The Fayette Seventh Day

Adventist Church had a special interest in the recent

Leonid meteor shower.

During the shower, meteors

seem to radiate from the direction of the constellation

Leo and do so every 33 years.

It was the occasion of the

meteor showers in 1833 that spurred the concern of a

number of citizens. It seems that the shower was

exceptionally intense that year in brightness, length and

the number of meteors.

Many people felt it

portended the scriptures regarding the advent of the

second coming of Jesus Christ. William Miller was a

Baptist preacher and believed with all his heart that the

second advent awakening would take place in 1844. A

following ensued composed of representatives of the

various Christian faiths.

Even though 1844 came and

went without the second advent taking place, in 1863 a

new faith was organized and today the Seventh Day

Adventist Church is composed of 900,000 people in the

United States and 10 million worldwide.

The Fayette congregation

dates back to 1984. Originally a group met in south

Fulton County but decided to move to Smyrna. The Fayette

countians in the group formed a church here, renting

several small churches for several years, and built their

own facility in 1994. The sanctuary can seat 200 people.

The congregation is

mission-oriented and supports its general conference in

worldwide missions, takes up a yearly offering for

humanitarian relief that may include countries such as

Bosnia, the quakes in Turkey or floods in the United

States as well as local agencies such as the Fayette

Youth Protection homes and the Samaritans.

Elder of the church is Gary

Fordham. He was born in Texas and reared in Hawaii, where

his father worked at Pearl Harbor. He is a graduate of

the Pacific Union College, an Adventist school, and he

attended an Adventist college in England, graduating in

1965 with a degree in theology and history.

He received his master's

degree in divinity and arts at Andrews Seminary in

Michigan. He also has received a master's of religious

education from the Southwestern Baptist Seminary in

Texas.

He has worked in Uganda

where he taught at a seminary for five years and in

Kenya, where he operated a seminary for nearly four

years. In the United States, he worked in Indiana for six

years. He came to Fayette County in 1988 and oversees two

churches, the one here and one in Austel.

He is married to Kaarina, a

native of Finland, and they met at Andrews Seminary. They

have been married for 32 years and are the parents of

Sonja, who teaches English in Korea, and Sari, who is

continuing her degree in writing.

The church's Sabbath

services are on Saturday, with Bible study at 9:30 a.m.

and worship service at 11 a.m. Vespers are Saturday

evening at 6 p.m. There is a prayer meeting Tuesdays at

7:30 p.m. and men's study is Sunday evening at 7 p.m.

The church is at 844 New

Hope Road and can be reached at 770-460-5904 or

770-739-4267. Its web site address is www.tagnet.org/fayettesda .