Celebrating Gods Goodness and Growth 29th Constituency Meeting

Story by the Visitor Staff / Photos by Ruth Anan and Kylie Kajiura

We’ve come to celebrate the goodness of the Lord,” said Marcellus T. Robinson, Columbia Union Conference president, as he opened the Columbia Union Conference 29th Constituency Meeting in May at Potomac Conference’s Southern Asian church in Silver Spring, Md.

During the meeting, 260 delegates and some 70 guests from the union’s eight conferences, entities and 876 churches and companies heard reports on evangelism, ministry and how the outpouring of the Holy Spirit resulted in 27,158 new members in the last quinquennium.

Held every five years, the constituency meeting brings together a delegation that includes a strategic representation of men, women, young adults, church employees and lay people to elect leaders and review the Columbia Union’s work.

A Celebration of Evangelism
The Sabbath evening vespers program began witha sacred music concert, followed by the president’s report titled, “A Celebration of Pentecost 2025.”

Robinson (pictured, right with Espósito), who has served as union president since 2024, shared highlights from the evangelistic efforts that yielded 7,097 new members in 2025 alone.

José D. Espósito, union vice president for Evangelism and Multicultural Ministries reported that church leaders wholeheartedly jumped into planning for and implementing Pentecost 2025—the North American Division’s (NAD) evangelistic initiative—to get members, churches and schools involved in sharing the gospel through evangelism.

During the president’s report, Blyden; Emmanuel Asiedu (pictured below with Charles Tapp), union treasurer; and Rubén A. Ramos, retired union vice president for Multilingual Ministries, interviewed representatives from each conference about how God had blessed their territories through the initiative. Many conference presidents reported historic baptismal numbers and described how the Holy Spirit worked in mighty ways during Pentecost 2025.

One example of how God impacted an individual in a powerful way is Jimmy. This individual from the Baltimore area received a Bible study flyer from the Chesapeake Conference shortly after he spent more than a year in the hospital due to a suicide attempt. After developing a friendship with Bible worker Drake Johnson and attending the Hope for Humanity evangelistic series, Jimmy was baptized and is now active in a local church plant.

Adding to the reasons to celebrate, five people were baptized during the meeting.

Asiedu said the mission of the union goes beyond the Mid-Atlantic states. “God expects us to do the mission here and the mission abroad,” he said, sharing that, with assistance from Adventist HealthCare and Kettering Health, the union provides educational and health care assistance in India, Cuba, South Africa, Zambia, Jordan, Liberia, Vietnam, Ghana, Cambodia, Uganda and Tanzania.

“We’re a praying union,” said Celeste Ryan Blyden, union executive secretary, on the importance that prayer played leading up to and during Pentecost 2025. She shared that, in 2025, and continuing into 2026, the union has hosted monthly Zoom prayer meetings—lifting up a different conference or entity each month.

“You’ve done a lot of work,” said NAD President G. Alexander Bryant, after thanking union and conference leadership, pastors, educators and members. “My heart has been warmed, inspired, encouraged as I’ve seen the work you’ve done in the union—every conference coming together. That really is what Pentecost is about. … God ..is still looking to do something special. And He is.”

Share Your Table

After basking in the blessings of Pentecost 2025, Espósito rejoined the stage and, together with Robinson, announced the Columbia Union’s 2026 initiative, Share Your Table. It encourages church members to open their homes to friends, colleagues and neighbors for simple, meaningful moments of connection that can naturally lead to questions about faith or God. “The purpose is to invite one person or family to your home for a meal—breakfast, lunch or dinner,” explained Espósito.

At the constituency meeting, delegates who accepted the call to participate received bags that  included, among other items, a prayer apron that asks, “How Can I Pray for You Today?” This prayer apron provides guests an opening to share what’s on their hearts—prayer requests for jobs, health, finances or family, says Espósito.

Union leaders hope that many members and churches will join the movement.

Union Leadership Re-Elected

An important area of business delegates handle at constituency meetings is electing union leadership.

After sundown on Saturday night, delegates re-elected President Marcellus T. Robinson, Executive Secretary Celeste Ryan Blyden and Treasurer Emmanuel Asiedu to the 2026–2031 term.

“This body has elected you with a very, very strong mandate and appreciation for your leadership and a desire to see you continue for the next five years,” said Bryant, affirming the re-election and declaring that he hoped the meeting would be the last before Jesus returns.

On behalf of the officer team and their spouses, Robinson thanked the delegation for the opportunity to serve again. “We’re humbled and we’re honored and know you’re praying for us as we pray for you. May God lead and direct us each day.”

As leader of the union, Robinson provides spiritual guidance and strategy to accomplish the mission of the church in the union’s eight-conference territory.

He chairs the Kettering Health Board of Directors, Washington Adventist University (WAU) Board of Trustees and serves on various educational, health care, and administrative committees throughout the Seventh-day Adventist Church system.

Blyden, union executive secretary since 2021, helps govern the union’s conferences, schools, health care networks and ministries. She keeps the union’s minutes and archives, ensures all union entities follow constitutions and bylaws, and chairs the union’s Board of Education and WGTS Media Ministry Membership Board.

Elected in 2018 and re-elected in 2021, Asiedu chairs the Adventist HealthCare Board of Trustees and several financial and audit committees; gives counsel to WAU; and provides strategic financial and policy-related guidance to the union’s conference treasurers and entities. His team manages tithes, offerings, budgets and payroll.

Vice Presidents Re-Elected
Delegates also re-elected all five vice presidents—José D. Espósito, Kelly Butler Coe, Donovan Ross, Lisa Saveikis Burrow and José L. Vázquez—to serve another five-year term in their respective roles.

Espósito served as assistant to the president for Evangelism since January 2022. During this time, he started the Garment of Faith initiative, which encourages members to request a baptismal robe, then commit to pray, mentor and spiritually nourish someone in the hopes that the person may one day be baptized in that robe. To date, more than 6,000 garments have been distributed. In March 2026, he was voted as vice president for Evangelism and Multilingual Ministries. In this role, he works with various multicultural ministries and Evangelism directors at local conferences to provide resources and support for members to continue sharing the gospel through initiatives such as Pentecost 2025.

Since September 2023, Coe has served as vice president for Communication. In this role, she helps shape the organization’s editorial voice and visual direction. She oversees the Visitor News platform, guiding a team that creates news and feature content across print, video and digital channels. She also manages crisis communication for the union and provides strategic communication leadership, resources and support to its entities.

Ross, vice president for Education, oversees a team that nurtures, supports and facilitates the “Journey to Excellence” for the more than 450 eduators in the union’s educational system. They support, mentor and develop educators by conducting annual principals’ boot camps and by securing funding from the Bainum Family Foundation to support leadership development initiatives. They also assist in the formation of system policies and provide mission-driven strategic consultations in areas such as program development, school accreditation, professional growth and teacher certification. He has been the vice president for Education since 2016.

Saveikis Burrow has served as vice president and general counsel for the union since 2021. As chief legal officer, she provides counsel to union and conference officers, entities and various ministries. The General Counsel’s office is also involved substantively with the operation of Planned Giving & Trust Services. Additionally, Burrow represents the union and its entities when dealing with Public Affairs & Religious Liberty (PARL), and also presents educational seminars on various topics including immigration.

At the union’s executive committee meeting in November 2025, Vázquez was elected to be the new vice president for Ministries Development.

Vázquez partners with the union’s conferences  to develop and support outreach ministries that evangelize and transform the communities within the union’s territory. His department provides union-wide training and oversight for Youth and Young Adult Ministries and Pathfinders and organizes the union’s camporee every five years.

He also works to secure and process funding for homeland mission projects and initiatives, including church plants.

Vázquez also serves as the union ministerial director.

Snapshot of the Last Five Years
In her report on Sunday morning, Blyden, who oversaw the constituency meeting, noted that, despite the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, the union experienced the largest net growth among NAD unions in the last quinquennium and remains the third largest union with 162,652 members.

She noted the median age of members is 48, with 46 percent being 60 years or older, and of these members, 57 percent are women. She added that these totals do not include children who are not  baptized or nonmembers who regularly attend church. She also said our union has members from every continent.

The Treasury Department understands the need to be faithful stewards, said Asiedu, in his report covering 2021–2025. “We want to make sure every dollar has a connection to mission,” he added, not- ing that the department’s financial stewardship is built upon the principles of integrity, accountability, transparency, faithfulness, excellence and service.

In the last five years, the conferences in the union received $835,971,736 in tithe. The union received $75,237,456 of this money, which funded union operations and services, education, evangelism, tithe to the NAD, and auditing expenses—and the union was able to return an additional $8,304,342 back to its eight conferences.

Beyond providing strategic financial stewardship and supporting mission, Asiedu said the department is directly involved in evangelism through preaching  at meetings in the union and abroad. The department also works to develop financial leaders through a mentorship program that has mentored more than 50 employees, including himself, who now work across the NAD.

Following Asiedu’s report, David Kavistan, an audit manager with the General Conference Auditing Service (GCAS), shared that the union and the Columbia Union Conference Association received a clean (otherwise known as a modified) audit opinion for 2021–2025.

During the business sessions of the meeting, delegates heard reports on how Adventist HealthCare, Kettering Health, WAU and WGTS 91.9 are also supporting the mission of the Seventh-day Adventist Church in their respective fields.

Kevin Krueger, president and CEO of Atlantic Gateway Communications, which oversees WGTS 91.9 and WGBZ 88.3—among other digital ministries—reports that 40 percent of 400,000 weekly WGTS listeners don’t even claim to be Christian. This demonstrates the unique ministry opportunity afforded to union entities that directly serve the public.

Executive Commitee Selected
Delegates also voted to approve a new executive committee to serve for the next five-year term.

The committee serves as the union’s governing body. It convenes quarterly, bringing together 46 members whose composition is deliberately shaped to represent a range of races, regions, genders and ages. Each member is nominated by the entity they represent and, collectively, they hold oversight responsibility for the union’s operations.

At the constituency meeting, delegates also reviewed and voted on proposed minor bylaw changes, which were largely editorial in nature.

This constituency meeting was the first in-person meeting since 2016, following an online 2021 meeting due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Delegates registered and received materials entirely through the Columbia Union Conference app, produced by the Communication and ITS teams.

“The Columbia Union Constituency Meeting is the result of many people and departments working together toward a common goal. The meeting app is one example of that collaboration, reflecting the combined efforts of multiple departments to keep delegates informed, connected and engaged throughout the event,” Coe notes.

“This event helps [members] to understand how our church is moving forward and how we’re changing lives and how we’re making an impact across the board, not just in our schools, but also in our hospitals, our health care systems and at WGTS,” says Cecil Calliste, an executive committee member and delegate from Potomac Conference’s Takoma Park (Md.) church. “I’m so honored to be able to be a part of this, and thankful for the hard work and commitment of all of the Columbia Union staff … so we could experience this.”—Ricardo Bacchus, V. Michelle Bernard, Amanda Blake and Becky St. Clair contributed to this article.