AMEN 2011: Center of Influence

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Adventist Medical Evangelism Network (AMEN)

AMEN 2011 Plenary Sessions

Phil Mills

Two Men Went Up

Stephen Bohr

Our High Calling, Part 1

Tim Howe

Every Practice a Lifestyle Center

Allen Lloyd

Vacation Centers of Influence

Our High Calling, Part 2

Wendell Lawrence

The Office as a Center of Influence for Health, Healing and Hope

Derek Morris

Radical Apostleship

Des Cummings

Mark Finley

Reformers Once Again

Our High Calling, Part 3

Father in heaven, I pray that your spirit might incline each mind and each heart, and my mind and tongue, as we unveil truths that each of us need.

I was asked to speak not about Weimar tonight, but about Vacation Centers of Influence, which actually has to do with my family's personal life story in regards to what happened a few months ago.

And this story came out and then I was asked to actually speak about it.

A little bit of the history of this family story comes from the pen of Ellen White.

She says, if Christians were to act in how?

1, under the direction of 1 power for the accomplishment of 1 purpose, they would move the world.

She goes on to say, the call to be given in the highways is to be proclaimed to all who have an active part in the world's work, to the teachers and leaders of the people, those who bear heavy responsibilities in public life, physicians, teachers, lawyers, judges, public officers, businessmen, should be given a clear, distinct message.

What shall it profit a man if he shall gain the whole world and lose his own soul?

So she talks particularly in this context of the need to give this message on the highways to what we would consider the upper echelon of society, the leaders in society.

She goes on to say, we talk and write much of the neglected poor.

Should not some attention be given also to the neglected rich?

Many look upon this class as hopeless, and they do little to open the eyes of those who blinded and dazed by the power of Satan have lost eternity out of their reckoning.

Thousands of wealthy men have gone to their graves unworn because they have been judged by appearance and passed by as hopeless subjects.

Often we talk in our churches of those who are disadvantaged being judged by appearance.

But sometimes there's a greater tendency to judge those of wealth by appearance as hopeless and not be worthy of going out of our way to try to affect them because we think they are unaffectable.

She says, but indifferent as they may appear, I have been shown, now whenever she says that, you need to take it very seriously, I have been shown that most of this class are soul burdened.

There are thousands of rich men who are starving for spiritual food.

So if you take a person of the upper echelons of society, the rich, and By the way, they've been under attack in our society in many ways.

But if you take this particular group, she says she has been shown that the majority, most means the majority, the majority of this class are soul burdened and they are starving for spiritual food.

Many in official life feel their need of something which they have not.

Few among them go to church for they feel that they receive no benefit.

The teaching they hear does not touch the soul.

Shall we make no personal effort in their behalf?

Some will ask, can we not reach them with publications?

And so often, publications, and of course, the term that would be utilized today, probably in a more major way than publications, but it fits under the same category, would be media.

Thinking that this is the group that we need to reach with media and with publications.

We can't get into their home, but somehow if the media does, maybe they can be affected.

She says there are many who cannot be reached in this way.

And by the way, when it comes to television, it's very clear that this group does not watch very much at all.

They're not going to be watching Hope or 3ABN or virtually any other programs on TV.

They've gotten their riches not by sitting in front of their television set.

And so this is something that they've learned early on, often, is the problems with that.

And so they're not necessarily going to sit there and vegetate and channel flip.

But, she says, it is what type of effort that they need?

There are many who are represented to me as being like Cornelius, man whom God desires to connect with his church.

Cornelius, if you remember, was a wealthy individual, a ruler of many, very well respected in his society, but yet 1 who was 1 to the Lord Jesus and to the gospel.

So she says there's many like him out there.

Their sympathies are with the Lord's commandment keeping people.

But the threads that bind them to the world hold them how?

They have not the moral courage to take their position with the lowly ones.

And those are the lowly ones that have the truth of the gospel.

She says, we are to make special efforts for these souls who are in need of special labor because of their responsibilities and temptations.

So it's going to require special effort to reach this group.

We're told in other places that this is not the group that tends to come to evangelistic series in your local area.

When they see the brochure, they might actually be interested in some of those topics, but if they're the very wealthy, they are going to be recognized, and they don't wanna be reported as being at that meeting when they're not sure whether they're going to agree or disagree with what's being said.

They're not reached by the usual publications, by the usual media as we have already talked about.

But they are reached through special efforts.

Now, when I was coming across this council, And by the way, some of this counsel was introduced to me by the president of AMEN.

I don't know if your talk, Phil, is on audio verse, but he has a special talk that's much more detailed than what I'm giving you tonight on how to reach the rich.

And so I had heard some aspects of that talk.

And so that was in the back of my mind in regards to this story that I'm gonna tell you tonight.

But also being president of Weimar, I noticed driving from 1 small town to another in California, I would see a large Adventist church.

Every town in California has a fairly sizable Adventist church that's much larger than it is in other towns in North America by virtue of the size of the town.

And of course, California is the most concentrated place for Seventh-day Adventists in our division or in America.

And I asked the question, why is California so concentrated?

I had to research this myself, because most of the Californians are fifth and sixth generation, and they have no clue as to why it's that concentrated.

And so I began to do some research myself on this and found out that it happened really in the 1890s and 1900s.

And it happened as a result of large tents being erected in prominent places in every 1 of these towns.

These large tents would be well advertised.

Everyone in the town would know that there was a grand event getting ready to take place.

And that grand event was just 3 meetings long.

The first meeting was on the second coming of Christ.

There was fervor, there was biblical evidence, And that was presented with an appeal to be ready for Jesus to come.

But truth combined with love was really what that meeting was about.

And then the third meeting was on the seventh day Sabbath.

The tent was taken down and taken to another city.

Now what happened is that Bible workers would stay in that town to follow up the interest.

And the Bible workers would then fill in some other biblical truths, such as the sanctuary doctrine, such as the prophecy, etc.

And those Bible workers would then reap the souls afterwards.

And that's how Adventism grew by leaps and bounds in California.

And so, when I was recognizing this, this fact, I had a desire to reach people, particularly those that I knew and those that I didn't know with those 3 truths.

And by the way, our term, our name, Seventh-day Adventist, pretty much says that.

I mean, if you believe in the Seventh-day Sabbath, and if you believe in the gospel of Christ and the second coming of Christ, you're pretty much a Seventh-day Adventist.

You know, There's a few other details in there that enhance those aspects of things, but in reality, that's what you are.

So how this vacation center of influence came about.

We only had 1 week of vacation for our family per year.

And I have 4 boys, and we quickly learned that the boys loved the winter sports.

And so what seemed to be the best was skiing in Colorado.

And so we would ski in different resorts in Colorado.

We would choose a different 1 every year.

We've ended up skiing many of the major ski resorts in Colorado.

And by the way, because of my speaking in many places throughout the world, my boys do not have a desire to travel, per se.

I would often take my boys and my wife with me on traveling.

Series

AMEN 2011 Plenary Sessions

Vacation Centers of Influence

Transcript

Parent Series

Parent Conference

Sponsor

Recorded

Young Professionals

F5 Challenge – Challenging the Status Quo!

23m

AMEN 2012 Seminars

Legacy

44m

A Day In Anil’s Life

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OYC 2011 Seminars

Kellogg vs. The Ministry: A Century of Collateral Damage

56m

The Doctrine of Personal Ministries

Part 4 - Doing the Wrong Job Well

1h 18m

Adventist Apologetics: Complex Issues, Adventist Answers

5. Delusions of Grandeur? (Panel Discussion)

1h 18m

Making Sense of Last Day Events

5. An End Time Life Worth Living

59m

AMEN 2011 Breakout Seminars

Relationships: the Secret Flavor in Freedom from Addictions

49m

ASI 2013 Plenary Sessions

ASI Members in Action

1h 57m

The Renaissance of Adventism

The Renaissance of Adventism, Get Out the Magnifying Glass

53m

The Three Angels’ Messages and the Everlasting Gospel

46m

You are Needed!

3. How To Share the Adventist Message in 30 Minutes

1h 9m

Sound Doctrine