Some years ago, after a seminar, I received a piece of paper from a colleague with a quotation from Ellen G. White that changed my commitment to our church’s mission. In the quotation she says, “Every day the probation of some is closing. Every hour some are passing beyond the reach of mercy. And where are the voices of warning and entreaty to bid the sinner flee from this fearful doom? Where are the hands stretched out to draw him back from death? Where are those who with humility and persevering faith are pleading with God for him?”1
When I think about the 332,648 people in this world who die every day and the 13,860 who lose their life every hour, I realize that we cannot wait for a better time to share the biblical hope with the entire world. The time is now!
Of course, we have many challenges to reach “every nation and tribe and language and people,” (Rev 14:6, ESV). One of the challenges is the distribution of our members in the world: 43 percent are in Africa, 29 percent are in Latin America, 20 percent are in Asia and Oceania, 6 percent are in North America, and 2 percent are in Europe.2 What can we do to increase our presence in the areas where we don’t have a strong presence? And how can we motivate areas with a high presence to help reach areas with a low presence?
This challenge and the call for urgency are the components of motivation for the movement called Mission Refocus. It is a reevaluation of both our sending of missionaries and our strategies for reaching the unreached or lowreached people groups, countries, and urban areas.
In 1882, Ellen White wrote, “Where are the missionaries who should be raised up at the heart of the work? From twenty to fifty should be sent out from Battle Creek every year to carry the truth to those who sit in darkness.”3 At that time the Seventh-day Adventist Church in North America had no more than seventeen thousand members, and sending fifty missionaries a year would have been three missionaries per one thousand church members. We have never repeated that rate. If we wanted to accomplish this challenge in our day, we would need to send 67,667 missionaries each year. We are far from this recommended number, but Mission Refocus is helping us get closer to this dream.
I would like to invite you to pray for and support this movement. Be a part of this urgent commitment to share the Three Angels’ Messages with the entire world, to witness God’s miracles in our mission, and to see our great hope become a great reality.
This article was previously published in the ISE Navigator, the IPRS newsletter, on March 28, 2024.
1 Ellen G. White, Patriarchs and Prophets (Washington, DC: Review and Herald, 1890), 140.
2 2023 Annual Statistical Report New Series, Volume 5: Report of the General Conference of Seventh-day Adventists’ 2022 Statistics, 17-36.
3 Ellen G. White, Testimonies for the Church (Mountain View, CA: Pacific Press, 1889), 5:187.
Erton C. Köhler is the secretary of the General Conference of Seventh-day Adventists, Silver Spring, MD, USA. He holds a master’s degree in theology and an honoris causa doctorate from Peruvian Union University. He is writing his dissertation for a DMin from Andrews University.
