Angela Ramirez of the  Dominican Republic

Ephim Brudskyy

Apostle Rick Maupin

Nanette Chun-Ming Ward

Urbain Mbenga of Congo

Carlos de Carvalho (left) of Brazil and Francisco Trevino of Houston, Texas

Council Examines Standards of Conduct

The bridge builders went to work in late April at International Headquarters in Independence, Missouri, USA.
They didn’t build with stone, steel, and concrete. Instead they used scripture, the Enduring Principles, and the recently released We Share: Identity, Mission, Message, and Beliefs.

The builders, the Expanded World Church Leadership Council, sought to lay the foundations for bridges to span cultural chasms while building community through service to Jesus Christ. Their task was daunting: Move the church forward in discussions on appropriate standards of conduct.

The weeklong exercise focused on church tenets. Leaders challenged the builders to stretch their minds, consider others’ viewpoints, and remember the mission of the church.

“We’re looking at a two-part experience,” President Dave Schaal said. “On this part we wanted to start the conversation and learn how this question of standards of conduct is understood around the world. When we come back together in September, we’ll be more specific in asking, ‘What is the way ahead on this issue?’”

The April event stemmed, in part, from a 2007 World Conference resolution. It resolved that “the church’s standards of personal conduct be applied around the world in culturally appropriate ways under the guidance of administrative officers and with the support and approval of the members of the Twelve….”

No easy task for a church that has members in more than fifty countries with widely divergent and sometimes-conflicting cultural norms.

Yet, that precise diversity became a point of unity during the week-long session. Roughly fifty people from more than a dozen countries and ethnic groups attended. They worked hard to embrace diversity and consider the viewpoints of others.

• Amanda Hernandez of Mexico: “The best way to resolve this is to respect one another and the worth of all persons, and to have trust. They provide perspectives I never imagined could exist.”

• Dale Luffman, apostle to the West Central USA Mission Field: “To stand in another’s shoes is not to fully understand, but it does provide perspective.”

• Carlos Enrique Mejia, apostle to the Central and South America Field: “We will have to put aside our own way of thinking and perhaps our own culture…because we all have the responsibility of including our brothers and sisters who aren’t here.”

• Keith Russell, Native American Ministries specialist: “The bottom line is, be nice to each other and don’t cause each other problems.”

• Gwendolyn Hawks-Blue, a Standing High Council member from Kansas City: “Everyone who is part of a culture doesn’t think like everyone else in the culture. Are your own actions in alignment with Jesus Christ?”

Participants also emphasized the empowerment that came through the group’s diversity.

“We have a voice,” said Francisco Trevino, who eight years ago moved from Mexico and now pastors a congregation in Houston, Texas, USA. “Whatever consequences come out aren’t so important, but we were here, and somebody will hear.”

Ephim Brudskyy, a ministry coordinator from Ukraine, told what it meant to have somebody from his nation present. “It’s tremendously important. Diversity in unity at the same time is a joy and difficulty.”

And Tonah Assoi, the Ivory Coast-Liberia Mission Center president, explained how people back home would benefit from his involvement. “My presence here is to modestly speak for those who couldn’t come…. I’m here to share points of view, hopes, expectations, and concerns. So it’s really important I’m here.”
Nanette Chun-Ming Ward of Ashland, Missouri, USA, called the event ground-breaking. “For me it’s foundational to keep moving forward in a way that represents and is able to include the many places where the church exists. Ethnic and international representation …has changed everything. The authority comes in the fact that we have many voices and many perspectives.”

Building consensus with those many voices and perspectives is hard. But President Schaal, while acknowledging a “healthy tension,” emphasized the work’s importance by speaking of an increasingly mobile world.

“On one hand we honor the uniqueness of cultures in church. On the other hand, just because something is acceptable in culture doesn’t make it good or right when pressed against the gospel of Jesus Christ. That’s what makes this so challenging.”

—Greg Clark reporting