NAD President Black History Month Message 2022 from NAD Adventist on Vimeo.

Greetings for each of you from the North American Division family!*

My name is G. Alexander Bryant. I serve as the president of the North American Division of Seventh-day Adventists. Here we are again in February to celebrate Black History Month 2022. This month was designed to get to know more about a people group who were brought here as slaves against their will. This month was intended [for us] to learn more about their history, which is really my history — their triumphs, and their victories; their tragedies, and their successes; their joys, and their sorrows.

In a world that is growing more fractured and torn every day, Black History Month is a time to hit the pause button, and really try to get to know each other better. To get to know each other more. Black History Month gives us another opportunity to listen to each other, and to embrace a story of a people that have been resilient and determined.

My encouragement to you is to take at least one of the days in the month of February to sit down and share a meal — that doesn't have to be a fancy meal — with a black person or someone who is not like you, and have a conversation to get to know them better. And as we learn [about] the beauty that God has given his people, black people and brown people and white people and yellow people and all people, I believe that understanding will cause us to embrace the beauty in all people and cause us to love people as God loves them. For the Bible says, "And by this love shall all men know that you are my disciples [sic, John 13:15]."

May God bless us as we get to know each other more, and get to love each other as God loves us

* For clarity, minor edits have been made to this transcript.