Connecting Columbia Union Seventh-day Adventists

Washington Adventist University

It’s a Sabbath afternoon and several Seventh-day Adventists can be found enjoying electric guitars, flashing strobe lights, praise and prayer along with 3,300 other people from disparate backgrounds and churches in Fairfax, Va. They are among the thousands attending DC Fest, a contemporary Christian concert featuring artists such as Jamie Grace, Matthew West, David Crowder, Audio Adrenaline and the Newsboys.
 

Charles McMillan, PhD, director of the Los Alamos National Laboratory and president of Los Alamos National Security, LLC (LANS), was named alumnus of the year by his alma mater, Washington Adventist University (WAU) during alumni homecoming weekend, April 12-14. The Los Alamos Lab, based in New Mexico operates the lab for the National Nuclear Security Administration. McMillan was the guest of honor at the annual alumni awards banquet held in Bethesda, Md., April 13.
 

Last Sabbath hundreds of people gathered at Potomac Conference’s Sligo church in Takoma Park, Md., to celebrate the life of John Konrad, who since 1996 served as vice president and general manager of Washington, D.C.’s contemporary Christian music station, WGTS 91.9 FM. Konrad, 43, died at the University of Maryland Medical Center in Baltimore, January 2, after a short illness.

Looking back, Josephine Benton, now 87, knows exactly where her desire to minister came from. Her father was a Seventh-day Adventist evangelist who frequently moved their family around the country. “I would sit and listen to my dad’s sermons, and I always knew that if I had been born a boy, I would have been a preacher,” she said. “But that path didn’t seem open to me.”

Last month, Weymouth Spence, president of Washington Adventist University (WAU); Mikhail Kulakov Jr., professor of religion and director of WAU’s Bible Translation Institute; Zack Plantak, chair of WAU’s Religion Department and Celeste Ryan Blyden, Visitor editor and publisher, joined leaders from the Euro-Asia Division for a groundbreaking ceremony for a new media center that will soon be erected at Zaoksky Adventist Seminary and Institute outside Moscow.

In 2010 Mikhail Kulakov, DPhil, became director and editor-in-chief of the Bible Translation Institute, which is based at Washington Adventist University. While Kulakov is based at the Takoma Park, Md.-campus, he is partnering with the Zaosky Adventist Seminary and Institute in Russia.

For decades people throughout the Washington, D.C., area who turned their radio dials to Washington Adventist University’s WGTS 91.9 FM on Sabbath mornings, have immediately recognized voice of Gerry Fuller, DDS. Over the course of 45 years, this WGTS radio host has interviewed famous authors, performers, medical experts and countless other public figures. He also hosted musical programs and advocated on behalf of Washington’s “Family Safe, Kid-Friendly” radio station.