Who We Are, How We Serve

The Columbia Union Conference, established in 1907 to coordinate the Seventh-day Adventist Church's work in Delaware, Maryland, New Jersey, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia, West Virginia and the District of Columbia, is part of the worldwide Protestant denomination of 23 million members in more than 212 countries. At the union level, we connect and provide administrative leadership, governance and support services to our conferences, schools, health care networks and ministries. Each year, our organizations sponsor programs and projects that address human needs, improve quality of life and introduce people to Jesus. Read our Mission, Values and Priorities.

We Believe

God is love, power, and splendor—and God is a mystery. His ways are far beyond us, but He still reaches out to us. God is infinite yet intimate, three yet one,
all-knowing yet all-forgiving.

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Story by V. Michelle Bernard

Susan P. Murray, a member of New Jersey Conference’s Rockaway church, started a journal documenting her feelings about her mother’s decline from Alzheimer’s. She turned those entries into Losing Everything, a book gives a gritty glimpse into how the disease changes its victims and how it impacts those that love them.

Read our interview with Murray below:

Visitor: What do you most want people to understand or know after reading this book?

By Andrew McChesney, Adventist Mission

All the villagers races to the airstrip, singing and dancing, when American pilot Gary Roberts landing at Suminka, a remote village in the Indonesian province of Papua.

It had taken 10 years to cut down the trees by hand to clear the way for an airstrip at their mountainous village, and Gary’s mission plane was the first to land. This was a big event.

As Gary stepped out of the plane, the crowd grew silent. The singing and dancing stopped.

“Is this a Seventh-day Adventist plane?” a man asked.

He saw the three angels’ logo on the airplane’s tail.

Story by Kimi-Roux James, Adventist Development and Relief Agency

Staring in the mirror, Marie* saw an ugly, bruised scar above her mouth that swelled over her entire cheek. The throbbing pain was unbearable. Tears slid down her face.

For the sake of her children, she couldn’t live with him anymore.

Her mind raced back to her own father who used to beat her for talking back to him. Staying with her parents was miserable and often violent. Then, at 17, Marie found solace and comfort in her boyfriend whom she ran away with, thinking life would be better.