5 Years of Advent Christian Voices
Can it really be five years? It is hard to believe that so much time has passed from when I published the first blog post on Advent Christian Voices – “It’s Time to Talk”. From the beginning, the purpose of Advent Christian Voices was to foster dialogue among Advent Christians on issues important to the local church and our denomination as a whole. In my post recognizing our one year anniversary, I recounted the origins of the blog and the immediate impact it had leading up to the 2017 Triennial and the adoption of the Advent Christian Statement of Faith. In many ways, we started off with a bang! The articles were gripping in both their sincerity and relevance to our immediate circumstances and considerations. Advent Christians needed a way to share their voice and we provided a platform – it was a perfect meeting between means and the moment.
The months and years that followed our genesis did not come so easily. After the triennial passed, nothing decisive was before us begging for response. With what spare time I had, I tried to find others who had spare time to write – often pastors with plates that were already very full. Somehow, a few of them found room. While not as apparently seismic as that inaugural year, I think the real vision of Advent Christian Voices began to take form in the years that followed. Advent Christian writers expressed themselves in new and diverse ways - producing content in Biblical Theology, Spiritual Formation, Apologetics, and Church Practices. Our writers also initiated and continued important denominational conversations about conditionalism, egalitarianism and complementarianism, creedalism and Advent Christian identity, and the vitality of our polity and structures.
Early on, ACV began offering some podcast and live video content. A few years in, at a critical time when the energies of the site were flagging, one show in particular had an immense impact in helping us carry on. In 2020, in the early weeks of the pandemic, Erik Reynolds and Luke Copeland started what would become Bible & Banter – a weekly live show that served up discussion about theology, church life and other relevant topics, all with a big dose of fun. The resurgence of energy they brought to the table personally encouraged me as editor to take steps towards growing ACV. We assembled a volunteer board, revised the website, and introduced featured bloggers who would write regularly for the site and maintain their own blog space.
I won’t pretend everything is as I would hope it would be at this point. Our board has not met since it was originally formed, in large part because we have not been able to make progress in registering as a nonprofit organization. While Advent Christian Voices will never be Christianity Today, we do have room to grow in the Advent Christian sphere and possibly even beyond that. To reach more people, we need funding. It is my hope that in the year ahead we will open that possibility.
I am moved to see ACV grow beyond its current capacity because I see the impact it has already had. In the past five years, over 30,000 unique visitors have been to our website. These are visitors who have visited our site at least once and some again and again. Some of our articles clearly gain interest beyond our small circle. In the past five years, our top article belongs to Devin Nicely, gaining 3,062 views – “Did Jesus ‘Hang Out’ with Sinners?”. Likewise, I am aware that other articles specifically relevant to Advent Christians, while not reaching sky-high numbers, have nonetheless prompted concrete dialogue among denominational leaders
In that first article I wrote five years ago, I called on Advent Christians to bring their voices to the table, to begin to define both the present and future of the Advent Christian church. Not too long ago, I was made aware of one instance which clearly captures the impact of our voices. Known for cataloguing various denominations, the popular religious YouTuber “Ready To Harvest” gives a breakdown of our denomination in the video – “What is the Advent Christian Church?” In that video, he repeatedly refers to articles found on Advent Christian Voices. While he could find historical descriptions of Advent Christians elsewhere and locate our official statements and beliefs on the ACGC website, the most prominent place he was able to find the present-day voice of Advent Christians was on ACV.
You can be a part of expressing who we are today. I hope you read, share, and comment, but I especially hope some of you will take the time to write and submit articles. In the busyness of our lives and ministries, it can often feel like a bridge too far, maybe even a pointless effort. However, just consider this: would you feel it was a pointless effort if you got to speak in front of an audience of fifty people about something you are passionate about? I suspect most would think that was time well spent. And what if you got to speak to 100, or 150, or even 3,000 like Devin? Most of us would jump at the opportunity. Alone, as individuals, we each have a limited audience. Together, we can reach Advent Christians across the world, other Christian brothers and sisters, and even those who are just beginning to seek Jesus. Praise God for what he has done through Advent Christian Vocies in these 5 years past; pray that he will do far more in the next five years to come.
