Potomac Conference

The 13th annual Women’s Ministries Retreat of the Potomac Conference’s Hispanic Ministries recently held October 21-23 in Arlington, Va., drew more than 1,000 women representing more than 60 Hispanic churches.

Several communication professionals from the Columbia Union Conference took home awards from the recent Society of Adventist Communicators convention held in Lombard, Ill. Potomac Conference’s Communication Department won “Best in Class” for the Corporate Communication Website category. The team includes Dan Jensen, Communication director; Adrienne Suarez, graphic designer and Paolo Esposito, communication intern.

Some 50 Seventh-day Adventist legal professionals enjoyed fellowship and professional enrichment during the recent inaugural Columbia Union Attorney Weekend. The event was organized by Adventist Lawyers Association (ALA), which “exists to unite and support Adventist lawyers in service to the community and each other.” The general counsel offices of both the General Conference and the Columbia Union Conference sponsored the weekend.

Potomac Conference’s Richmond Academy of Seventh-day Adventists (RA) in Richmond, Va., celebrated 100 years of excellence in Christian education on October 14-16. The weekend festivities started with Dwight C. Jones, Richmond mayor, and Nancy Melashenko, Potomac Conference associate director for education, dedicating RA’s new brick commemorative walkway.

According to the King James Bible Trust, “The King James Bible is the book that changed the world … [It] was the culmination of an heroic 80 year struggle to give the English people a Bible in their own tongue.”

“Last year we baptized 42,000 Hispanics, which represents about a third of the entire baptisms done in all of the North American Division,” shares Ricardo Norton, DMin, director of the Institute of Hispanic Ministries at Andrews University (Mich.). Norton is sitting in front of a class at the Columbia Union Conference’s headquarters in Columbia, Md., which just finished covering the ins and outs of developing and implementing small group ministries. In front of him are 29 Spanish-speaking students, most pastors of churches throughout the union, who have just completed one class toward their Master of Arts in Pastoral Ministry. 

“Sometimes as young adults, especially those who are single, we go our own way on Friday nights. But with this ministry, we can open the Sabbath together,” says Anthony Barnes, a member of Allegheny East Conference’s First church in Washington, D.C. It was at his church that young adults from around the region recently met for the “First Fridays” worship service.

After 20 years of meeting for worship in places they could not call home, last weekend members of the Potomac Conference’s Virginia Beach (Va.) church celebrated the purchase of their own church building. Visitors from the community and over 10 sister churches in California, West Virginia, Maryland, Florida and North Carolina joined them for the grand opening ceremony. The sanctuary, lobby and hallways were standing-room-only when attendance soared to over 400 during the divine hour of worship.

The Hyattsville (Md.) church recently took part in the 32nd Annual Historic Hyattsville House Tour, an event hosted by the Hyattsville Preservation Association, Inc. (HPA) to showcase the city’s most beautiful and historic buildings.