CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT: Pastor Joel Mpabmaniwana and church treasurer Christian Rwamukwaya add names to the official church membership list. Executive Secretary Jorge A. Ramirez confirms church members’ commitment to the tenants of the Adventist faith. Pastors Joel Mpabmaniwana and Gary Venden greet both members present and viewers online at the start of consecration service. President Ed Keyes signs the official Certificate of Church Organization on February 5, 2022.
Ubumwe Congregation Becomes a Church
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n an atmosphere charged with energy and excitement, officers of the Arizona Conference officially recognized the Ubumwe Seventh-day Adventist Church on February 5, 2022. Equally exciting is that a number of years ago the church was no more than a couple of families meeting in a church Sabbath School room. Now, within the span of a few years, they have grown from a group to a company to a church. Beginning at the Camelback church in 2009, the group moved to the Glendale church a year later to be more centrally located to where refugee families were living in the Phoenix metro area. Initially, a Sabbath School room fit the group nicely; however, the efforts of Pastor Joel Mpabmaniwana began producing an increasingly larger group. “Pastor Joel came to us wanting space to meet with two or three families. But every week there was a new family, so we kept stretching our space,” Gary Venden, pastor of the Glendale church, said to the congregation gathered for the consecration service. To incorporate the group into the mainstream church service, the families would assemble in one section of the church, where translation into their native Elder Villamor Meriales leads a prayer of blessing for the leadership team of the Ubumwe church.
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tongue would take place. But it soon became apparent that this was not a long-term solution. “We needed to change our philosophy,” said Pastor Venden. “We realized there were people coming and sitting in our church that had raised up churches in the refugee camps that were bigger than Glendale,” he continued. “Instead of trying to integrate you into the Glendale church, we needed to help you have your own space to worship in your own language.” The gym at Glenview Adventist Academy, sitting on the same property as the Glendale church, provided a larger space for the body of believers. This gave the group an opportunity to have a full church service in their own language and style of worship. However, the group kept growing through the years, and the facilities became inadequate to meet the needs of both the Glendale church and the Ubumwe group meeting at the same time.
