For at least a few more days, anyway, I’m a “twentysomething,” which is to say my conscious experience of the Adventist church is more or less limited to the past 15 years. To my mind, they have been difficult years for the church because they brought fiscal, doctrinal and administrative crises, not to mention more subtle (and therefore more pernicious) crises of meaning. Certainly, my view of the church is affected by all of this.

Yet when I gaze at the church through the eyes of David Bieber—eyes that have watched it for seventy-some years—I feel myself getting caught up in Bieber’s confidence about its future. And apparently, seniors like him are not alone in feeling optimistic about the church.

At the other end of the age spectrum is Mia Roberts, a second grader at Mesa Grande Academy in Calimesa, California. Mia drew the joyous picture on our cover when her teacher asked her class, ‘What does your church mean to you?” I especially like how the word “Mia” and an arrow clearly identify one of the figures in the picture as the artist herself. Someone young is eager to claim the church as her own!

I wish that were the case with everyone. But between the seniors and children are five other age groups, and they don’t all look at the church the same way. Just as seeing the church through Bieber’s eyes is helpful to me, I also benefit from hearing some of the more disturbing views featured in this issue.

Deborah Vance first provides an overview of the intergenerational church and then focuses on young adults. Teens Kelly Orr and Erin Reid voice some of their fears and frustrations with the church, while Donna Evans tells what she sees from her vantage point as a teacher of teens. Steve Case and Delwin Finch are both members of that rare species Youth Ministry Professional. They rightly call on the church to show that it values its youth. Fellow twentysomething Joel Sandefur cogitates on a possibly over-moralized Adventist universe, while Gary Russell puts in a plug for still-socially-conscious baby boomers. Finally, member-of-the-establishment Gary Patterson takes a shot (no pun intended) at uncovering the roots of our present church structure.

At least one common thread runs through other articles in this issue. In his “Perspective” piece, Smuts van Rooyen asserts that a church stands glistening in the sunlight when it proclaims the kingdom of God. Likewise, in his new book A Remnant in Crisis, Jack Provonsha holds that we live in a time when we can clearly see the true natures of both the kingdom of God and the kingdom of Satan. As if to illustrate Provonsha’s point, Ray Cottrell writes of a recent child abuse case. And finally, Adrian Zytkoskee, Adventist Health System administrator, urges Adventist medical institutions to follow Christ’s teachings and example, rather than strive to be “unique” in the changing climate of health care.

These people see the health of our church as somehow contingent upon our proclamation of God’s kingdom. So when I think of what Jesus said about that kingdom and children, I wonder, could it be that Mia and her peers have something to teach us about our church? Something to think about.

Twentysomething and holding.