2,000 Adventist Couples Renew Wedding Vows Jamaican couples get a crash course on how to improve their marriages.

 

 Northern Caribbean University president Trevor Gardner preparing to kiss his wife, Patricia, at a marriage conference on Feb. 7, 2015. Photo: Nigel Coke

A record 2,000 Seventh-day Adventist couples from across Jamaica renewed their marital vows at a gathering where they learned that the keys to a successful marriage are humility and the full surrender of self to God.

Willie and Elaine Oliver, directors the Family Ministries department of the Adventist world church, speaking at the “Journey Toward Intimacy” conference. Photo: Nigel Coke

The couples, young and old, waited in long lines at Northern Caribbean University in Mandeville, Jamaica, to gain free entrance to the couples’ conference, which is held once every five years and was organized by the Jamaica Union Conference.


“What was accomplished here today, where nearly 2,000 couples participated in this convention, is a statement to our nation that this church still believes that marriage is to be between a man and a woman as God intended it to be,” union treasurer Bancroft Barwise told the crowd as the Feb. 7 event wrapped up.

 
Fewer couples are tying the knot every year in Jamaica even as the divorce rate has grown from 11 percent in 2010 to 13 percent in 2013, according to the latest figures available from the Statistical Institute of Jamaica.

The most important path to an improved marriage is for the couple to be kind and loving, humble and forgiving, said the presenters, Willie and Elaine Oliver, who have been married for more than 30 years.

“The most critical ingredient is surrender: surrender to God and self,” said Elaine Oliver, who with her husband co-directs the Family Ministries department of the Adventist world church.
“Marriage is hard,” she said. “It’s hard work, and if I can focus on the other person more than I focus on myself — which is totally counter-cultural because we live in an individualistic world — then we can have a happy marriage.”

Willie Oliver underscored the necessity of humility.
“When we are humble, we will recognize that we have made a mistake and it’s OK to ask for forgiveness and apologize,” he said. “But persons might be just too proud to say, ‘I am sorry,’ and as the wise man Solomon said, ‘Pride goes before a fall.’ So if we want to stay strong in marriage, we have to be humble.”

Each couple received a 21-page workbook, “Journey Toward Intimacy,” written by the Olivers and packed with practical marital information from the Bible and the writings of Adventist Church co-founder Ellen G. White.

Among the questions is ”What did Jesus say about commitment in marriage?” The answer offered in the workbook is drawn from Matt. 19:3-6: “The Pharisees also came to Him, testing Him, and saying to Him, ‘Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife for just any reason?’And He answered and said to them, ‘Have you not read that He who made them at the beginning “made them male and female,”and said, “For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh”? So then, they are no longer two but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let not man separate.’”

In a section on committing to intimacy, the workbook quotes Ellen White’s Happiness Homemade, p. 24: “Determine to be all that is possible to be to each other. Continue the early attentions. In every way encourage each other in fighting the battles of life. … Let there be mutual love, mutual forbearance. Then marriage, instead of being the end of love, will be as it were the very beginning of love.”

The couples were given five- to 10-minute breaks during the conference to discuss their marriages and then list ways to enhance their relationships.
Five couples, one from each of the five Adventist conferences in Jamaica, were randomly selected and given a prize of a weekend for two at a resort.

Attendees Errol and Valerie Vaz, who have been married for 35 years, said they had filled in the workbook and looked forward to putting their new ideas into practice.
“There some areas that were discussed today that we need to brush up on, and we have made our list as to how we are going to address them,” Errol Vaz said.

Some 2,000 couples packing the gymnasium at Northern Caribbean University in Mandeville, Jamaica, for the conference. Photo: Nigel Coke

Adventist University Goes Hi-Tech, Winning Praise From Rwanda’s Premier

The Adventist University of Central Africa opens a state-of-the-art facility where smartboards replace chalkboards.

Rwanda’s prime minister cut the ribbon at the grand opening of a state-of-the-art facility that is expected to turn the Adventist University of Central Africa into a leading provider of IT and communication specialists for the region.

The inauguration of the Science and Technology Center, one of two major Adventist-owned buildings that were opened in Rwanda this week, marks the transformation of the university from a run-down place where students were ashamed to be seen into a top-flight school.


Prime Minister Anastase Murekesi, who toured the campus with a delegation that included Adventist Church leader Ted N.C. Wilson, thanked Wilson on Wednesday for making good on a promise in 2012 to support health and education in Rwanda.


Wilson in turn thanked Murekesi for fulfilling a government pledge to construct a 1 mile (2-kilometer) paved road to the campus’ entrance.
“Three years ago when breaking the ground for the building of this center, Pastor Ted Wilson left me with a promise of a church vision to support health and education in Rwanda,” Murekesi said. “On our part as the Rwandan government, we pledged to build a road. … Both promises have been kept. This is therefore an excellent partnership, and I look forward to many more years of fruitful collaboration.”

The university, formerly located in Mudende in western Rwanda, was destroyed by the 1994 genocide. It reopened in Gishushu, along the main road between the country’s main airport and the capital, Kigali, but offered sparse classroom space in old buildings until construction work started in earnest in 2012.

“It was like a slum,” university rector Abel Ngabo Sebahahashya said at the ceremony Wednesday.
He said students used to sneak on and off the campus with “a sense of humiliation and frustration,” hoping that no one saw them.

The campus is no longer “a kindergarten project but a world-class project,” said university chancellor Blasious Ruguri, who also serves as president of the Adventist Church’s East-Central Africa Division.

The Science and Technology Center has 24 classrooms that seat 40 to 60 students each. Photo: Claude Richli

24 Classrooms With Smartboards

The new building contains 24 classrooms that can accommodate 40 to 60 students. Each classroom boasts a smartboard, replacing chalk or a felt tip pen with a fully networked, digitally responsive whiteboard that facilitates presentations and the instant archiving of lecture notes. The center’s computer labs are equipped with state-of-the-art networked technology that allows students to study with teachers onsite or remotely.

The university, which has about 4,000 students, is working to make all of its teaching materials available digitally. Even the library will be fully digitized, with e-books to students’ computers.
The university also broke ground on Wednesday on a new guesthouse and dormitories. The rector said a school of medicine would open in 2016, the first in Rwanda and Central Africa.


The university’s expansion comes at a key time for the Rwandan government, which has vowed “to transform itself from a low-income agriculture-based economy to a knowledge-based, service-oriented economy with a middle-income country status by 2020,” according to a country report by the World Bank.


Before the prime minister left the campus, Wilson prayed for him and his family, Rwanda’s president, and the government. Wilson claimed a Bible promise regarding wisdom for the prime minister: “If any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to you” (James 1:5).

Prime Minister Anastase Murekesi, center, touring a computer lab in the new facility. University chancellor Blasious Ruguri is standing in the foreground to the left. Photo: Claude Richli

Mission Headquarters Opened

In a separate ceremony Tuesday, Wilson oversaw the opening of an eight-story headquarters for the Rwanda Union Mission. The mission had been operating in a modest building since its establishment in 1984, but the local church is quickly growing and Kigali has rapidly transformed into a regional center.


Rwanda is one of the Adventist Church’s fastest growing regions, with an average growth rate of 7 percent a year, and it has nearly 700,000 members.
The new headquarters offers spacious suites for church offices and for rent, and a stunning view of Kigali from its terrace at the top.


The headquarters and the new university center cost a combined 5 billion Rwandan francs ($7.2 million), church leaders said.


Wilson said in a speech that the new buildings were magnificent, but Adventists should not be blinded to the fact that they are tools to exercise a strong spiritual influence throughout the country and to help prepare Rwandans for the coming of Jesus.


In an acknowledgement of the humble beginnings of the work in Rwanda, Wilson and Hesron Byilingiro, president of the church in Rwanda, unveiled a plaque in front of the building to commemorate the legacy of Henri Monnier, the Swiss missionary who brought the Adventist message to Rwanda in 1923 and was the first to translate the Bible into the local Kinyarwanda language.

Dr Ted Wilson AWASILI JUBA,SUDAN YA KUSINI AKITOKEA NCHINI TANZANIA.

Kiongozi wa Kanisa la Waadventista Wa Sabato Duniani Dr Ted Wilson amewasili Juba,Sudan ya Kusini akitokea nchini Tanzania baada ya kushiriki kwenye sherehe za utume wa kanisa hilo(Mission Extravaganza) zilizofanyika kwa juma zima toka februari mosi mwaka huu na kuhitimishwa kwenye uwanja wa Taifa kuanzia Februari 4 hadi 7,mwaka huu.

 Ted akiwa nchini Tanzania aliongoza ibada ya siku ya Sabato ambapo alihutubia waumini wa kanisa hilo wapatao 50,000 wanaounda Divisheni ya Afrika Mashariki na Kati yenye nchi 11,huku ukihudhuriwa na Makamu wa Rais Dr Mohamed Gharib Bilal ambaye alizindua mkutano huo akiwataka waumini hao kuombea taifa la Tanzania kudumisha amani,upendo na mshikamano.

 Mkutano huo ambao pia ulihudhuriwa na viongozi wandamizi wa Kanisa la Waadventista Wa Sabato toka yalipo makao makuu yake huko Washngton DC,Marekani ulishuhudia Waziri wa Mambo ya nje na Ushirikiano wa Kimataifa Bernad Membe akiufunga kwa kulipongeza na kulitaka kanisa hilo kutojiingiza katika migogoro ya aina yoyote. Ted Wilson akiwa ameambatana na viongozi wengine wa Divisheni ya Afrika Mashariki na Kati aliwasili Juba na kupokelewa na viongozi mbalimbali wa kanisa hilo nchini humo ikiwa ni mara ya kwanza kwa kiongozi huyo kutembelea nchini hiyo toka ilipojitenga na Sudani julai 9,2011.

The First of Sciences

A knowledge of true science is power, and it is the purpose of God that this knowledge shall
be taught in our schools as a preparation for the work that is to precede the closing scenes of this
earth's history. The truth is to be carried to the remotest bounds of earth, through agents trained
for the work.


But while the knowledge of science is power, the knowledge that Jesus came in person to
impart is still greater power. The science of salvation is the most important science to be learned
in the preparatory school of earth. The wisdom of Solomon is desirable, but the wisdom of Christ
is far more desirable and more essential.

We cannot reach Christ through a mere intellectual
training; but through Him we can reach the highest round of the ladder of intellectual greatness.
While the pursuit of knowledge in art, in literature, and in trades should not be discouraged, the
student should first secure an experimental knowledge of God and His will.



The opportunity of learning the science of salvation is placed within the reach of all. By
abiding in Christ, by doing His will, by exercising simple faith in His word, even those unlearned
in the wisdom of the world may have this knowledge. To the humble, trusting soul the Lord
reveals that all true knowledge leads heavenward.

Ellen.G.White Counsels to Parents, Teachers, and Students chap2,pg20

MIKUTANO MIKUBWA YA UTUME ILIYOKUWA IKIFANYIKA KATIKA UWANJA WA TAIFA IMEFIKIA TAMATI JANA.

Ni kweli na ajabu ya aina yake MUNGU aliweza kuifanikisha mikutano hii nayo iliweza kumalizika SALAMA kwa maana kwa upendo wa ajabu alileta WINGU ambalo liliweza kuzuia JUA na JOTO kali lisiweze kuumiza watu wake na kufanya hali ya hewa kuwa SHWARI na MIBARAKA iliwafikia WOTE kama alivyokusudia na katika mikutano hii WATU WALIOBATIZWA walikuwa ELFU MBILI MIANNE NA TISA (2409) jina la BWANA lipewe SIFA.

 kwa kadiri jinsi  muda  ulivyozidi  kuwa  unasonga  mbele  idadi  ya  watu  waliokuja  kufata  mibaraka  toka  kwa MUUMBAJI  wao   alikuwa ikiongeza  maradufu

Kwamwe  WAADVENTISTA  hata  wakuja  kuisahau  idara  ya  watoto  na  kwetu  watoto  wana  nafasi  kubwa  sana  maana  wao wakulelewa na  kupewa  maadili  MEMA  wanaweza  kuwa  changu  ya  maendeleo  na  mafanikio  ya   JAMII yoyote  katika  ulimwengu  huu  tazama  hapa ni  watoto  kutoka  katika  shule inayofundisha  na  kuzingatia  MISINGI  ya  elimu ya  KISABATO toka  HERITAGE

Na  hawa  ni  watoto  walio  katika  chama  cha  watafta  njia  chama   hiki  kina  wanafundisha  mambo  mengi  sana kama  afya ya miili yao,masomo  ya wanyama, bila kusahau elimu ya  BIBLIA na  kuwafanya  wawe na elimu  bora  na  nidhamu  tele

God Desires to Bestow the Gift of the Holy Spirit

When a special effort is put forth by laborers of experience in a community where our own people live, there rests upon the believers in that field a most solemn obligation to do all in their power to open the way for the Lord to work. They should search their hearts prayerfully, and clear the King's highway by putting away every sin that would hinder them from co-operating with God and with their brethren

In visions of the night, representations passed before me of a great reformatory movement among God's people. Many were praising God.

The sick were healed, and other miracles were wrought. A spirit of intercession was seen, even as was manifested before the great Day of Pentecost. Hundreds and thousands were seen visiting families and opening before them the word of God. Hearts were convicted by the power of the Holy Spirit, and a spirit of genuine conversion was manifest. On every side doors were thrown open to the proclamation of the truth.

The world seemed to be lightened with the heavenly influence. Great blessings were received by the true and humble people of God. I heard voices of thanksgiving and praise, and there seemed to be a reformation such as we witnessed in 1844.

God desires to refresh His people by the gift of the Holy Spirit, baptizing them anew in His love. There is no need for a dearth of the Spirit in the church. After Christ's ascension the Holy Spirit came upon the waiting, praying, believing disciples with a fullness and power that reached every heart. In the future the earth is to be lightened with the glory of God.

 A holy influence is to go forth to the world from those who are sanctified through the truth. The earth is to be encircled with an atmosphere of grace. The Holy Spirit is to work on human hearts, taking the things of God and showing them to men.

The Lord is willing to do a great work for all who truly believe in Him. If the lay members of the church will arouse to do the work that they can do, going on a warfare at their own charges, each seeing how much he can accomplish in winning souls to Jesus, we shall see many leaving the ranks of Satan to stand under the banner of Christ.

If our people will act upon the light that is given in these few words of instruction, we shall surely see of the salvation of God. Wonderful revivals will follow. Sinners will be converted, and many souls will be added to the church. When we bring our hearts into unity with Christ, and our lives into harmony with His work, the Spirit that fell on the disciples on the Day of Pentecost will fall on us.

SIRI YA MTINDO WA MAISHA ULETAO AFYA

Watafiti wanaoishi katika kipindi hiki tulicho nacho wamejitahidi sana kuithibitisha ile kweli iliyothibitishwa kwanza na Biblia kwa kutoa maelezo haya:

Wanadamu ni viumbe kamili Mara nyingi kile tunachokigawa katika sehemu za kimwili, kiakili, na kiroho ni sehemu za mtu zilizo na uwiano unaoingiliana, wala hazitenganishiki kwa maneno mengine, kinachoidhuru akili, kinaudhuru mwili.

Hali yetu ya kiroho ina shinikizo lake juu ya hali yetu ya kimwili, na kinyume chake. Sisi ni watu kamili.

Kwa mfano watafiti wa kisayansi katika uchunguzi wao uliodhibitiwa wamegundua kwamba kicheko kile kitokanacho na furaha na shangwe huleta mabadiliko yanayoweza kupimwa katika mfumo wa kinga mwilini mwa mtu unaweza kabisa kuusaidia mwili wako kupigana na ugonjwa kwa vizuri zaidi ukiwa na furaha uchunguzi huo huonyesha jinsi akili na mwili vinavyofanya kazi yao kwa pamoja kwa ushirikiano wa karibu sana.

Katika maelfu ya miaka iliyopita Neno la Mungu lilidokeza kuwapo kwa uhusiano huo wenye nguvu kati ya akili na mwili ambao ni hivi karibuni tu umekubaliwa na kuingizwa katika nadharia ya kiganga:
"Moyo uliochangamka ni dawa nzuri, bali roho iliyopondeka huikausha mifupa" - (Mithali 17:22)