you've opened the doors, Lord, for us to be here, to share, to network, to learn, to listen.

And I just pray that in this space today, right here, your spirit would speak in a powerful and clear way to help us to understand and to grasp this idea of transformation.

And Lord, I just pray that this work of transformation would be done in each of our lives and hearts.

Good morning everyone, how are you doing?

And I'm excited to be able to share with you today on the topic of transformed practical Christianity.

So as most of you guys know, the theme for our conference is, can anyone share with me?

Yes, I was talking about the subtitle, but yes, that as well, right?

So this whole idea of united, transformed, and sent.

And so each of our seminars today in the Young Professionals track will address each of those pieces.

And so this morning we're going to start off with transformed.

What does it mean to truly be transformed?

A little bit about myself, if you have not met me.

Good to see some of my wonderful friends and good to see friends that I will meet soon.

I am an ESL professor and a freelance artist coming from California, northern sunny California.

I am affiliated with different ministries.

I think the most that I've been doing projects with and the most current would be with Beautiful Minds Medical, as well as with the Josiah Ministry, and I also work with ASI Pacific Union in the local chapter.

When I think of the idea of transformation, I think it can be really an abstract concept in Adventism.

Something that we often talk about, but how do we really define it?

And how do we really see and know if it is actually happening in our lives?

So I feel like the best way to share that is simply to share from my personal experience from Scripture and from being able to see through the experiences of the highs and lows.

So this is gonna be honestly a very real and raw testimony about how God has been transforming my life and about the things that I've been learning in this journey of discipleship.

Now, I actually just recently, quite, quite recently, came back from Japan.

How many of you, just I'm curious to know, by raise of hands, have been to Tokyo, Japan before?

I literally just got back a week ago, fought off the jet lag, and got over here, and now to be on East, what time are we on now?

Central, thank you, I'm still trying to keep track here, my brain has just been through so many different waves.

Well, a week ago I was in Tokyo, and for those of you who know, Tokyo is the most populous city in the entire world.

Packed in for a whopping 14 million people in a city.

For those of you who raised your hands, you've shared, you know what the sights and sounds of Tokyo look like.

Going through the streets, people streaming through everywhere, the beautiful sights, the grander architecture, the nightlife, stores and shops galore, everywhere you go, there's a constant sensation of just, you're bombarded from every direction.

1 of the things, I mean, man, if you wanna go shopping, go to Tokyo, okay?

Shop fronts in every direction, the most amazing, exquisite displays.

And whatever you're shopping for, Tokyo will have it.

And can somebody, please, please, we have to talk about the food art as well.

The amazing food that you see on many different shops when you go to the restaurants there, but it's all fake, right?

And every front of every store restaurant, they have these amazing lines of decorated foods, and you're just looking there, just drooling, and seeing all the amazing things you could eat, potentially.

So all of these things, as I was just soaking up the sights and sounds of Tokyo, a thought came to my mind.

I was just being overwhelmed by everything that was around me, And I thought about this.

I was like, can we be like this in Adventism?

Can we sometimes put at the forefront of our shops, We love to share the things of how God brought about divine appointments.

We love to share about the amazing Bible studies that we just landed the last week and how God has opened the doors for me to witness to my coworker.

We love to share about the amazing missional projects that we're starting and launching, and the exciting new ministries that are opening up.

And praise God, all of those are important.

We want to encourage each other in that aspect.

But I would argue today that if that is all we share in Adventism, we are falling short.

That if we only showcase a display, a boutique display of Adventism.

We are not truly sharing the work of transformation that God does in our hearts.

You see, what I'm trying to get at is that behind all of the amazing work and ministries that you will see and hear at ASI this weekend, I wanna show you a sneak peek today at the toil, sweat, and tears that happen behind the scenes.

There's so much that God leads us through, and as we discover that other side, that presents and shows to us a full picture of the Adventist message, of the biblical message, of the wholeness of who God is and what transformation really is.

So I would like to take you guys on a trip today.

Past the boutique displays and into another section and actually I want to take you through my journey in Tokyo as an illustration.

So past all of these nice lovely sights and sounds, I actually went exploring a side of Tokyo that I'd never seen before.

I went to this little, little shop in the middle of, I mean, this is still in Tokyo, but I literally had no idea where it was.

I'm thankful for some local friends to show me around.

I mean, literally I was like looking, I was like, what is this?

I went up this tiny little staircase down some side street of Tokyo, went up the stairs, and went into this tiny little art cafe.

Now this is a very special place to me and I'm gonna share with you why it's so special.

In this tiny little art cafe is an artist by the name of Nakamura-san.

Nakamura-san is actually well known in the Tokyo area, specifically for his artistry in an art called kintsugi.

I know it's a strange word, but Okay, a few hands.

All right, so let me share with you a little bit about what is so interesting about this art called kintsugi.

This little hole-in-the-wall niche in this art cafe, they were doing this special type of art.

In Japanese, I am not Japanese by the way, so if I don't pronounce everything so perfectly you understand.

So kintsugi is made up, I'm sorry I keep tripping here.

Tsugi, on the other hand, is a word for mending or binding together or combining.

It also has the meaning of passing on from generation to generation.

Something that transcends the space of time.

Now just tuck these concepts into the back of your head as we start to dive into this.

Now, the art of kintsugi has actually been around since the 15th or 16th century.

Interestingly, it has become a national phenomenon just in the most recent years.

And the basic premise of kintsugi is taking broken pottery, things that have been destroyed, broken, smattered into pieces, and then actually restoring it and putting it back together again with a special technique, a lacquer technique, using erushi.

Erushi is a tree sap from a native tree in Japan.

So through this intricate process, they use the irushi to bind together the pieces of the pottery.

And once it's dried and hardened, they actually use gold to paint the seams.

And so what actually comes out are some amazing pieces like this.

You see what once was fractured and broken is now put together and restored and transformed in a really special way.

Steve Dickman

Felecia Lee

Andrew Park

Rick Remmers

Bridging the Gap: Panel Discussion

All right, well, welcome again to our Young Professionals Track, Track 4 here at ASI.

And our subject this afternoon is United Bridging the Gap.

And so we're gonna talk about that this afternoon.

As you can see, we have our panelists, and what I'll do is I'll start us off with a word of prayer.

We'll let our panelists introduce themselves, And then we'll get started with our discussion.

Well, if you'll join me, let's bow our heads for a word of prayer.

Our Father in heaven, Lord, we need that experience of Acts chapter 2, of unity.

We desire, we need the Holy Spirit's outpouring.

And we just ask that you would be with us at this time and that you would teach us as we discuss this subject that we can be prepared for Christ's soon coming.

Be with our panelists and with all of us who are here today that we can learn and grow together in Jesus' name, amen.

All right, So what we can do is we have our panelists and we can start over here and work our way from our right to left.

And just tell us your name, what you do, and 1 thing that makes you smile.

I studied engineering at Michigan State and most recently I became a pastor.

And 1 thing that makes me smile, This is very, this might just be my personality, but I like when everything is in 1 location.

So like all my belongings, if I'm traveling somewhere, I want it in a bag.

If we're going somewhere, I want everything in the car, and it makes me feel very happy to have everything consolidated in 1 space.

I am now a full-time homemaker and my husband and I, we have a marketing business.

I am Rick Remmers, and I'm a minister, spent most of my life as a church pastor, but also for a number of years now, an administrator at different levels.

Currently, I'm serving as assistant to the president at the North American Division.

I even just stepping outside here and enjoying the sunshine and fresh air, camping, cycling, I enjoy the outdoors.

I am currently serving as president for Outpost Centers International.

Previously I served as president for ASI for 6 years.

And so I also operate a ministry in Tennessee, a school.

Been involved in ministry for about 32 years in the education side.

So we have a little comment on the other end of the table.

And then God called me from that into administration.

Now, this was not part of the panel, but I also studied engineering at some point.

Never worked a day in my life as an engineer.

Well, so again, our subject is United, Bridging the Gap.

And all of our questions are in the context of intergenerational interactions.

And we want to focus on how to become more united.

United, that's what we want to focus on in our discussion.

So, Mindy will start us off with our first question here.

I'm a nurse here at ASI as president of Rise Up Young Adult Ministry.

1 thing that makes me smile is also the outdoors and being outside in nature.

I'm Ashwin Sukumaran and I serve at Uchee Pines Institute as the administrator of the Lifestyle Center and all the medical staff there.

And 1 thing that makes me smile is seeing someone take hold of truth.

Okay, so our first question this afternoon is, as a church and as leadership, Do you feel that there's a gap between the generations in leadership?

And part of that is because just as life experience happens and as culture changes over time, there's bound to be some differences of experience and perspective that comes into play.

Thankfully, though, in the body of Christ, those gaps can be bridged, and we have something that draws us together that's much more powerful than the things that would separate us and cause differences among us.

So yes, there are going to be gaps and I think in the local church of differences and preferences on styles and use of technology, and there are differences that we have, but we can come together respectfully and work through those in a positive way.

So I am aware that there are differences, okay?

So I think I recognize that there are differences, but I have also seen numerous occasions where very diverse groups have come together.

And where I see us coming together is generally in mission.

When we are together on a certain mission, those differences tend to disappear.

When we are allowing ourselves to get distracted from mission, the differences tend to become more evident because we're focusing more on ourselves than we are on others.

So I think the, 1 of the ways we can address this concept of unity is to actually do mission together.

And when I say do mission together, we all have different skills and talents.

But I would say even with the group we have here today, we could find something that is mission-focused to do together where we would forget most of our differences very quickly?

My husband and I are only a year apart and we have huge gaps, right?

That we have to work out constantly in marriage.

So for sure and it's gonna be sort of bridge us through communication in Philippians chapter 2 and in 1st Corinthians Paul is talking about Timothy and he refers to Timothy as his beloved son First and second Timothy is this whole letter that this very old elder in the church is writing to this very young man and he's telling him this is how I want you to do the work.

This is what you need to do and encouraging him.

In Titus, Paul is talking to the older women and he says, older women mentor the younger women.

Teach them how to love their husbands, how to love their children, how to be homemakers, how to do all this stuff so that the word of God would not be maligned.

And so the Bible outlines what we should do to bridge that gap.

Older people, take the younger ones under your wings.

Invite them for dinner, invite them to your home, bring them on vacation with you, like young people who are not your children.

When they're off to college, if you're a professor, do you ever have students over in your house?

And so this is 1 of those practical ways that we see this bridging of the gap taking place.

If you're an older married woman and there's a new bride or a young woman who is in a relationship, invite her over and sit with her and talk to her about marriage.

Gina Nino

A Call to Urgency

How many folks are coming from the East Coast?

How many of you know the title of the presentation today?

So you came and you don't know what you're expecting.

So my name is Gina Anino, and I am part of this ministry called Unjay, and our goal is to, we work in the 1040 window.

Someone wanna give me a description really quick?

You should've raised your hand, because I'm gonna call on you.

And when we have our pretty PowerPoint up there, I'll show you the map.

And so they're on reach because that means that they're very or 9 Christians or they've never heard of the gospel.

So we live in a country in America that whether or not you identify yourself as a Christian, even politicians talk about God, right?

But in those places, no 1 has even heard of God, right?

And it's very difficult because a lot of our missionaries do not necessarily go into that area.

And so we haven't been able to move forward with the work, but there's an opportunity that's coming to be able to work with that here in our own neck of the woods.

How many of you did the Reach the World Next Door mission trip prior to here?

So, ASI had partnered with ASAP and they have this ministry called Reaching the World Next Door, and they did a couple of events here.

So, calling around the theme, we wanted to talk about how you can utilize or push forward reaching your own neighbors in your own neighborhood.

So I was saying, our ministry focuses on that area, but particularly on a personal level, really impacted by what happens in our neck of the woods.

So we are actually a big hub, the region where I'm from, we're a big hub for refugees.

And I am an attorney by trade and because I'm very involved with my local community I got called in.

People always introduce me as the immigration lawyer.

I just happen to volunteer and be in those circles and because of my skill set people call on me And so I've been working with that particular effort for many years, creating sustainability around the state and in the city of how to reach out.

And taking those skill sets to figure out how do we, as Christians and as Adventists, pursue our Great Commission and be able to reach to folks who most people will never go.

I mean, how many of us are going to go to Afghanistan next week?

But I got to tell you that we have so many people from Iraq, from Afghanistan, from so many of those regions that are right here in our own backyards, right?

And as someone who's constantly trying to recruit people to go where our ministry is, I can tell you that is incredibly hard, but you have opportunities to do so right now.

So before we get started and sort of disseminate how you can work in this area, I want us to do a little bit of an activity.

I need you to take, they're already divided.

So I'm going to ask my husband and he's going to help me pass them out.

I'm also gonna go ahead and pass a couple of pens, unless you have your pens.

And let me know if you already have your pen, because I don't think we have that many.

And then I'm gonna give you further instructions.

So everyone should get in total 16 different cards.

Let me know when you guys are all set, and I'll give further instructions.

So we need to do something first in order for the Lord to be able to come, this is what?

Reach to every nation, tribe, tongue, and people, and then shall the Lord come.

We have over 4, 000 Unreached People groups consisting of more than 3 billion precious individuals.

So if you need a, why did I go to DSI and what is my task and where am I going to go and what am I going to do?

We need to figure out how we're going to outreach to these 3 billion individuals.

And many of those 300 of those unreached people groups are where?

So the majority of them, I'll show you another map.

But we have an opportunity here in the US that where are they coming?

North America, providential leading, right?

So we can readily be part of finishing the Great Commission, right?

I'm not going to learn the language in 10 years.

I don't want to leave my family behind right in our backyard.

Sister White tells us that we should be able to see and multiply in opportunities to reach many foreigners in America.

Back to Menu

Series

Young Professionals

A Call to Urgency

Transcript

Description

Parent Series

Parent Conference

Sponsor

Recorded

Parts

Practical Christianity

45m

Bridging the Gap: Panel Discussion

1h 15m

A Call to Urgency

40m

Sound Doctrine