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Advent HOPE Sabbath School

Johnny Wong

Multiplication: New Testament Paradigm

When I walked in here, I was so surprised there's so many people.

I was expecting only 12 people to show up.

Because this, those of you who were in the morning, who was there in the morning?

Is Loma Linda a very radical place is it?

Well you're going to be, that's a concern now.

I'm going to put something on my slide here now that something came to my thought I just want to put this on here and then I'll get started here.

I'm going to put a phone number down where you can text your question to.

Alright I'm just going to put here so that you can text your question to it and then I should be able to pick it up.

I want this session to be more interactive as well, especially after you hear these crazy ideas.

You'll be probably saying I don't know where this guy is coming from, what is all this?

Let me throw some questions to him and let's see what he says.

So it'll come up on my screen on my phone here when the question comes.

All right, who wasn't there this morning?

Okay, there's a few who wasn't there this morning.

Well, those of you who were not there this morning, I come from a church in Australia called Gateway Adventist Center.

It has planted 5 churches now based on the concept of care groups.

The Lord has blessed us with over 250 some baptisms, and majority of those baptisms are studied by lay people.

We do have pastors, but our primary role of The pastor is to follow the New Testament model and the early Adventist model, which is to be coaching, to be going out there and multiplying work, rather than just minister and hover over the church.

We have, we praise God in the first 10 years, we have about 90% retention rate.

Of course, now in 20 some years, we look back at the data of the 250 baptism, we have a 80% retention rate, which is still considered very high, because in our union, Australia Union Conference, probably the stats is about 45% retention rate.

They come in the front door, but then they go out the back door.

We thank God for the growth of this church, and the tithe has been a blessing.

Our tithe alone for a church that started off as a campus church, 2 of our churches are in campuses, secular university campuses.

We have a church right in the middle of this university.

Second university, Monash University, Australia's largest university with about 70 to 80, 000 students.

We have a church in the middle of the university as well.

And then 2 of the other churches are in the community, and then we have 1 that is incubating in a home at the moment, as we try to multiply that church.

We believe in centers of influence, as Sister White has described those.

We ran a campus center of influence across the street from the university, and over the years, over 120 campus students were baptized through this process of running events and eccentric influence connecting with student clubs and so on.

We now have a wellness center as well, a wellness center of influence as well.

We partner with Amazing Facts, so I'm a director for Amazing facts as well.

We only take about 16 students in our program.

The main purpose is not masses but quality and so we partner our students, the FCO students, to go with experienced people because it's apprenticeship model.

A wellness center is not the hardware, it is the software, and it's the people that makes the difference.

So we have scientists, we have doctors, we have nurses, counselors, people who believe in the health message.

That is the right arm of the gospel, working together.

You have people who want to work in health, but if you don't have values and alignment, you have a problem.

So it's important to bring a team of people that are working together.

I'll be teaching there for their master's program.

We have a cohort of students that come to learn the master's in biblical Mission and Wellness.

And I teach also a guest lecture at Avondale University, our church school in 1 hour north of Sydney.

Today, I want to talk about the New Testament model for multiplication.

Father in heaven, as we open your word, we just ask for your presence here.

We know you're here, your spirit is here.

We're thankful that we can come this afternoon, and I thank you for the willing hearts that come out on a hot day to listen.

But Lord, I just pray that they will not listen to what I say, but listen to what the Spirit will speak to their hearts.

Because indeed the Spirit will lead us to all truth.

And the Spirit indeed is the 1 that gives the power, because you say in your word, not by might, not by power, but by your Spirit.

So Father, we ask you to guide us, prompt us with the thoughts that you want us to have and lead us in our discussion today.

When I was 13 years, 12 years old, 12 and a half years old, I was baptized into the Adventist church.

I hear this saying, Jesus is coming again.

I hear this saying, we have to finish the work.

We've got to finish the work before Jesus comes.

Well, you know, Jesus used that phrase, didn't he?

In John chapter 4, where it says, my food is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish the work.

I got active when I was baptized at 12 years old.

I went to youth camps, youth ministry stuff, and I told you the story.

We had a great youth ministry of 50 people.

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Multiplication: New Testament Paradigm

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