“...Prepare a People to meet God...”

This is the commission given to our Publishing houses and the motto of our Literature Evangelists.

What is a Literature Evangelist?

A Literature Evangelist is sometimes called a colporteur or canvasser. Colporteur merely means "a man with a bag', while a canvasser is one who interviews the people.

A literature evangelist does more than this. Their work is to evangelize, turn people to Christ, so one sells books or literature that contains this message.

The first Literature Evangelists

The Waldenses of the Piedmont Valleys, in Italy, with their own hands they copied the Bible. Their greatest desire was to share its treasures with others. As itinerant merchants, they traveled from place to place in their Alpine valleys, and in regions beyond. Wherever an interest was aroused they either sold or left portions of the Word of God, often at the price of their liberty or of their lives. Thus the seeds of the Reformation were sown.THE HISTORY OF THE WALDENSES

The first Adventist Literature Evangelist.

The first Adventist literature evangelist was George King, a man God raised up with no special gift for preaching, who was invited to distribute and sell tracts from door to door. His first attempt was successful.

King soon saw the potential of selling larger books. So at the 1881 General conference he persuaded the church leaders to combine the books “Thoughts on Daniel” and ‘Thoughts on Revelation”. George King  personally guaranteed the sale of the first 1000 copies.

On April 3 1882, the first copy of the book Daniel and the Revelation came of the press. That very day George King sold the first copy of it. Along with his fellow colporteurs whom he had trained, the first 5000 copy edition was soon sold out. Thus the Adventist colporteur ministry was born. Since then it has circled the globe.

How we Operate

Here in the South Pacific Division of Seventh-day Adventists (SPD) we  have a structure that works like this:

At the Division level we have a committee (Publishing Administration Committee, PAC) that oversees the Publishing program. It is chaired by a SPD officer and includes Conference Presidents, Treasurers, Union Conference President, Publishing House Manager, SPD Publishing Director and Associate Director it also includes two Area Managers and a Unit Leader.

This committee hires Area Managers and appoints Unit Leaders plus approves people to become Literature Evangelists or “Distributors”

There is a Publishing Director and Associate (see Team) who oversee the whole Publishing Ministry in the South Pacific Division which includes the island fields. Then there are Area Managers to manage smaller areas, their roll is to promote, recruit and train Literature Evangelists. In turn these managers have team leaders or Unit Leaders to help them. These team leaders are the motivational agent of their team. They do this by running weekly unit meetings going out with the Literature Evangelist

A Literature Evangelist is a “Distributor” of the church’s books, they are involved in a spiritual work. In practice they run “their” own business, buy wholesale and sell retail. A Literature Evangelist has to keep their own business records  which include tax & customer records. Pay income tax on their commissions & look after their business expenses.

We have in place systems for the above which includes a computer program. Also there is a “Starter Financial Package” for select applicants. See Area Managers

An incentive plan is in place so that  a Literature Evangelist can earn points, and are able to cash them in for items such travel trips, school expense etc.

The Literature Evangelist has to pay up front for their books and the usual practice is to have the customer pay for their books before taking delivery. To help out we have in place a Direct Debit system which allows the customer to layby the books. The Literature Evangelist is totally responsible for their customer.

Because there is a standard for a Literature Evangelist or “Distributor” to maintain they are required to sign a “Distributorship Agreement” every six months.

For further information feel free to contact any team member.