Northern New England Conference President Denies Rumor Ron Kelly Considered for Executive Secretary
27 June 2025 |
In a recent Northern New England Conference of Seventh-day Adventists (NNEC) town hall meeting, president Gary Blanchard denied a rumor that Ron Kelly, fired pastor of the Berrien Springs Village Church, had been considered to be the conference’s executive secretary.
Anybody heard of Spectrum magazine? I have gotten lots of phone calls and lots of emails from people having questions, and I just want to tell you from the bottom of my heart that we have respect for people—they can write whatever they want to—we live in America, am I right, people?—and have the right to write whatever they want to. But no, Ron Kelly is not going to be our executive secretary for the Northern New England Conference.
Blanchard expresses admiration for Kelly:
I like Pastor Ron Kelly very, very much, and we’d be honored to have him here, but you know what? He has a ministry God has called him to in Berrien Springs. And he’s gotten lots of calls to lots of different places, and he’s decided he’s going to go there and do the ministry there, and we’re happy for him, and we’re going to be praying for him.
Blanchard implies that the search for an executive secretary hasn’t yet begun:
We’re going to be gathering applications and résumés. Here’s the process: the first thing that’s going to happen is me and Daniel and Brad will sit down with résumés. We’ll go through them to find out which would fit with our vision. We’re looking for people who have calling. character, and competency….
Blanchard responded with some pride to author Stanton Witherspoon’s characterization of NNEC as “the most ideologically extreme in the North American Division,”
The magazine calls us all extremists—I don’t know if you saw that. And I’m not sure if that’s a bad thing because there’s a lot of quotes in the Spirit of Prophecy that talk about that kind of thing…. Ellen White says [that] when we reach the standard that the Lord would have for us for us to reach, worldlings will regard Seventh-day Adventists as odd, singular, straight-laced extremists—we are made a spectacle unto the world and to angels and to men. So I hope that clears it up for you.
He adds that the NNEC has a booklet that defines the conference’s vision for Northern New England called “Revival in the East,” which can be downloaded from the conference website.
