News Articles

The November 7, 2021, first-ever Sonscreen Film Festival alumni event opened with a screening at which presenters showed trailers for their films. The schedule then opened up, giving the almost two dozen guests participating time to share information for future projects, learn what their peers were working on, and connect with former classmates and new friends.

Google led Iris Miranda to the Peoria Seventh-day Adventist Church’s weekly “Sabbath Stream” livestream. Iris and her husband, Herminio Irizarry, weren’t able to find a local church home during the pandemic, so they began joining the Peoria church each week: “I am seriously hesitating going back to my church here in Virginia,” Iris wrote, “because I don’t want to stop watching Peoria’s services.”

The North American Division Ministerial Association hosted an inaugural church revitalization bootcamp Nov. 4-7, 2021, in Washington state to begin unpacking best practices for churches to evaluate their current status, pray through a new vision, and find renewed growth. It’s time, church leaders say, to take a refreshed look at the local church’s ministry, mission, and purpose.   

When a 7.2 magnitude earthquake struck southwest Haiti on August 14, 2021, the international community rushed to send aid. But for three Union College alumni, simply sending supplies wasn’t enough. International Rescue and Relief graduates Janae Schumacher, Justin Dena, and Lauren Lombard volunteered with Educáre, a Haitian-run organization, to bring medical help to those most affected by the disaster.

Adventist education tends to have a ripple effect. Josie Reeves is a junior nursing major at Southwestern Adventist University (SWAU). Though she started attending only three years ago, her connection to SWAU goes back all the way to 1955, when her grandfather, Gary Heinrich, headed off to attend Southwestern Adventist Junior College. 

Adventist Information Ministry, the North American Division's contact center, welcomed a new director on Nov. 1, 2021. Brent Hardinge, previously the assistant communication director at the General Conference, is poised to help lead AIM into its next era of ministry. 

Isaiah Long was appointed pastor of an Apostolic church in Washington, D.C., in 2014. Throughout his life he’d seen other pastors leading their churches in various ways, but he didn’t want to just mimic others; he wanted to fulfill his calling in the way God created him to. He began to pray that God would show him how to lead. In October 2016, a question from a congregant started him on a journey that would lead him somewhere very unexpected: The Seventh-day Adventist Church.

In the morning on Nov. 1, 2021, Randy Robinson, NAD treasurer, commenced his annual treasurer’s report at the North American Division Year-End Meeting (NAD YEM) with introducing new General Conference treasurer Paul Douglas. Douglas, at the NAD headquarters in Columbia, Maryland, addressed the NAD officers, and executive committee delegates watching via Zoom, by expressing his appreciation for working with the division.

Carolyn R. Forrest, associate secretary-director of human relations for the North American Division of the Seventh-day Adventist Church, opened the sixth and final day of the NAD year-end meetings on Tuesday, Nov. 2, 2021, with a reading of Psalm 100:2. A devotional by Minervino “Minner” Labrador, Jr., vice president for multilingual ministries for the NAD, followed.

During the sixth and final day of the North American Division Year-End Meeting on Tuesday, Nov. 2, 2021, the meeting moved into executive session to review policy edits and vote. NAD president G. Alexander Bryant reminded the group that these motions and votes can only take place during the year-end meetings.