Story by Cinthia Portanova
Andre Ascalon, who retired at the end of 2022, served in the New Jersey Conference (NJC) for 38 years—20 years as a lay pastor and 18 as a full-time pastor, alongside his wife, Hillary. “My wife has been the most integral part of my ministry. This is a match made in heaven,” says Ascalon. “I think she is everything to my ministry.”
Story by Jaslyn Valverde
For the last couple of years, I’ve been participating in Partnership for Eternity. Since 2006, this program has been helping cultivate relationships between mentors and students at Seventh-day Adventist academies and elementary schools. The goal of the program is for students and mentors to create relationships and experience the blessing of service together. It has also been created to help retired individuals connect more with youth by build- ing relationships and learning from each other.
Editorial by Stephen Lee
“I Will Go: Making Disciples” is the overarching theme that we pray will motivate every member in the New Jersey Conference. One may ask, “How am I to accomplish or even attempt such a feat?” or “What’s in it for me?”
In order to find the answers, we need to explore what Jesus meant when He gave us this command. How did He accomplish it? He not only taught through His words, but through His life of servitude. What was in it for Him? That is more difficult to answer, if not impossible to understand with our finite estimation. He allowed the ungrateful human race to ultimately reject Him by piercing His hands and feet and nailing them to the cross.
In Philippians 3:14, the apostle Paul writes, “Forgetting those things which are behind” (NKJV), a concept that can be applied to us spiritually and also by looking at the occurrences of the past year.