Potomac Conference

Story by Ron Mills

Takoma Academy’s (TA) chorale and camerata are joining forces to participate in the Music for All National Choir Festival and the World Choir Games (WCG)—the largest choral competition in the world!

Via a recorded audition, a panel of renowned choral conductors selected the TA chorale as one of the charter groups that sang at the premiere of the Music for All National Choir Festival in Indianapolis, March 15-17, 2018.

The Music for All National Choir Festival is a noncompetitive experience for outstanding middle school, high school and youth choirs. The festival is a celebration of musical excellence, combining world class performance and evaluation opportunities, with an exhilarating atmosphere of camaraderie in music.

Members of the Fredericksburg Pathfinder Club participate in the Columbia Union Pathfinder Bible Experience

On Sabbath, 54 teams, comprised of at least 320 Pathfinders, gathered in Blue Mountain Academy’s gymnasium in Hamburg, Pa., to test their knowledge of the Bible during the Columbia Union Conference’s sixth Pathfinder Bible Experience (PBE), a competition that tests participants Bible knowledge. So far it is the largest Columbia Union PBE event in the union.
 

Story by Michele Joseph

The single most effective evangelistic methodology under heaven is planting churches,” says Rubén Ramos, the Columbia Union’s vice president for Multilingual Ministries, quoting from C. Peter Wagner’s book Church Planting for a Greater Harvest: A Comprehensive Guide. Here are some tips Ramos and Peter Casillas, who most recently served as associate director for pastoral ministries in evangelism and church planting and volunteer lay pastors in Potomac Conference, say any leader can use in their ministries:

Story by Michele Joseph

When Juliana Marson received a call from a woman so depressed she was unable to leave her home, Marson did what she knew would work best—she prayed. Then she invited the woman to her two-week-old church plant, the New Jersey Conference’s Grace Place, in Lakewood.

Jacqueline Lewis didn’t come to church, but she arrived during fellowship dinner.

“I stopped what I was doing, ran and hugged her,” Marson says. But Lewis replied, “You can’t hug me. I’m ugly.”Jacqueline Lewis (right) credits Lay Pastor Juliana Marson and the New Jersey Conference’s Grace Place church members in Lakewood for helping her overcome depression. Photo by Jorge Pillco

Photo of David Franklin at NAD's eHuddle 2018 by Pieter Damsteegt

Story by V. Michelle Bernard / Photo by Pieter Damsteegt, NAD Communication

This week church leaders, local pastors and institutional leaders from across the Seventh-day Adventist church in North America gathered to discuss ways to collaborate to reach, retain and reclaim the people of North America with Jesus’ message and mission.

Topics covered included church revitalization, the trend of aging churches, ministering to large people groups (such as single mothers and their families) and how to reach missing Adventist members.