Communicating the Adventist Message after the World War I (1918–1922)

Abstract

Communicating the Adventist message has met many challenges, moreover, in times of war. However, Seventh-day Adventist Church, after World War I, had remarkable growth especially outside the North American region even though after the War, the world experienced the Spanish Flu (pandemic, 1918–1919) and economic challenges (especially in the United States from 1918 to 1921). How did this denomination overcome the difficulties? And what were the factors that helped this church to grow? This research finds some significant elements to the successful efforts of evangelism by SDA Church from 1918 to 1922. In addition to these aspects, this article suggests three ways for the church growth amidst these difficulties. The first is to communicate the message through institutional evangelism or systematic evangelism and the other is to exercise temporary training or consistent training. The institutional evangelism and temporary training affected ordinary and temporal growth, but systematic evangelism and consistent training stimulated extraordinary progress. The third is to focus on Jesus Christ in communicating any Adventist message, not on the doctrines themselves.

Keywords

• Adventist message
• World War I
• Spanish flu pandemic
• Media
• Evangelism