Metropolitan Church

During the 11 o’clock service on Sabbath, January 5, Brenda Billingy, senior pastor of Allegheny East Conference’s (AEC) Metropolitan church in Hyattsville, Md., looked from her chair on the podium to the back of her church and wondered, “Why is the [Columbia] Union president here?” She soon found out. Her associate pastor, Marquis D. Johns, had planned a surprise ceremony, that included Columbia Union president Dave Weigley, executive secretary Rob Vandeman and treasurer Seth Bardu, to celebrate her ministerial credentials that had been recently revised to indicate that she is an ordained Seventh-day Adventist minister.

Everyone knows the economy is at best limping along, so why would someone with his career on the rise, walk away from a job, to honor a church doctrine he abandoned several years ago? That’s the choice that Adrian Mundle, a used car sales manager with more than 18 years of experience, faced in September when he became a baptized member of the Allegheny East Conference Metropolitan church in Hyattsville, Md. Mundle was one of 113 people who took a stand for Christ after attending the church’s two-week “Lifted” evangelism series.

The pastors at Allegheny East Conference’s Metropolitan church in Hyattsville, Md., weren’t planning on performing a baptism on Sabbath, September 17. Members were in the midst of “Lifted,” a two-week long evangelism campaign that attracted some 300 people each night and the only baptism scheduled was for the second Sabbath. But the Holy Spirit had been working on Christopher Robinson those first few days and he couldn’t wait another week to publicly commit his life to Christ.

After 10 years of planning, sacrificing, facing challenges and faithful giving, Allegheny East Conference’s Metropolitan church in Hyattsville, Md., recently dedicated their new activity and ministry center.