Where We Worship
More than just the soul
By Zeniada Serrano Espanol
Advertiser Staff Writer
• Name of the church: Kailua Seventh-day Adventist Church
Jeff Widener • The Honolulu Advertiser
• Our affiliation: Seventh-day Adventist, based in Washington, D.C.
Rob Lloyd is the pastor of Kailua Seventh-day Adventist Church.
• Where we are: 160 Mo'okua St., Kailua
• Our numbers: About 150 members attend weekly services.
• Our pastor: Rob Lloyd
• What we believe: The printed mission statement reads: "The Kailua Seventh-day Adventist Church exists to glorify God, be filled with His Spirit, and hasten the return of Jesus Christ. We recognize all people as children of God, and we practice inclusive worship, teaching and fellowship.ÊWe uplift the grace of Jesus Christ, the seventh-day Sabbath, and the living Work of God in the Old and New Testaments.ÊWe pursue a dynamic, growing fellowship of believers, serving the community and the world, in all things showing forth the praises of Him who called us from darkness into light."
The name of the church highlights two important features of the faith, Lloyd said.
"We believe in the second coming of Jesus, and secondly, that the way to happiness is through obedience to the will of God, and that is succinctly described in the Ten Commandments, one of which is the fourth, which talks about remembering to keep the sabbath holy," Lloyd said.
Followers believe the sabbath is on the seventh day of the week, or Saturday, which is why members gather to worship on Saturdays.
Members also "have a holistic understanding of the human person rather than a dualistic one, which most of Christianity has adopted," Lloyd said. Typical Christian thought is that a person has a body and a soul, which are two separate, distinct things, Lloyd said. "Our understanding is that we are body and soul, together, one entity."
Jeff Widener • The Honolulu Advertiser
• Our history: Kailua Seventh-day Adventist Church and Windward Adventist School, on the grounds of the church, were both organized in August 1945. Both the church and the school, then known as Kailua Mission School, operated out of a two-story summer home on the site of the current church and school facilities.
The church, built in the 1950s, is undergoing a $1 million renovation.
At the end of World War II, a Quonset Hut and military barracks were donated, and used by the church and school, respectively. The church sanctuary was built in the early 1950s, and the school building in the late 1950s. Since then, both have undergone several renovations. Windward Adventist School serves about 60 children in kindergarten through eighth grade.
• What we're excited about: The church is being renovated — a $1 million project for about the past three years. Members hope to have an open house by late spring.
• What's special about us: The members' holistic beliefs "means that because we are a whole person, we're not just interested, for example, in 'saving your soul,' " Lloyd said. "Relationships are important, diet, health, exercise are important, in the sense that God gave us a body and so we are stewards of this," he said.
Therefore, Seventh-day Adventists do a lot in the area of health education and health promotion. Castle Medical Center, an Adventist hospital, sponsors "a plethora" of health programs, Lloyd said, covering topics such as smoking cessation, grief recovery and vegetarian cooking.
"Another implication of our holistic thinking is, a person's mind is something to be cherished," Lloyd said. "We (the Seventh-day Adventist Church) operate the largest Protestant parochial school system in the world." There are more than 1 million students enrolled in 5,846 Adventist schools worldwide, he said.
Kailua Seventh-day Adventist also has an evangelistic outreach to other parts of the world. Lloyd did missionary work in October for three weeks in a Venezuelan village, and in May and June he plans to do more work in Kenya.
• Contact: 261-1560 or visit hc.adventist.org/windward/index.html
