Giving Tuesday: Create Space for Questioning Adventists
My friend Jim Gorney recently died—the day before his 85th birthday.
Jim was an impressive fellow. He had been orphaned and raised by his grandfather. He came from a working family, but pushed himself to go to college, and spent his life happily teaching elementary school. He had lots of interests: an avid golfer, a long-distance runner, and when he retired he took art lessons and learned to be a pretty good painter.
Jim became a Seventh-day Adventist about 60 years ago. As we got better acquainted and he knew he could trust me, he admitted that he’d never felt quite at home in the church. It seemed too legalistic, too hard-edged to him. He had thoughts that didn’t fit, and nowhere to speak them. The things the church told him to do and not to do seemed arbitrary and odd. The stories about the end times didn’t ring true to his observations. He didn’t understand why Adventists didn’t have more friends outside their church like he did, nor why Adventists were so opposed to labor unions—he’d been a lifelong union member, and felt it had done him nothing but good.
I retired from being the pastor of his church about the time that COVID kept many of us at home. So I invited Jim to the Adventist Today Sabbath Seminar. He was already past 80—but it was transformative for him. He was there every week, even when he was in the hospital near the end of his life. He told me repeatedly, “Pastor, this has opened my eyes. I didn’t know there were Seventh-day Adventists like the people here.”
I went to visit him a few weeks before he died. He and his wife JoAnne were very concerned that their regular contribution to Adventist Today should continue.
That is why I do Adventist Today. It is for people like Jim. And for people younger than Jim, who find a place here.
Thank you for supporting Adventist Today today on Giving Tuesday.
Loren Seibold,
Executive Editor, Adventist Today
Image L-R: Jim, JoAnne & Loren