By: Monte Sahlin

Monte Sahlin has worked to understand contemporary trends in our society and to help congregations and faith-based organizations make innovations since he organized ACT while in college at La Sierra University, Riverside, California, in the 1960s. ACT was a student volunteer organization that served in inner city neighborhoods and with suburban teenagers. He is currently chairman of the board for the Center for Creative Ministry, a research organization and resource center helping pastors, congregations and other organizations understand new generations and how to engage with them. He is also chairman of the executive committee of the Center for Metropolitan Ministry, a "think tank" and training organization based on the campus of Columbia Union College in Washington, DC, as well as an adjunct faculty member at the Campolo School for Social Change at Eastern University in Philadelphia and in the DMin program at Andrews University. In addition, he serves on the steering committee of the Cooperative Congregational Studies Partnership, a coalition of researchers from more than 40 denominations and faiths who produce the Faith Community Today (FACT) research. Sahlin is an ordained pastor in the Seventh-day Adventist Church, currently serving as a vice president in the mid-Atlantic region of the denomination. He served for 12 years at the denomination's North American headquarters with responsibilites for church ministries, media projects, social needs and issues, and research and development. He has pastored small and large congregations in major metropolitan areas and Appalachia. He is the author of several books, scores of research studies and hundreds of magazine articles. Currently available are "Ministries of Compassion," "One Minute Witness," "Understanding Your Community," "Trends, Attitudes and Opinions" and "Adventist Congregations Today." In 2005, he coauthored with Harold Lee, "Brad: Visionary, Spiritual Leadership," a history and evaluation of the career of Charles Bradford, the first African American to serve as president of the Seventh-day Adventist Church in North America. Sahlin has worked as director, board chairman or strategic consultant with more than 100 innovative, community-based ministries, church plants and nonprofit organizations over the last four decades. In 1994 he was awarded an Outstanding Public Service Award by the United States government and in 1996 he participated in the Presidents' Summit on Volunteerism as well as the preparatory gathering of 50 representatives of the nonprofit sector at the White House.