Stories & Commentaries

Daniel R. Jackson, president of the Seventh-day Adventist Church in North America, shares a Christian greeting during the 2019 holiday season.

November 8, 2019. One year after the Camp Fire ripped through his community, Allen Plowman is back on his property. Or what was left of it. As fall slips into winter around the residents of Paradise, it’s not the haunting, happy sounds of Canada geese flying south that greets them every morning; it’s the visceral roar of a chainsaw. Or three.

The presence of Jesus in the flesh is an absolute gift to the human family. And it’s not just a gift to Seventh-day Adventists or Christians, but to the entire world and all who live in it. If God is for us, who can be against us?

The program challenges students and employees to focus on improving their physical and mental health through challenges to drink more water, manage stress, prioritize rest, and more.

Seventh-day Adventist advocates are working to protect this vital human right within a culture that has grown skeptical of many religious freedom claims. 

While on earth, Jesus gave His disciples a “new” commandment to “love one another” just as He loved them. He invites us to live a life that faithfully points to and mirrors Him.

On Nov. 25, 2019, almost 1,000 families who preregistered through a county database began receiving a full, 30-pound Thanksgiving meal basket including turkey, bread, vegetables, potatoes and more. For three days, families came to the Adventist Community Services of Greater Washington (ACSGW) in Silver Spring, Maryland, for their meals.

God promised SaMonna Watts victory when her young son was diagnosed with cancer. She continues to live in victory five years after his death.

Heidi Baumgartner, Washington Conference communication director, reflects on having a history of five generations in the same church family, and how God has been faithful for 121 years. "This was the location where my dairy-farmer great-grandparents came to faith at an H.M.S. Richards crusade and raised their family of five children. My brother and his family now have their membership in the family church. Life isn’t always easy, but through the years, we’ve seen how God is faithful. This legacy is worth passing on."

In the autumn of 1969, Virginia-Gene Rittenhouse — already an accomplished and internationally-known violin and piano soloist and composer — invited four little kids to play music in her living room. Little did they know, this was the beginning of the New England Youth Ensemble (NEYE), a group of young musicians that gave its first performance at the local Kiwanis club in Worcester, Massachusetts.