This article is so misleading and condescending.
Pastor Shane has been my pastor for the last 19 years and he’s NOT what they are painting him to be here in this article!
Be careful with stirring controversy. If God wants him to be the pastor at Pioneer memorial church, there’s no amount of lies, controversy or scheming that can stop that. He will be a blessing to you all there🙏🏻
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In A Cafe
Gary Johnson
When Love is lost, the laughter’s good and gone,
The sun sinks down, the heavy fog rolls in,
Nothing is left to say and you know that no good
Will ever come of this,
Life will never again be miraculous.
Tall dark woman in the café, I see
How the tears glitter in your blue eyes.
You drink black coffee for bravery
And weep onto the front page of the Times.
I had a love once too who now is gone, is
gone, she’s gone. The waves roll along
The coast, the sweet summer rain blows in.
If I knew you, I’d sit by your side and sing:
This world is not our home, we’re only passing through.
—Gary Johnson
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Please point the reader to factual evidence that resets the compelling and evidentiary narrative presented to something you are more comfortable with.
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We have known the Anderson family for many years, have sat through many of Pastor Shane’s sermons, and we participated in the infamous constituency meeting that was mentioned in the article.
This article takes you on a wild ride through many twists and contortions, semi-falsehoods, and rumor-mills to try to smear a Seventh-day Adventist pastor. In fact, it got a whole lot of things wrong about Pastor Shane with the exception that he does like to use a stool when he preaches (did anyone else think that was a petty thing to mention?), and he uses old-school Bible Prophecy meetings (which does still reach many people). However, the article fails to mention that he also has used many creative ideas for reaching the community such as Journey to Bethlehem around Christmas time.
The truth isn’t always popular, but it’s still the truth. We plan on sending Pastor Shane a truckload of kittens and coloring books to give out to those that feel triggered. 
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Oh, the humanity! The hand wringing and cries of anguish on here are humorous. Listen to a few sermons for yourself before leaping head first onto the bandwagon of righteous indignation.
And, oh my, Shane preaches while sitting on a stool!
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2ndOpinion said something to the effect of: “The youth pastor nearly died from his anti-vax and anti-mask opinions.” He/She since erased the comment after the damage it caused. I leave my original response below:
The associate pastor nearly died from COVID. The rest of your statement is false.
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I’d have to plead guilty to some old-fashioned prophecy teachings in former years, too, before I knew more/better. I can see why there are concerns about the pastor. For one, I would think the ability to speak to academicians in an intelligent way that respects their various disciplines would be necessary at PMC. I would have appreciated the author sharing some discussion about Pastor Shane’s gifts, what he brings to PMC that will be valuable and valued. In the meantime, I’m willing to watch with an open mind as I have sympathy for anyone who follows Dwight Nelson, who has been a gift to SDA’ism, imho.
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It seems the comment I replied to no longer exists. That eliminates context. Taking things out of context is one of my big issues with the article. If you don’t like things out of context, feel free to skip my comment.
Original reply begins here:
You no doubt know that he was not on the Andrews campus at that time. He was in the Commonwealth of Virginia. The Commonwealth compelled churches and Shane and the New Market Church complied. The restrictions for churches varied from week to week with seemingly no regard for common sense. At one point there was a limit of around 10 people allowed in the building at one time–no matter what occupancy the room could support. Later it was lifted to a percentage of occupancy, but no greater than X.
Not only is he a team player, but he brought the church and schools together where there was an uneasy stand-off culture before. I don’t know if that’s the current atmosphere at Andrews, but @vandieman suggests that was his experience at AU. I expect that Shane will be very involved in any campus events that his schedule will allow.
You can disagree with his methods, but we know that religious liberty will be threatened, and we shouldn’t wait to fight it until it’s too late.
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The GC operates both Loma Linda and Andrews. How ludicrous that the GC has now made sure that someone is appointed lead pastor at Andrews who clearly contradicts what Loma Linda, our health sciences university) teaches (i.e. regarding vaccinations, masks, etc.)! Unbelievable but true and frightening.
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It would do everyone and the pastor here, to have some actual evidence presented for both sides of the issue. Perhaps a followup article is in the works?? Many questions have been brought up and accusations that the current article is incorrect in many ways. Thanks
Factual evidence regarding YouTube:
A sermon series he preached on July 4 and July 11 of that year show 35 views and 11 views, respectively.
This ignores the live streams of these services of 374 and 372 views, respectively. Why use the smaller numbers? That is very misleading. That’s around 10% and 3% of the views, respectively. It makes it look like Shane is misrepresenting the facts when he is quoted with “a place for thousands to access worship” when that isn’t the case. YouTube reports 6.2K unique viewers for the past 90 days.
Other than that, I don’t have any factual arguments with the first or last paragraph. The last paragraph does lack quite a bit of context though.
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Hmmmm… well, 372/374 is hardly equal to “thousands,” so yeah, someone is doing some misleading… 
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I fail to understand the point of this article. The decision has been made and accepted.
One of the worst parts of Adventism is that we look and feel holy when we pick apart those who are different than we are, or even worse people we think are different.
The only possible point is to get people to prejudge him, to think badly of him before he starts.
You could selectively take things i have written on Spectrum, Adventist Today, Linkedin and my own website and make me look like a far left liberal politically and religiously or a far right conservative politically and religously.
What I care about, what members of the congregation (the only ones who really count) should care about is how he treats those of his congregation and those in his field of influence.
It would have been more helpful to talk to church members to see what kind of pastor he was, to ask how he interacted with those who have been on the fringes.
Perhaps there would be wisdom in waiting to see what happens.
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Correction: Loma Linda and Andrews are General Conference institutions.
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Perhaps you missed the part where the channel is getting over 6,000 unique viewers over the past 90 days. Views and viewers are not the same thing. Also, Shane never claimed that any video got thousands of views. Just that our channel is a “place for thousands” (over 6,000 in the past 90 days) “to access worship” and that seems to be missed by the article’s author and you. I’d hate to ascribe this to malice when it could simply be ignorance or confusion.
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The Village Church has become the conservative magnet for English speaking Adventists in Berrien. With Dwight, PMC was theologically centrist and progressive on social justice issues. Based on his track record, PMC will become more like the Village Church, leaving a gap for other churches to fill. Fortunately, there are plenty to chose from, and more might be created. At the end of the day, people will vote with their feet.
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i really wonder whether a pastor comes across as he does because of his own ideology, or whether he’s simply adapting, perhaps unconsciously, to where he senses his worship team and congregation are…perhaps Anderson was perceived to be far right when he was in Virginia because that’s where he’s congregation, elders and board were…i don’t think a pastor can operate independently of his elder team, or his board, and these can’t operate independently from their congregation…i think a pastor is merely a reflection of reality behind the scenes, as much as his own initiative…
i don’t expect anything to change at Andrews, either from the Taylor presidency or the Anderson pastorship…certainly the student body will experience little, if any, change…
Good analysis, Phillip. I’m shocked. One more argument for the university to exercise academic independence. The transition could hardly be any more difficult than remedying the potential damage to the image of PMC as serving the faculty of a research based institution. By association, AU could become the scorn of the sisterhood and brotherhood of scholars and institutions of higher learning. PMC will not be a place where I worship. I imagine that decision will be joined by other university personnel.
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I would add this nuance to your relevant comment. In the beginning of a pastoral assignment, a good pastor will seek to modify or match his ministry style and substance to the perceived personality of the congregation. This is especially true of the “honeymoon” period which may last as long as 18 months. However, the longer the pastorate, the probability will be that the congregation will be influenced by the character of the leader and reflect his/her thinking. After 18 years of shared experience, the SVA Church fully a reflection of Pastor Anderson.
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I have made and then retracted comments a couple times on this thread. After taking more time to process the situation, my assessment has somewhat changed. I have come to think of Andrews University as the site of a proxy war between conservative church leaders and now progressive watchdogs. The limited involvement of local church members and students in the search process is telling, as is the armchair quarterbacking from Spectrum. It seems that everyone is having their say in this selection except those most affected: the congregation.
Denominations that successfully match clergy with congregations do so with a thorough understanding and respect for the membership and its needs as well as the candidates’ gifts and abilities. The search is open and there are several levels of vetting to arrive at an optimal match. I do not believe that has happened here. Unfortunately, the Michigan Conference has a much greater concern for its pastoral criteria (which are notoriously restrictive) than with meeting the needs of the congregation. Many qualified candidates were simply “non-starters” because of the veto held by Michigan Conference officers.
Perhaps the better story for Spectrum to research and report is how Pioneer Memorial Church members feel about the quality of the search process. Had there been more time for local leaders and members to consider the candidates, their sermons, and their views, perhaps we would not be where we are today. Instead, Andrews students and community members are left with the trappings of a conflict that has nothing to do with their spiritual wellbeing and everything to do with the battle to bring the PMC pulpit into a particular ideological orbit. For me, this is the travesty. It is the willingness of ecclesiastical “superpowers” to wage their wars in other people’s pews.
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