Allegheny East Conference

Roland Hill’s wife, Susie, was tired of hearing Hill complaining that there wasn’t a deep Christian book about success, so she encouraged the stewardship guru to write his own book.

Six months later, Hill, a pastor at Allegheny East Conference’s Maranatha church in Fredericksburg, Va., and Penuel church in Brandy Station, Va., noticed the prayer of Eliezer in Genesis 24:12—a prayer for success. His latest book, Success is Bigger Than Me, delves into all areas of success in Christian living.

The book includes an 8-week study guide designed to help readers ignite their lives and change their world, says Hill.

Photo of James Jackson by Darrell Bullock

Story by Tamaria L. Kulemeka

“[The church] is supposed to be a hospital, but we’re not all ready to address the sick,” says James Jackson, AEC’s coordinator for Adventist Recovery Ministry (ARMin), and a member of the Mount Olivet church in Camden, N.J., who spent 20 years under the influence of alcohol and other drugs. After being “restored to sanity” and getting clean, he worked as a counselor and retired as a clinical supervisor for an agency that provided mental health and substance abuse services in the city. 

Story by Tamaria L. Kulemeka

The opioid and heroin epidemic is crippling communities across the nation, leaving health officials and providers, coroners, law enforcement and churches scrambling to respond to and combat this widespread crisis.

Bonnie Franckowiak, professor and coordinator of the Master of Science Nursing Program at Washington Adventist University in Takoma Park, Md., says, “The use of opioids in this country is staggering. It’s huge, and it’s growing all the time; we don’t seem to have a handle on it at all,” she says. “In 2012, 259 million prescriptions were written for opioids, which is enough to give every American adult their own pill box.”