Celebrating Junk Food
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celebrating junk food HAVE WE FORGOTTEN OUR HEALTH MESSAGE? 14 NEWS ADVENTIST SCHOOL CLOSED AFTER FIRE DESTROYS CLASSROOMS 5 ADVENTIST RECORD | DECEMBER 2, 2017 ISSN 0819-5633 The Official 2018 Big Camp Mission Offering Project Every year thousands of children, women and men in the South Pacific die as a result of Type II Diabetes. Thousands more lose their toes and limbs. Each loss is preventable. Help save lives and limbs now. Join The 10,000 Toes Campaign today and help stamp out diabetes in the South Pacific www.10000toes.com A partnership between Health Visit www.10000toes.com for information, stories and more ways to get involved. editor’s note WHERE ARE THEY? Going back to a church and a community where you once the same Adventist school and enjoyed the same church ac- pastored or fellowshipped is always an emotional experience. tivities who are living with their boyfriends and/or girlfriends. It’s encouraging to see the stalwarts who laboured with There is a doctor, mechanic and florist but none of them you in the various community and evangelistic events that find church attractive. Some are antagonistic; others just were run, still faithfully serving God to the best of their ability. drifted. There’s the joy of seeing former Adventists you had visited, Seeing the above hurts. They are the 50 per cent of all who never showed an inkling of returning to church, but are Adventists globally who statistically do not associate with us now fully committed disciples of Jesus. anymore. It’s satisfying to see people you baptised and left as babes Local churches are very fluid. The power of the Word of in the faith now on the church board God and the Spirit change lives that are and leading Sabbath School ministry to challenged with relational breakdowns, children. Life in financial debt, lack of meaningful work, There’s the complete wonder of abuse from a partner, jealous retribution seeing those you ministered to in Bible from a friend . But sometimes these studies and seminars, who never made the church human frailties impact others and give a decision at the time, now rejoicing in people a reason to leave the Church. the truth of Jesus and involved in helping can be an There is much latent pain within many others find new life through faith in churches as those who used to be there Jesus. emotional and are not anymore are our son or I would like to stop writing right now, daughter, cousin, brother, sister, uncle, thank God and just dwell on the above rollercoaster. father, mother, best friend. Not having stories but that’s not the complete them in church hurts. We pray and know picture. that God hears and acts, but God never There are those you remember fondly who are not there chooses to force the will of these people who are loved more anymore. With enquiry you discover a few have passed away by Him than us. We know this but it still hurts. and await their joy in Jesus. Others have transferred to new As we pray for others, we need to pray for ourselves so churches. However, there are other stories that just bring that we can endure to the end (Matthew 24:13). For life in heartache. the church can be an emotional rollercoaster. The Sabbath School teacher who was excellent at build- How else can we deal with such pain? Besides prayer, we ing a group and engaging people in the Scriptures who no can make a choice to be different. Emotions are the E or longer chooses to fellowship at the church because of hurtful energy that bring motion. E-motion. Energy-motion. Emo- untruths spread around. tional pain can thus be turned into positive action. Let’s use There’s the lady who led in an exercise class that had the pain of loss to move us to become more real: listening, many community people participating who no longer attends praying, supporting and advising each other without any because the church board did all they could to block and stop judgement (Matthew 7:1,2; Romans 13:8; Colossians 3:13). the ministry because of the clothes people chose to wear That’s what it means to be a disciple of Jesus. That’s the kind while exercising. of church we all are looking for. There are the kids I grew up with in Pathfinders and Sabbath School, now successful lawyers, architects and businessmen, who are just not there. Nobody seems to know glenn townend why. spd president There are the contemporaries of my children who went to /SPDpresident senior consulting editor graphic designer noticeboard adventist media adventist record is the glenn townend theodora amuimuia [email protected] locked bag 1115 official news magazine of the senior editor copyeditor subscriptions wahroonga seventh-day adventist church’s jarrod stackelroth tracey bridcutt [email protected] nsw 2076 australia south pacific division assistant editors noticeboard + 61 (03) 5965 6300 + 61 (02) 9847 2222 kent kingston julie laws mailed within australia and cover credit: abn 59 093 117 689 maritza brunt letters nz $A43.80 $NZ73.00 other vol 122 no 24 RichVintage vania chew [email protected] prices on application. —iStockphoto linden chuang (digital) news & photos website [email protected] record.adventistchurch.com december 2, 2017 | Adventist record 3 news Living faith new centre of influence for fiji tracey bridcutt It was one of those balmy after- noons during holiday time when one Seventh-day Adventist Church of our fellow passengers suddenly members in Suva, Fiji, have wel- stood up in the middle of the bus we comed the opening of a “centre had just boarded. With a sure voice, of influence” large enough to he requested the attention of all the hold 1500 people. passengers. Not knowing what he Fiji Mission general secretary wanted or where this was going, we Pastor Joe Talemaitoga said they gave him our attention. But what he were very thankful for the new Pastor talemaitoga at the new facility. said next was surprising. centre, which was funded by the He explained that he was a Chris- South Pacific Division. Church will hold its Sabbath wor- tian, that he believed in the power Previously there was no church ship services at the new facility. The of God and that he wanted to pray building large enough to accommo- church’s 140 members have been for protection before we started our date big meetings in Suva. According meeting in a simple corrugated iron three-hour bus trip. Immediately, to Pastor Talemaitoga, the centre will structure behind the new centre. most of the passengers hushed, the complement the work of the Church The centre will be open through- bus driver lowered the volume of the in Fiji. out the week for various activities, music and the repeat episode of Ha- “The Fiji Mission is grateful for this including cooking demonstrations waii Five-0 about to play on the bus TV was paused. facility,” he said.“It’s going to really and indoor games. Meetings will be That response from the passengers support the work of discipling our able to be livestreamed. and the driver was incredible and re- members here, young and old. This Future plans include the addition ally stood out for me. As soon as they facility is really going to be a centre of pull-down shutters for weather heard that someone was going to pray of influence, offering worship servic- protection and the construction of a for their protection, they all stopped. es, creative activities, recreation and permanent minister’s home on the It was as if there was an intrinsic many other functions that will help site. desire in people to pay attention to build up our Church and the mem- “It is going to be a centre of someone who was willing to pray for bership here.” influence right throughout the week,” a positive outcome in their lives. In Cakau Seventh-day Adventist Pastor Talemaitoga said. essence, hope is what captures the hearts of people when the road is unknown. So we all bowed our heads and were blessed by the prayer of that At The Table now airing on Channel Ten unknown man. Maritza brunt What is also interesting is how one Adventist Media’s At The Ta- voice wanting to live out his faith ble women’s panel show is now brought about change that day. All the being broadcast on free-to-air tele- people around me, including myself, vision in Australia. said “Amen” when the man finished The show, which officially praying. This indicated that there was on the set of at the table. a degree of connectedness with God— launched earlier this year, has the and yet, there was only one person 4:30am Sunday morning slot on who stood up to invite us to pray. Channel Ten. This adds to the range “We’d like to thank Sanitarium The man on the bus challenged of ways the show can be accessed, for their generous support, as they us that day. When it comes to God, including via YouTube, Facebook and provide the TV time slots on Channel we were reminded that we have to Hope Channel Australia and New Ten free of charge, and also to Hope live our faith, live our beliefs and act Zealand. The ministry also includes a Channel New Zealand for including out what is in our hearts and minds. website and monthly magazine. the program a number of times in And that’s exactly how we must “do “At The Table is truly a multimedia their weekly schedule.” church” also.