Central Visayan Conference of the Seventh-day Adventists, in collaboration with the Central Philippine Union Conference, hosted “Harvest 2025: Empowerment and Consultation,” a nationwide training program launched and organized by the Southern Asia-Pacific Division, equipping leaders for a year-long intensive evangelism initiative.
Held from Jan. 20-23, 2025, at Adventist Academy Cebu International Church in Bulacao, Talisay City, Cebu, the event brought together delegates from the unions, missions, and conferences across the Philippines. Eight SSD leaders spearheaded the event, under the leadership of Pastor Roger Caderma, SSD president, who came to encourage everyone to work hard in achieving the goals of Harvest 2025.
Delegates included presidents, ministerial secretaries, Nurturing Discipleship Retention/Integrated Evangelism Lifestyle and Hope Channel coordinators, Sabbath School/Personal Ministries directors, and key leaders in communication.
The presidents of the host conferences, Pastor Charles Nogra (CVC) and Pastor Eliezer (Joer) Barlizo Jr. (CPUC), personally welcomed the delegates and officially declared the event open.
The event started with a morning devotional wherein Pastor Michael Palar, Hope Channel coordinator of the Southern Asia-Pacific Division, was the speaker. In his message, he set the delegates’ minds on aiming, working, and accomplishing something great and intentional for evangelism.
To elaborate on this, Pastor Palar illustrated how Nebuchadnezzar relentlessly pursued success, driven by his ambition to achieve greatness. He expounded on the king’s extraordinary measures to achieve his goals. However, while acknowledging that Nebuchadnezzar’s drive was fueled by worldly desires for wealth, fame, and honor, Pastor Palar drew encouragement from the king’s unswerving determination.
He stressed that having this intense desire to succeed can also be everyone’s driving force in evangelism. “Great people dream great, work greatly, and achieve great things. That is why great leaders also work great, put great effort, and achieve great things,” he said.
Before the series of lectures started, Edward Rodriguez, SSD assistant communication director, laid out the Harvest 2025 training objectives. These objectives were to deepen theological understanding of mission and evangelism, enhance evangelistic leadership skills, leverage media for evangelism, promote community collaboration and involvement, integrate new members into the mission, strengthen global and urban disciple-making, and build commitments to mission objectives.
Through these objectives, he discussed the significance of Global Total Membership Involvement, which aims to mobilize and equip every church member, regardless of age or background, to actively participate in evangelism and share the gospel.
“Our success is not measured by our individual achievements. It will not be measured by who makes the most numbers of baptisms or who makes the most number of evangelistic meetings this year,” Rodriguez said, appealing to the leaders to take the Harvest 2025 initiative sincerely.
“No, our motivation should be on how many people in this territory, especially the unreached areas within our territory, have actually heard the gospel so that they too can be people receiving God when He returns,” Rodriguez added.
Pastor Arnel Gabin, SSD vice president for NDR/IEL, delved further into Harvest 2025’s measurable goals and objectives, emphasizing discipleship and nurturing. Through comprehensive discipleship and retention programs, there would be a sense of belongingness and commitment within the church community, ensuring that new members are well-integrated and actively engaged.
Pastor Gabin believes Harvest 2025 can lead to exponential growth in church membership if every member actively participates. His sample calculations show the remarkable potential of Total Member Involvement (TMI). If each member leads just 20 people to baptism, the Adventist population will dramatically increase, exceeding the goals of Harvest 2025 and impacting even the challenging 10/40 Window region.
“This Harvest 2025 is not an IEL/NDR program. This is a program of the administration and all the departments,” Pastor Gabin said, signifying the leaders’ responsibility for this initiative.
In closing his message, he added, “The Lord’s mandate is clear. His instructions are plain. Let us join together to reach God’s harvest now.”
Anthony Stanyer, also an assistant communication director, emphasized the importance of a clear and consistent brand identity for the Adventist church. This branding involves unified messaging across all communication channels and a recognizable visual identity.
“Branding is very important. It is a public perception and expectation of you or an organization,” Stanyer explained, highlighting how a strong brand attracts, especially within the context of Harvest 2025, where it can inspire greater participation and outreach.
Recognizing the significance of media evangelism nowadays, Pastor Heshbon Buscato, SSD communication director, talked about the roles of pastors as media specialists.
Their roles involve understanding the evolving media landscape and utilizing online platforms for effective evangelism. He encouraged pastors to acquire media skills, including content creation and ethical online engagement, integrating these into their ministry for outreach and discipleship. He also discussed the potential for pastors to become influential voices in the digital space, magnifying the church’s message and building online community.
“You will realize that the moment we begin engaging social media, people from different parts of the world become more engaged to your content, relating themselves to the ministry you are doing. They then consider your ministry as part of their family growth,” Pastor Buscato said, explaining the effect of digital evangelism.
On the other hand, Pastor Rudy Situmorang, SSD ministerial secretary, discussed the disciple-making evangelism process in one of his lectures. He opened his message by quoting Matthew 9: 37-38, a verse that showed the world’s current spiritual condition wherein there is an abundant harvest but with only a few laborers.
Pastor Situmorang explored methods of increasing the number of church members participating in evangelistic outreach initiatives with the goal of TMI.
“Global discipleship-making evangelism means every Adventist, division, union, conference, mission, and the local church is invited to implement this ongoing culture tending evangelistic strategy in a 12-month period,” he said, highlighting Harvest 2025 goals and objectives.
He emphasized the importance of personal spiritual development and mentorship in equipping individuals to share their faith and guide new believers effectively. Furthermore, he provided a comprehensive framework for cultivating a culture of disciple-making within the church, empowering members to actively participate in fulfilling the Great Commission.
Pastor Felixian Felicitas, SSD field secretary, also shared his subject expertise on “Theology of the Remnant and Mission.” According to him, this theology connects to four things: identity, theology, ministry, and mission. He then led the attendees to understand the difference between the “doctrine of the church” and the “theology of the remnants.”
“Some people believe that the remnants are something in the future,” Pastor Felicitas said,” explaining the confusion and the several interpretations people have of the word “remnant.”
Yet, further down in the conclusion of his message, he explained that the current Adventists are the remnants, representing the three angels of Revelation 14 who accept the light of God’s messages and go forth as His agents to sound the warning throughout the length and breadth of the earth.
The event culminated Wednesday afternoon through a commitment program wherein Pastor Segundino Asoy, SSD Sabbath School/Personal Ministries director, was the speaker.
In his commitment message, Pastor Asoy highlighted the importance of care groups or small group ministries. He taught them how to nurture small groups and reclaim membership by keeping a list of all the members. In this way, tracking and inviting them back would be easier.
Pastor Asoy also emphasized the importance of the sense of belongingness a member can experience. As he said, most people love to be in a place where they feel loved, appreciated, and respected. They love to be in a place where they are encouraged to share and serve. Thus, church membership can grow in an environment such as this, where members are valued.
The attendees left equipped and empowered to launch Harvest 2025 initiatives, filled with insights and eager to see impressive results by year’s end.
Lyn Lucero, Communication Department