Five years ago, we participated in the first Growing Young cohort, eager to learn how to help the Seventh-day Adventist Church become the best place for young people to grow. We’ve experimented in the margin, presented the six commitments all over the world, and helped publish a Spanish translation of the book, Creciendo Juntos.
We’ve faltered, and grew. We encountered a worldwide pandemic, and grew. We’ve experienced first hand that change involves loss and that is hard for anyone, including our church members. Yet, we’ve experienced growth all along the journey.
Marking a half decade of answered prayers, diligent focused leadership, and miraculous growth, let’s take a moment and reflect on this milestone and peek at what is on the near horizon.
• Collaborations between local churches, ministry departments, conferences, unions, and divisions are opening up new opportunities for inter-agency relationships.
• A new Doctor of Ministry cohort, Interegenerational Church, has launched through the Seventh-day Adventist Theological Seminary.
• To date 350 local Adventist churches have participated in a cohort journey.
• The 2022 Growing Together Cohort is the first Adventist-led endeavor partnering North Pacific and Southwestern Union to provide the entire North American Division with a fully digital training experience.
• Growing Together Podcast as well as various other media programs and video casts have been produced to share Growing Young Adventists broadly on the digital landscape.
• Plans are being laid for a Spanish language primary Creciendo Juntos Grupo in 2024.
In conversations with church members and administrators alike, imagineering across unions, collaborating across divisions — the opportunities for church revitalization, church growth, and church vitality continue to expand.
It is our intent, in the remainder of this decade, to see Growing Young Adventists become as recognized and staple to our faith family as “Pathfinders” or “Happy Sabbath.” Our desire is for Seventh-day Adventists to be known as the faith family where all generations are thriving and growing . . . together.
Growing Together 