Guestspeaker John Sanches delivers an inspiring message.
On Sabbath the 8th of October the spiritual congress for all Dutch-speaking Adventists was organised in Hasselt. Adventists travelled from all over the country to the cultural centre in Hasselt. The church of Hasselt welcomed everyone, after which the children and youth had their own programme during the day and adults could sit down in the theatre hall. After a welcome by the president, Jeroen Tuinstra, the theme “Samen Kerk, Samen Sterk (Together Church, Together Strong)” was further explorered through a varied programme of sketches, mime, singing, Bible texts and expositions. The whole morning part took 1,5 hours and emphasised that being church together is not easy. Through various Bible texts the audience was shown that being church together doesn’t mean being exactly the same.
Symbolically, during the morning programme, a wall was built in two different manners. One half was very precise, where only correct and well fitting stones were allowed to be used, the other half every little stone was allowed to contribute, even the not so perfect and beautiful stones. Both build a wall, and when both walls were put together a figure of a church emerged. It showed very nicely how we in the Adventist church can build up our faith community in different ways, but in the end we all need each other to form the church. Symbolically the cross was added finally to show that without Christ our church is not a church.
This very creative and original part was orignally planned to be presented by Johan Delameillieure, also the writer of the piece, but because of sickness Nadine Van Parijs from Brugge church had to jump in at the last moment. This she did in a very professional and inspiring way.
Presentation of the youth departement, with Jeroen Tuinstra and Philippe Leduc.
The morning ended with a serom by guest speaker John Sanches. As clinical psyhologist, Sanches helps people who encounter the justice department in England and need help. Before that he worked as a consultant for family ministries at the Trans-European Division and as youth director in the Netherlands Union Conference. During his sermon he explored the theological meaning of being church together. He also emphasised that the Bible stresses diversity and not uniformity. And stressed that the Bible emphasised equality. Being church together in Christ, means that you can no longer discriminate nor hold certain groups back.
The afternoon was dedicated to the more practical side of being church together. Presented by Jeroen Tuinstra the audience was taken on a journey through all different type of activities the church does together. Through live interviews, videos and presentations, the oldest Flemish Adventists alive were presented, the new ADRA-Belgium director, Jonathan Lo Buglio was introduced, students at Collonges Adventist University presented themselves and the youth department made an appearance. It was clear the church in Belgium is not sitting still and the church indeed stands stronger together.
During the whole day, Guido Delameillieure presented his creative interpretation of Together Church, Together Strong. Through drawings, which were drawn and projected live on a seperate screen, people were encouraged to reflect on the subject.
From the morning onward the children till 10 years old had their own programme, under the skilled leadership of Linda Voerman-Wooning and her team. The youth from 11 years onwards, under leadership of Philippe Leduc, the youth director of the conference, spent the whole day outside as they had to navigate in various ways through the city of Hasselt, with Biblical questions.
One of the inspiring drawings of Guido Delameillieure.
At the end of the congress the organisation received many positive comments. Even people, who hadn’t attended congresses for a long time, were pleasantly surprised with the creative and special content of the congress.
The conference has decided this year to have three separate spiritual congresses. During the springtime the international spiritual congress was organised for the non-Dutch and non-French speaking Adventists. On the 22nd of October there will a French-speaking congress in Liège. As these congresses are expensive to organise, this will be a one-off. The seperated congresses were organised after many requests from members to have a congress without the need of translation.