Oral History Project: An Interview with George W. Brown By Benjamin J. Baker

Transcription

1 Oral History Project: An Interview with George W. Brown By Benjamin J. Baker Purpose of Project In 1990 at the General Conference session of Seventh-day Adventists in Indianapolis, IN, George W. Brown, a black man, was nominated to the presidency of the world church, the highest office in Adventism. He was the only African American or person of color to ever be nominated to the position. Brown declined the nomination. Eighteen years later, Brown's nomination has almost been forgotten. The episode occurred quickly, and Brown did not personally come forward nor did his face appear on any screens or monitors. It was a low key occurrence, and most Seventh-day Adventists today don't know it ever happened. The purpose of this oral history project was to find out exactly what occurred in 1990: What issues was the church facing? Why was Brown nominated? Why did Brown decline the nomination? Importance The 1990 nomination of George Brown to the General Conference presidency was probably the highest point in terms of leadership in African American Seventh-day Adventist history. Blacks have been vice presidents of the General Conference (Calvin Rock, Ella Simmons and Bekele Heye), presidents of the church's largest division (e.g. Charles Bradford of NAD), presidents of the church's largest conferences (e.g. Harold Lee of Columbia Union and Gerald Penick of Southeastern California), chairmen of important boards (e.g. Calvin Rock with Loma Linda and Florida Adventist), and pastors of Adventism's most influential churches (e.g. Hyveth Williams at Campus Hill and John Nixon at Southern Adventist University), but a black has never been nominated or served as General Conference President. Brown was a first: the first black to be nominated and the first to decline. Brown's was a watershed moment for Seventh-day Adventist race relations. A Brief Bio of George W. Brown George W. Brown was born on January 11, 1924 in the Dominican Republic to an Antiguan father and Dominican mother. His native language is Spanish. Both his parents and grandparents were Seventh-day Adventists. Brown grew up in the Dominican Republic and Antigua. He earned his Bachelors in Theology from Caribbean Union College in 1948 and served successfully as a pastor and evangelist for a decade. He received his Masters in Systematic Theology and Doctor of Divinity from Andrews University. 1

2 Brown held numerous positions in the Seventh-day Adventist Church, including president of Caribbean Union College and president of the Inter-American Division which he occupied from Brown retired in 1993 and has since authored two books, Portraits of Jesus and Fruit of the Spirit. Dr. Brown was married in 1952 and has four daughters, eight grandchildren and one great grandchild. Currently he and his wife Carla reside in Avon Park, Florida. The Interview On December 4, 2007 I interviewed Dr. Brown in his home in Avon Park, FL. Two interviews were conducted, one at 10:00 a.m., and the second at 1:00 p.m. The first interview was foundational, and I asked him biographical questions and queried about his philosophy of ministry and leadership. The second interview dealt with his General Conference nomination and its aftermath. 2

3 Interview with Dr. George Brown December 4, 2007, Avon Park, Florida Interviewer: Benjamin J. Baker Part 1 Baker: Thank you for this interview and meeting with me. It is a pleasure to meet you. We may have met before. Brown: We may have. It could be that we ve met before I meet so many people (laughs). Baker: I have great respect for you and your ministry. Brown: Thank you. Baker: And my father has a high regard for you also. Brown: Yes, I think the world of him too. Baker: How has your retirement been? Brown: Well, very delightful. My wife and I retired in December of Since then I have been kept rather busy. I ve had speaking engagements in North America, Inter-America, several trips to the Far East, conducted weeks of prayer at two of our universities in the Philippines, South Africa and a number of other areas, along with campmeetings, workshops and all other types of functions. Then I ve found enough time to write two books: Portraits of Jesus in 1996 and The Fruit of the Spirit in I should have done a third one, but did not finish because of my wife s illness. She has some chronic problems. So that has kept me somewhat homebound for a while. But we have, or are, enjoying our retirement. It s a great experience to be able to continue to make contributions to the work of the church and at the same time not be bound by any time element. There s a lot of freedom. So we re enjoying it. Baker: What is the third book about? Brown: I have received much positive feedback on Portraits of Jesus, so I collected all of the appellations, accolades and titles of Jesus throughout the Bible, from Genesis to Revelation, and found 365 of them. I have developed these into daily devotionals Jesus the Rock, Jesus the Bright and Morning Star, and so on, concluding each one with a succinct statement from Ellen White on that particular subject. I ve had so many favorable comments about it and encouragement to pursue that so I thought I would expand it and title it Sayings of Jesus. I started but have not gone very far with it as of now because of some domestic circumstances. Baker: I m anticipating the book. What do you enjoy most about retirement? Brown: What I enjoy most is that I can continue to provide a ministry and be of service to the church in a significant way without following a timetable. I m flexible, I can pick and choose. 3

4 When one is involved in direct denominational service you re bound by certain conditions, regulations, policies, timetables, and all that. But now I m free to decide where I go and where I don t go. So there is flexibility. I can move at my own pace. I ve found that is very useful because it makes the work more enjoyable and you can do it at a more relaxed pace. Baker: When did you first know that you were called to the gospel ministry? Brown: I tell you, that is an interesting question. It would take a lot of time to give you the full details, but I will be as succinct as possible. I was born in the Dominican Republic. My mother was from that country, my father a native of the island of Antigua, which is also in the West Indies. He went to the Dominican Republic, met my mother, got married there and had a family. My mother died when I was rather young, maybe 4 or 5. There are many anecdotes about her. Among these was that she said she wanted me to be a minister before she died. That stayed in my mind as I grew up. Shortly after my mother s death we moved back to Antigua to my father s homestead, which was kind of remote, in the boondocks. It was quite a distance from any church, but we never missed an opportunity to be at a small church miles away. I became rather enamored with what was became known as the Missionary Volunteer Department-the youth department. There were many activities and the young people were rather active. I got very involved, taking part in all kinds of activities. It was during this time that I developed a natural burden for preaching. I would take copious notes whenever the pastor or lay preacher or anyone spoke. I was just a little boy, but I traveled with my pen and paper and I would take notes and make outlines to the extent that I could reproduce some of the sermons. And the more I did this the more enamored I was with the whole concept of the preaching ministry. So I was given opportunities to give Bible studies in the MV Society and I was fortunate that there were so many adults and my peers who affirmed what I was doing. They would say George, you re doing great. You re going to be a preacher! That kind of affirmation is great. It does something for a youngster. I kept hearing that all along. I got baptized at 11 years and that s a story by itself because I had to run away in order to do that. Baker: You had to run away? Brown: My dad was a solid SDA, but extremely conservative. He had the idea that baptism was for perfect people, not for growing people. He would say: Oh no, George. You re not ready yet. You have a long way to go, and so forth. But I had a burden, a real passion that I had to get baptized. So I got up one morning. I knew that there was a baptism at the beach, so I got dressed and slipped out of the house, unbeknownst to him. I approached the pastor and said: I want to be baptized. He said: Do you have permission? And I said, No, I don t, but I came to be baptized. He said: OK, I ll take a chance and do it. And I was baptized. I was so glad that I did it because that became a controlling factor in my life. I saw too many of my peers go astray for the same reason. Their parents felt they were not ready for baptism and they waited and waited and eventually became older and developed new interests and forgot the message altogether. So it was in that background that I continued to pursue my interest in preaching and all that. When I was about 13 or 14 a group of young people decided to have a crusade. In the islands they have a lot of these wayside crusades. They would come and put up a table or 4

5 something on a corner and people would just come and listen. So a group of us went and I was designated to be the preacher. There I was preaching in the open, night after night, no mike, no nothing. And the more that I did it the more I felt that the Lord was directing my life into ministry. And my fame as it were, went abroad. One day the pastor came to me and said: I ve heard about your exploits in evangelism and I want you to join our team. Several years had gone by and I was about 16 or 17 then. The pastor invited me to be a helper in his evangelistic program, so I conducted the song service and in his absence conducted the Bible class. And that went on and on. The more I did it the more I was impressed that this was what I needed to do. God was calling me for it. Then, of course, I got so much encouragement and affirmation from all the folk. They said You must go to college. You must go to college. And I tell you something. There is nothing that does better for a young person in our church than to be affirmed. That is one of the reasons why I urge our leaders in the church today to encourage and affirm and nurture our young people and give them opportunities. The more opportunity they get, the better they will perform. So, with a lot of encouragement I decided that I would go to school. However, there was one big problem: I did not have the wherewithal to go. Baker: You mean money? You didn t have the money? Brown: Yes, yes, money. You may not know about that (laughs), but I didn t have it. My father did not have it either and was in no position to make sacrifices. But I was determined. I felt that the Lord had called me. I had to go to school regardless of what it took. So I contacted the Conference, which was on another island, Barbados, and arrangements were made for me to go to Barbados as a student colporteur. That was a new experience for me. I went to Barbados in July of 1946 and started out on a new venture. I canvassed all over that island, in and out, and eventually raised enough money for a scholarship. I landed at Caribbean Union College in January of 1948 and there began my studies for ministry. I studied several years and graduated and went into the ministry. And that is, briefly, the background of my calling to the ministry. Baker: You became a pastor? Brown: Yes, I started as a pastor-evangelist. I should say that in Inter-America, in general, the brethren do not particularly savor the idea of separating pastors from evangelists. When a young man graduates he goes out as pastor-evangelist. He is to pastor x number of churches and have evangelistic activities several times a year. So I was sent to the island of Tortola. No one had ever heard of Tortola. That is one of the British Virgin islands. That was a very interesting territory back then. There was no electricity and outdoor toilets. Shortly after graduation in 1952 Carla and I were married. So I had to take my young bride under those conditions. It was a challenge and I have to tell you that there were moments when I felt distressed, discouraged and wondered Am I in the right field? And I must point out to you that even though you have a profound conviction that the Lord has called you for a particular type of work, there are times when you are faced with crucibles-as our Sabbath School lesson this quarter emphasizes-and you wonder if you are in the right place. So I wondered at times because it was very difficult. When we arrived there we saw our churches. We had three churches but the main one was in Rowtown. It was dilapidated, very disconcerting just to look at. The worse part of it was 5

6 that the membership was in constant tension and hostility. I saw the need for reconciliation among the brethren before we did anything in terms of church growth. Baker: You say church growth. Were there many people on the island then? Brown: The island had a small population of about 25,000. We had 75 members in our church, but it was dormant. We had a revival, a reconciliation, and I began to feel a sense of satisfaction that the Holy Spirit had guided me. After we were finished with several weeks of revival, we launched a crusade. This was a challenge because Adventists were viewed very, very poorly on that island; we were not respected at all. We were perceived as just a backward little group, you know? But we made handbills and started our crusade. The opening night was a lifting experience. That little church was packed solid inside and outside. Word began to spread. Just about 10 yards away was the Anglican church. A little further down was the Pentecostal church. And what happened was in the evening when their services were over the people would leave and come down to the Adventist church. It became quite the news on the island. So I preached and we went on and the Lord blessed remarkably. We baptized 45 in the very first baptism which was making history on that island. That new group of believers came with new blood, new vision and a new understanding of what Adventism was all about. This was an injection to the existing membership. So the membership enlarged and the church began to grow. Eventually we built a new church building and things went well before I was transferred over to St Croix. That was my very first experience in the organized work other than two crusades I had conducted in Trinidad while a student at CUC. We had a wonderful time in Tortola and would never exchange it for anything else. Baker: What principles did you use to reconcile the church there? Brown: Of course, the basis of any type of reconciliation is the word of God and an appeal to the sense of unity that should exist in the church. I relied heavily on Paul s appeal in Ephesians for the oneness of the church and principles enunciated by Ellen White. We tried to bring in the element of fellowship because that is one of the things that caused tension. There wasn t any sharing. The New Testament concept of koinonea [brotherhood] did not exist. Everybody did his or her own thing. But we tried to get together and fellowship, pray together, work together and visit each other. By employing these elements we saw people come together and appreciate each other. It brought about a great revival in that church. There can be no effective and lasting church growth without this sort of revival. Baker: I did my undergraduate degree at Oakwood University in Theology. The big question was, How do you know if you re called? For many, students at Oakwood, Greek is the crucible (laughs). How does someone know if they re called? Brown: Well, I hesitate to give any fixed rule. But I ll give you some general principles that I ve found to be helpful. I knew I was called in a way which I term sunrise realization. It is gradual. You recall that Paul had a cataclysmic or dramatic manifestation of his call: he was knocked down and cried, Lord, what would you have me do, -that s dramatic. That did not happen to me, nor does it happen to most people. I grew up a Seventh-day Adventist. I learned 6

7 a lot of things as I went along, some negative, some positive. As I grew I began to feel and I m very cautious of the term feel somehow within me that there was something God wanted me to do. Then in the back of my mind what I d heard from my elders about my mother s wish for my life. The more I prayed, I asked the Lord to show me what to do, to guide me. Should I be a minister or be a treasurer of some conference or another profession? The more I thought about it I always came back to one conclusion: that God wanted me in the ministry. So it was a constant reminder. And I believe very profoundly in the guidance of providence, the things that happened in my life. I knew that these things would not have happened except that God was directing my life in a certain direction. So the individual must first be open to the prompting of the Holy Spirit. He or she must feel this call progressively, because this is not punctilious, but progressive. You must progressively feel that indeed God is leading in a particular direction. Another thing one needs to consider is What are my capabilities? We have young people, and in my own ministry I ve dealt with [many] young people, who have a tremendous burden to be ministers, but they can hardly communicate orally and they have tremendous drawbacks and difficulties. But if you have the ability to communicate and other certain gifts and you feel as if God is directing you to the ministry because he equipped you this indicates to you that, somehow, that the Lord is directing you in a certain channel. So there are many things to guide one into his realization of his call to ministry. Baker: How did you know which place God was leading when you had several calls simultaneously? Brown: Good question (laughter). And it s a tough one, but let me illustrate it. We were in the Virgin Islands, our first district, and we were there and doing well and felt very happy. People loved us and wanted us to stay and that s the worse time to make decisions, yet it s often the best time; it s good to leave when you re wanted. Ok, so while we were there, I got a call one day from the secretary of the Caribbean Union. He said to me, George, the president of Caribbean Union College has just discussed the matter with us, and the committee here has met and it has been decided to invite you to serve as the dean of men at Caribbean Union College. Now remember I m a pastor out there, and as pastor I had travel allowances and all the emoluments and benefits that accrue to a pastor. So here I get a call, young in the ministry, with the possibility of ordination down the road, and I get a call now to go back to my alma mater to serve as dean of men. Baker: A position that may not have been overtly ministry. Brown: Exactly, exactly. And you know I have seen some folks stuck in that situation. I viewed it as a ministry, but there were times when people didn t view it as a ministry. I ve seen people stuck; they ve stayed there for years upon years with no diversity in their ministry at all. And to leave the field with all the benefits that accrue was a little difficult, because I wasn t sure what was going to happen back there in college. Moreover, at that time there was a serious problem at the college. The dean of men had run into a problem, a terrible, difficult problem, and why would I want to get in the middle of that situation? So I did a lot of praying and struggling. We prayed one night and thought about it. My wife and I wanted the Lord s direction. Now I m not the person believing the world, and sighing 7

8 and all that stuff, but I want the Lord to guide me, and I had a very strong impression that I should go, accept this call, because there was a challenge there that God was going to help me to meet. And somehow it dawned on me, then and there: you ought to say yes to this call. I felt convinced that I should. And I responded to that, and we went back to Trinidad, back to the college. And when I went there it was a mess, I mean a real mess. But I accepted that responsibility and it was one of the best things I ve ever done. We had special meetings with the boys and tried to turn things around and develop some new approaches and the satisfaction I got spending five and a half years living there was immense. And the interesting thing about it was the most unusual happened in the second year I served as the dean of men. The president came to me and said, You know the Union committee has just voted your ordination. Baker: While you were dean? Brown: Dean of men Baker: Did you leave then? Brown: No. And several folks said to me, George, it would be a foolish thing to go to CUC as dean of men; there s no possibility you will be ordained. But there it was. I was ordained and found that I had a parish within that dormitory. You know, to meet with those boys every morning, every evening- Baker: It was ministry. Brown: Precisely. And you know I developed series upon series where we dealt with the spiritual issues, the social issues, the economic issues, all kinds of issues the young men were facing. We prayed with those boys. We had marvelous fellowship together. And I saw those fellows grow up. There were some who came there with a vision, ready for service-they seemed to be prepared. Others were banished there by their parents; you know it was a penitentiary. But I saw those guys transform, and then I watched those young men as they graduated and went abroad. Today I feel so much satisfaction because I see so many of those fellows in positionspastors, administrators-you name it. To mention just one, one of the fellows that really brought a great deal of pride and satisfaction to me, is Roy Adams; he was one of my students. Baker: At CUC? Brown: He was there, and was a great lawyer- even in those early days I could see that. The minute he spoke in one of my classes, I saw he was special. Baker: So you taught there, too? Brown: I taught as well, yes. Baker: Ok. 8

9 Brown: I taught one, two, three, four, five subjects-yes, five subjects. And it was a tough job, to run a dormitory in those days and to teach, but it gave me great satisfaction. When I transitioned from pastoring to CUC, I felt the Lord guiding me. And I m glad I went, because I saw the results and there was no significant change because there I was ordained and became part of the ministry so that I was able to carry out functions of the ministry even as the dean of men. Baker: What are two or three of your fondest ministry memories? Brown: You only asked me for two or three, but that s ok (laughing). Well let me tell you, the first memory occurred when I was not officially in the ministry. I was at Caribbean Union College [as a student] in my last year and I received a call from the conference president, I don t know whether you knew Pastor E.C. Ward, but he was the conference president. He called me and said, George, we re having a problem in the north Trinidad area, a place known as Toco. A pastor who was conducting a series of evangelistic meetings there had become sick and had a heart attack and was no longer able to continue the crusade. It was vacation time and we were getting ready to go out to canvas to earn a scholarship. Pastor Ward asked, Would you go and carry on the crusade? You know I had no preparation at all for that. How would I do it? He said, You know, you can do it. I prayed over it and decided to go. Now Toco was a very drunken town. In fact, some of the folks who came to the meetings were stone drunk. It was in a clubhouse, and man I tell you! I had to be the song director, the Bible worker and the preacher! I did all of that. The little church was in disrepair, just a few old people and so forth. To cut the story short, I, by the help of the Lord, conducted those meetings. We saw thirty-six people baptized. Among them, almost twenty were young people-which was a great boost for that church. And that is a memory that I will never forget. And I see people right now who were baptized then, who are not only members today, but in the work of the church. It was a great experience. My second memory: I mentioned before of the absolute joy, the fascination I had with deanship, the closeness you had with young people, and how you were able to shape, train, orient them, and direct their thoughts towards noble aims. So my deanship was another great experience. I was youth director for the Caribbean Union for a number of years and went subsequently to the Inter-American Division. There we did a number of things, but one thing I remember in particular. We had a burden for the young people-there were so many refined young of university, of college age, bright young people-and these were the ones that slipped through the cracks. So we came up with an idea of having youth Bible conferences. This was no play stuff, no getting out there and just having fun-we had fun of course, lots of fun-but the focus of the whole thing was Scripture. I remember we went to the island of Antigua in which we had a lovely site, and had one of these Bible conferences, and the theme was: The Lord has need of Thee. There were so many young people-teachers, accountants, civil servants, and so forth, young Seventh-Day Adventists-and we wondered why so many of these kids were not going to our college to train for service. So that was the focus. And you know, from that particular conference, we had 14 young people decide to go to Caribbean Union College 14 bright folks! Almost all of them except maybe two or three graduated and went into the work and are still in the work today. You talk about instant satisfaction that is. And the same program was conducted in Central America, in Columbia, in Venezuela, and all over the Inter-America Division with better results than that. Even today, I meet people and they come up to me and say, You know elder, remember that Bible Conference you conducted in such and such a place? 9

10 Well, I am so-and-so. I was there. I would ask them, What are you doing now? They would say, Well I am the pastor of this place, the president of this conference, and so on. Talk about satisfaction! So these are some of the things that bring great memories to me and wherever I go I find young people who responded to my ministry and have made valuable contributions. They give me such great memories. Baker: What advice would you give to young ministers today, especially in the times we are living in? Brown: Brother Baker that is such a relevant question. I see young ministers today and I wonder sometimes what the church or the profile of the church will be down the road if there isn t a change. I think one of the greatest things that need to be done among our young ministers is to recognize the uniqueness of Adventism. Now when I say uniqueness I don t mean that we stand out and are untouchable. I mean that we have a special message. As young men and minister, we need to recognize the uniqueness of our message and our mission and stick to that. I listen to some of the messages presented today and they could be preached by anybody, anybody. There is no uniqueness; there is no redemptive emphasis on it. You don t see Adventism in all of its entirety. I would urge our young men to concentrate on our message and our mission, focus on it, and give more attention to the biblical basis of our message than they do because so many times we get on tangents with the mega churches and the popular television-style presentations and we forget the substance and emphasize just the style. Number two, I believe that our young men and women who enter the ministry need to emphasize more the necessity for ensuring that the purpose of the church is not ignored. The primary mission for our church is to communicate the gospel and to prepare people for the coming of the Lord. These are elements that need to be emphasized if we are to prepare the nations. Baker: What are some things young ministers should avoid? You just mentioned ambiguity and style over substance. What are some other pitfalls that you see that make you want to shout, Watch out! Brown: Yeah, watch out! We have seen some things happen recently that bring concern to our minds and one of them is-and I can best refer to it in the words of the apostle Paul in the Philips translation- Don t let the world squeeze you into its mold. Some of our young ministers are not as alert as they might be with respect to the secular influences that surround them. And one of the things that are causing some problems with too many of our young workers are the attitudes toward the opposite sex. It s part of our society today; it s there, it s on television, it s in the news, it s on the Internet, it s everywhere. And the tendency for us to allow these things to influence us to the extent that we are not as cautious as we ought to be can lead to serious problems. We must also be careful with extremism. I was-not too long ago-in a certain church that was split right down the middle because this young pastor had become so passionate about what he felt was a violation of church principles. And you ll never believe what this was: it was that some of the ladies were not wearing hats. Baker: This is recently, Elder? 10

11 Brown: Oh yes. It wasn t in North America. The church was split right down in two over it! We need to emphasize the message and avoid all of these extremes which are human inventions, our human concepts which we have developed but are not sustainable in Scripture or the Spirit of Prophecy or the church manual, for that matter. Having mentioned the church manual the next point that I think will be very important to our young men is to adhere to the policies of the church. Now, policies should not be a substitute for Scripture, not at all. Scripture is not subject to change; it s eternal, and contains fundamental principles that we are to follow. Policies change, but until there is need for collective change by the collective wisdom of the church we need to stay within the confines of Scripture and the policy provisions established as a church. If we do this we will avoid some of the doctrinal pitfalls that have tripped us up in the past. For example, we take the question of righteousness by faith, that wonderful, redemptive, satisfying message that is intended to unify people, but instead has become one of the most divisive issues in our church. When extremism is allowed in, it is always damaging to the church. Baker: How has the church changed throughout the years? Good changes and bad changes. Brown: (Laughter). I like how you put it the good ones and the bad ones. We have become a more inclusive church. I remember the days Brother Baker, when we were rather exclusive, hard-line, ultra-conservative. And you know, the devil doesn t care whether we are extreme leftist or extreme rightist. He just wants to know that we are extreme. We are to find the middle ground based upon the principles of Scripture. So we were rather rigid, but we have become more inclusive. I remember when we first went to Antigua as kids, the uproar we had when a pastor came there at Christmas time and put up a little Christmas tree in his home for the children. Oh boy! He created the unpardonable sin. That became such an issue and the brethren took it out and they were debating if he was an unfit pastor. I ve seen all of that change. Today there is a more balanced view on such trivial issues. Now we ve got to be careful that we don t take another extreme on that. So, inclusiveness, a more open attitude, and that s good. Number two, I think that formerly-and I have to be careful how I say this-formerly, we gave the wrong impression to people about our attitudes towards law and obedience. To give you a case and point, there was a time when every Adventist church that you entered had a huge chart of the Ten Commandments behind the pulpit. So the parishioners sat and looked at the imposing law all the time. And we emphasized obedience to the commandments. But you know, the more you study the Spirit of Prophecy, the more you examine Scripture, the more you realize that the heart and soul and the primary focus of our message is the life and person of Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ crucified-christ in all his majesty and glory. And I ve seen through the years graduallyand it s very interesting to watch the way things change as time goes by-i ve seen that change and I don t remember for the last so many years finding anything of that type any more. Now, that is good. The focus is where it should be: on Jesus Christ and his righteousness and what he has done for us, and is doing for us, and will do for us. That s the focus. And I m glad to see the church emphasizing that so freely. Now at the same we need to be very careful because I ve seen, Brother Baker, over and over again, we have become so embarrassed by the perception that the world had of us that we have now swung completely to the opposite direction and we are now almost cautious, hesitant, to even talk about obedience and law. You hear so little about that. So there is good and there is 11

12 bad there and I hope that we would stay in the middle of the road and recognize that Christ is the focus of all things. He is the all-and-all. When we love him there will be a natural and spontaneous response of obedience so that the place for law is not as a means for salvation but as a demonstration that Christ has already saved us. Another thing that I think is quite an interesting change is the structure of the church and the missionary outreach of the church. There was a time when the church sent out from North America all of its missionaries and they went abroad. I am a product of the work of the missionaries so I thank God that they ever went. They instituted schools, hospitals, other institutions, and they gave rise to Adventism in hundreds of places. But as time went by some forgot their mission and became known as an elite group which brought some tensions with the local folks-the nationals, as they were called. There were some tensions there, but I m glad to see through the years the changes that have been made. For example, it was in the time of [General Conference President] Robert H. Pearson that the emphasis went out from everywhere of an interchange of people regardless of culture or ethnicity participating in the work of the church and they would go as missionaries to South America to Inter-America, from Inter-America to South America, or from North America to Inter-America, and Inter-America to North America. This interchange made people feel like they were a part of a global mission. Policy-wise, I ve seen some tremendous changes that have been for the good of the church. We are not yet perfect; it s a work in progress and as time goes by and as the complexion of the church changes there will have to be some changes as well to match the situation. So I ve seen doctrinally-from the point of view of policy, from the point of view of ecclesiology, from the point of view of organization and structure-i ve seen a number of changes that have benefited the church but they contain elements that could lead to tensions if we are not very careful. So there is good and there is bad. Baker: What is the Church doing well and what does it need to work on? Brown: The Church is doing well Just yesterday I got documentation from [the] Inter- America [Division], for example, and I felt such gratitude, such thankfulness to God, for what this Church is doing in terms of its evangelistic outreach and global mission. You know in 1982, while attending a fall council in Rio Janeiro, Elder Wilson, who was then president, introduced this matter of global mission and it has taken off and what a blessing it has been because we have seen an enormous impact. Today the church stands at over 15 million members. Three million of those are in Inter-America alone, 2.5 million are in South America, and if you took all the various divisions in Africa today, there are another 5 million there. And so, the church has done some good things in terms of new outreach in global mission, the funding program, the restructuring of its missionary program. There was a time when everybody who went out went out through the General Conference went out for so long. And there was a tension there that some felt, to change that would be the unpardonable sin. But today you have short-term missionaries going out, young people going out, and that s one of the best things that happened to the church, young people going out there with vision. And they get into the boondocks and they look after the needs of people, and that means a great deal. So this new emphasis on mission and the funding for missions, this has really been a great thing the church has done. Another thing that has been really satisfying is the harnessing of technology. When I started the ministry, the most technological you could get was a microphone, and that was it. We had a little tape recorder or something like that. Today we have all of these and more: the 12

13 Internet, CDs, DVDs, PowerPoint. I think of AWR, I think of HOPE Channel, I think of 3ABN. And by the way, that is another element that the church has done right. We have given freedom to organizations that are not an integral part of the organizational structure, but are a vital part of the whole. ASI for example, has a lot of volunteers internationally, and is making a tremendous impact. The more you encourage these outreaches, the better it will be for the church. So I feel wonderfully happy with what I see in terms of its emphasis out there, and we have, of course, enough room to grow still. Baker: Grow in what ways? Brown: I think we need to pay some more attention to the question of-you take for example this matter of leadership-i think we need to pay some more attention to the way the leaders are selected. I have been in our national service for a long time, chairing nominating committees over and over again and we have to be so very careful that we don t allow privilege or ethnicity or provincial considerations, or any of these things to dominate. And too often, we allow some of these things to control our intellect and influence our decision in leadership. If we would emphasize more care in some of these things, and continue to be a little more inclusive as I mentioned earlier, it would do a great deal for the church. Baker: When is Jesus going to come? Brown: What a great question! Well I hope soon. Baker: I thought I wouldn t graduate from college. Brown: Well, tell you what, let me give you a better scenario. I didn t think I would finish college before He came. I didn t think I would marry this wonderful lady that I loved and have children with. Now I have grandchildren, and I have a great-grand just born. So that continues to be the question. But the more I study, the more-i am totally satisfied with this-the more I study, it is not the question of when, but what is important is that I am ready for the event whenever it does occur. The Master just said Occupy till I come, keep on preaching, keep on living, keep on marrying, keep on studying, keep on getting your PhD, keep on doing whatever you have to do, but always bear in mind the imminence of Christ s return. And that is what it is all about: being ready and preparing others to be ready for the event. I don t know when in terms of time but I would say this; and if I may quote Mrs. Billy Graham: If He doesn t come soon then He would have to apologize to Sodom and Gomorrah. The evidence of his soon coming is overwhelming. You see things can t continue as they are: global warming, terrorism, wars, ethnic cleansing, and all these horrible conditions that prevail in our world here. They re not getting better, the situation isn t getting better; it is getting and worse and worse. The more now that we have, the worse we seem to become. And I was just talking to my wife the other day, you know what a great invention the Internet is, great invention. I communicate with Benjamin Baker- Baker: You re very good with that, by the way, very good 13

14 Brown: -in a few seconds, he has it and he replies. I listen to some of the fascinating mission stories today, where from the homeland here, people are in constant communication overseas, help is flowing all over the place, and one of the greatest things that we have done as a church is to harness some of this, and this such a blessing, and yet at the same time it is one most deadly inventions. I mean, what privacy do we have now, what does the future hold in terms of terrorism and the use of the Internet? So you have all of these conditions developing around us which are definite signs that indicate the nearness of Christ s coming. So we know He is coming soon; precisely when we don t know, but the idea is to keep on working, keep on reaching out to others, keep on fulfilling the mission. And I know one thing: He will come on time. Let me give you a piece of personal theology. I am one of those who believe that Christ has a time, that God has a time set, beyond which he will not wait. When that point arrives, he will come regardless of who is ready or who is not ready. I m coming, that s it. And I have to be careful when I say that because some folks will throw at me the statement of Ellen White, We can hasten the return of the Lord. Precisely what she meant by that, I m not altogether sure, except to say that I am confident that in the interest of justice and God s love, that He cannot go beyond a certain point. Baker: You said that the most important thing is being ready. That can be exhausting, it can be tedious, to remain ready. How can a person remain ready? Brown: Well, when we accept Christ, we accept His righteousness. And I like how Ellen White puts it, that when God sees the individual, He doesn t see that individual, but He sees Christ because I am in Him. And I believe that when we accept Jesus Christ and give our lives to Him, we are still imperfect. We have a lot of growing to do still. But that old Paulian statement is relevant, My grace is sufficient, and He gives us day by day what we need. And even though I have not reached that standard of perfection that ultimately I will reach at glorification, I am in the process because I am covered in His righteousness. You know, out here in my yard, I have pomelos, and that fruit from the time it comes out from that flower is a perfect pomelo. It isn t perfectly ripe, but is a perfect pomelo. And I like that illustration because I am in Christ, and as I am, I m covered in His righteousness and He, day by day, builds into my character what I need. I consecrate my life afresh to Him, through prayer, through reflections and Bible study, through renewal of my commitment to Him, pledging my commitments to Him. Living by His grace, I am kept in a condition of readiness. And there is no point, let s settle that, there is no point in my pilgrimage that I can say I am absolutely perfect in terms of freedom of any element of sin, because while I may not be committing sin, my very nature is sinful. So readiness is what Christ does for us when we commit ourselves to Him and continue on a daily basis of growth in His grace, growing in grace and in the knowledge of the Lord and our Savior, Jesus Christ. Baker: Thank you, Elder. This concludes interview one. 14

15 Part 2 Baker: Dr. Brown, in 1990, the Seventh-day Adventist church held its General Conference quinquennial session in Indianapolis, Indiana. It was a crucial time. What sort of issues was the church facing then? Brown: There were a few major issues, one of them being the ordination of women, which was very, very hotly debated. The Annual Council before that was dedicated to a discussion on that issue and representatives from all over the world church from the different divisions were asked to prepare material on that issue so there was a lot of research going on about the subject. Theologians and church leaders on various levels were engaged, so there was an enormous amount of documentation on that subject. Much of the documentation was presented at the General Conference for a final disposition. The fact is that there was so much to say and there was so much passion invested in the issue that the brethren were not able to complete the discussion at that General Conference session, hence it was left for a following session. Baker: Five years later? Brown: Yes, but that was the major, major issue at the time. There was also the question of the restructuring of the world church into more divisions. There were previously eleven divisions. At that time it was restructured to create thirteen divisions. Now some more have been added. Also, a new structure was also being debated at the time and that was known as the union of churches. As you know we have our structure that begins with the local congregation, and then the conference, the union and the General Conference, and as part of the General Conference you have the various divisions which are divisions of the General Conference. But there was no provision made for areas that were not part of a conference; they are a bit isolated, and this was true in Eastern Europe and a few other places. We had some of those territories in our [Inter- American] division as well. And so provision was made at that time to create another, I don t want to call it structure, but to make another provision so that there would be what is known as a union of churches and those churches would be directly answerable to the General Conference rather than being answerable to a local union. That was one of the issues. Another had to do with the Lay Activities Department. Elder Wilson, then GC President, spent a lot of time seeking to restructure those types of departments. Stewardship became an independent department at that time, and the Sabbath School became part of a series of departments rather than being a single department. So the main issues were primarily the ordination of women and restructuring. A bit more on the ordination of women. That issue necessitated the input of the whole world church, because to introduce the ordination of women in one section and not in the other is basically problematic. For example, when a person is ordained in North America to the gospel ministry, he can perform the functions of an ordained minister in any part of the world field, because he is accepted in every part of the world field as part of the body of the church. But if there is no approval from the world field then you have a problem. For example, if a woman is ordained in North America, and she goes to Inter-America or South America or some other division, she would be restricted in the performance of her duty because it [her ordination] is not recognized there. And so the church cannot move forward except there is a consensus-a global consensus-so 15

16 that a minister who is ordained to the gospel ministry functions the same in every place and for that reason it is necessary to have global input. That s why it took so much time. And then of course the structure of the church and the reorganization of the departments. Those are all things that affected the world church and for that reason they had to be discussed. There were some heavy issues on financing as well. As the church grew, there was the feeling that it must, the regions, the various regions, must become more independent, self-sustaining financially and not be dependent upon funds, appropriations, coming from the General Conference. See, previously a lot of the work that went on in the world field was financed by North America, this is the pot of gold here, and millions of dollars would flow from North America to the General Conference to the various workers in forms of appropriations. As the church grows, it must grow not only numerically and spiritually, but it must also become more self-sustained. And so emphasis was made on stewardship in an effort to strengthen the financial base of various fields. Essentially, the General Conference cut back on financial aid to various fields. That was a very important decision because since then we have seen some striking changes in the world field. The Inter-American Division for example, in that very year, was confronted with a cut-back in overseas budgets by the General Conference. Twenty five budgets were cut out. Baker: And you were the [Inter-American Division] president then? Brown: Yes. But we were able, this division, to keep those fifteen budgets alive by putting in our own funds. There were divisions in Africa and a couple of other places that were faced with a real problem because if they didn t get the appropriations from the division they would have no way of financing those budgets, so those missionaries would have to come back home. So these were some big issues: finance, restructure and reorganization, and the question of women s ordination. Incidentally, the issue of women s ordination was finally settled at the General Conference session in Holland when the church as a whole voted not to proceed in that direction. But those were the issues in Indianapolis. Baker: As president of a major division at the time, how did you handle these controversial and potentially incendiary issues? Brown: We had something of an advantage Brother Baker, because Inter-America tended to be conservative on women s ordination, the most incendiary issue. And that membership moves with the church when it makes that decision, but it is very hesitant, and it will only move when the subject has been debated and moved upon in consensus. So there wasn t any great passion at all in our division for that subject, except in some areas. For example, in Puerto Rico, an American territory, and some other movements in a couple of other places felt like cooperating with North America which was the main champion of women s ordination. But we were able to keep it under control, because we made it very clear that this is one universal church and what we do we do together, and if we begin fragmenting ourselves, ultimately, we ll find ourselves so fragmented that we cannot fulfill the mission of the church. And we must not do anything in which there is not consensus. Now there are some things that can be done in one division but not in another but that would not affect the work of the church as a whole. Sometimes we especially have to bear in mind the local and cultural situations, and there are some things we can do in Inter-America and 16