United Methodists seek to ‘turn worlds upside down’
More than 1,200 United Methodist annual conference leaders attend the
denomination’s quadrennial training event in Jacksonville, Fla.
A UMNS photo by Erik Alsgaard. |
By Jeanette Pinkston and Erik Alsgaard*
Feb. 6, 2009 | JACKSONVILLE, Fla. (UMNS)
Texas Bishop Janice Riggle Huie addresses the participants. A UMNS photo
by Erik Alsgaard.
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What happens when nearly 14 million United Methodists around the world focus on a single idea with four “themes”?
Denominational leaders pray that in the next four years some amazing
transformations will take place -- around the corner and around the
world.
The four areas of focus adopted by the 2008 General Conference, the
denomination’s top legislative body, were rolled out in earnest at the
quadrennial training event for annual conference leaders Jan. 29-Feb. 1
in Jacksonville.
More than 1,200 leaders gathered for the “Living the United
Methodist Way: Turning Worlds Upside Down” event to learn how their
respective places of ministry can connect with others to transform
themselves and the world.
Susan Ruach, chairperson of the design team and staff member at the
United Methodist Board of Discipleship, said the event’s goal was to
give participants “the big picture” of the four areas of focus, which
are the centerpiece of the denomination’s ministry for the next four to
eight years.
“My prayer, my hope, has been that this event will really help us as
The United Methodist Church to come together and move forward in God’s
vision,” she said.
“We need to change, but we must change and do so without losing our
identity,” warns Bishop Timothy Whitaker. A UMNS photo by Erik Alsgaard.
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The four areas – leadership development, church growth, ministry with
the poor and global health – were introduced in plenary sessions,
followed by workshops on each topic. Texas Bishop Janice Riggle Huie illustrated how the emphasis was
formed through intense Bible study, prayer and conversation, and she
and invited the leaders to “move out…of our little boxes” and follow
“where we believe the Spirit is calling us.” If the church did that,
she said, United Methodism would once again become a movement.
Held every four years, the quadrennial training event jointly
planned by the boards of Church and Society, Communications,
Discipleship, Pension and Health Benefits, Global Ministries, Higher
Education and Ministry, Christian Unity and Interreligous Concerns,
Religion and Race, Status and Role of Women, United Methodist Men,
Publishing House, Finance and Administration and annual conference
leaders.
Leadership
Florida Bishop Tim Whitaker led participants on a trip down memory
lane, noting that a loss of memory may lead to a loss of one’s
identity. “If a group begins to lose memory of its origins, it loses
its identity,” he said. “We need to change, but we must change and do
so without losing our identity.”
“Some folks just aren’t leaders. Leadership is a gift of the Spirit,”
says Jay Williams, a seminarian from New York.
A UMNS photo by Erik Alsgaard.
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The bishop showed how Methodism’s John and Charles Wesley articulated a
clear theological vision, often encapsulated in their hymnody. The
Wesley’s strong Trinitarian roots forged a theology that said that the
living God is acting in history for our sake; that transforming the
whole creation starts with transforming the individual; and that a
theological vision without a community in which to live it out is no
good. Jay Williams, a 27-year-old seminarian from New York, offered his
thoughts on developing church leaders from the perspective of one who
is in the process of being developed himself.
“Some folks just aren’t leaders,” he said. “Leadership is a gift of
the Spirit. If we force people into leadership, the imminent result
will be utter disaster.”
“We want to get to the point in the future where we are starting one
new church every day,” says the Rev. Thomas Butcher. A UMNS photo by
Jeanette Pinkston.
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Williams, who led and co-led his conference’s delegation to the 2000
and 2004 General Conferences, stated three theses on living the United
Methodist Way.
“First, death is not always a bad thing,” he said. “It’s time to
let deadly practices die. Some of our churches have been struggling to
die for decades.
“Second, our primary task is to be a Christian, not United
Methodist,” he said. “Too many of us can talk about strategic plans but
too few of us can give a witness. Too many of us know the Book of
Discipline and the rules of polity, but not the Bible.”
And the third thesis, he said, is that in order to lead, one must
follow. The church needs to develop a culture of apprentices and
followers of leaders.
New places for new faces
The Rev. Thomas Butcher, executive officer of New Church Starts and
coordinator of Path1 at the United Methodist Board of Discipleship,
said that his mission is to lead a movement that starts new
churches--re-evangelizing the United States.
The Rev. Candace Lewis, pastor of New Life United Methodist Church in
Jacksonville, Fla., talks about starting a new
church fresh out of seminary.
A UMNS photo by Jeanette Pinkston.
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“From 1870 to 1920,” he said, “the Methodist Church started one new
church every day. Starting new churches is the most effective
evangelism tool we have. We want to get to the point in the future
where we are starting one new church every day.” That’s the vision of the Path1 team, the group charged with
recruiting, training and providing resources for 1,000 new church
planters to start 650 churches in the next four years. One-half of
those churches are targeted to be racial/ethnic congregations.
The Rev. Candace Lewis, pastor of New Life United Methodist Church
in Jacksonville, started her church in a storefront in 1996. Lewis was
fresh out of seminary and knew only two people in Jacksonville. “And
neither of them joined the new church,” she said with a laugh.
The new congregation started in an urban community and its parking
lot was its mission field. “When you’re committed to reaching new
people for Jesus Christ, you have to try just about anything,” she
said, and that included carnivals in the parking lot, concerts,
picnics, fellowships, a health fair and “heavenly harvest,” an
alternative to Halloween trick or treating.
“Most of the people who came were not part of a church or The United
Methodist Church,” she said. “We had contemporary, excited worship with
people lifting hands; they weren’t getting arrested, they were just
excited to be praising God.”
“Most pastors had no training in mission evangelism,” says the Rev.
Bener Agtarap. A UMNS photo by Jeanette Pinkston.
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Four years ago, the congregation moved into a new building. The former
Baptist church is now proudly United Methodist with more than 200
members. Even with all the excitement of starting new churches, the
challenges the denomination faces today are real, according to the Rev.
Bener Agtarap, new church system strategist for the Board of
Discipleship.
Agtarap spoke about how the church in his home country of the
Philippines learned to grow again. “Prior to the 1980s, most
congregations in the Philippines had no program on mission or
evangelism,” he explained. “Most pastors had no training in mission
evangelism. We had more clergy employees than clergy evangelists; more
local pastors and fewer mission pastors.”
Further, there was no clear policy at the annual conference level to
promote mission evangelism. “What if every annual (regional) conference
had a policy that every local church had a mission to start a new
church?” he asked.
That was the question asked in the Philippines, and the church
responded. In 1984, the church declared the province of Cavite as its
mission field. Churches in metro Manila started 30 new churches in
Cavite between 1984 and 1999.
The Rev. Diane Presley says a transforming church needs to have a stable financial base, a vision to nurture and
“you gotta have people.”
A UMNS photo by Jeanette Pinkston.
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Then there is the story of Oak Cliff United Methodist Church, Dallas,
Texas. “Two minutes from closing,” by the pastor’s own admission, with
the endowment used up and the people gone, the church decided to change
drastically. The Rev. Diane Presley, the church’s pastor, told the seven-year
story of this church that could be almost anywhere in the United
States. She said there are three things that any transforming church
needs to have: a stable financial base; a vision to nurture; and “You
gotta have people.”
Ministry with the poor
The Rev. Ed Paup, top executive of the United Methodist Board of
Global Ministries, told participants that “it cannot be business as
usual if we intend to make ministry to and with the poor a priority.”
While many United Methodists are not poor, he reminded listeners
that “more than 80 percent of humanity lives on less than $10 a day.
The poorest 40 percent of population accounts for only 5 percent of
income.”
“It cannot be business as usual
if we intend to make ministry to and with the poor a priority,”
says the Rev. Edward Paup.
A UMNS photo by Erik Alsgaard.
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The church can do three things, he said: listen to the poor themselves,
not just to the statistics; accept the poor – which implies seeing them
and acknowledging that they exist; and serve the poor – responding to
needs, spiritual and physical. Noting that The United Methodist Church has hundreds of effective
ministries with the poor in place, Paup noted that the church today is
“neither without model or practitioner.” Nevertheless, to make a
difference, United Methodists—who make up about .002 percent of the
world’s population—must collaborate in new and sometimes strange ways.
“If we do this in a way that I believe God calls us, we will see a
renewal in The United Methodist Church and a new sense of relevancy in
the world,” Paup said. “The transformation will take place
individually, then in our congregations, and then in our conferences.”
An offering raised nearly $8,000 for the North East District
Outreach Ministries of the Florida Annual (regional) Conference.
Participants placed money and checks on a table at the front of the
stage as the praise band from New Life United Methodist Church provided
music.
Global health
Choir members of the New Life United Methodist Church in Jacksonville, Fla., lead praise and worship.
A UMNS photo by Erik Alsgaard.
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From the beginning of the Methodist movement, John Wesley recognized
the correlation between poverty and health, said the Rev. Larry Hollon,
top executive of United Methodist Communications. “Wesley’s holistic
theology led him to engage with individuals and systems that dealt with
health care systems,” he said, noting that one of Wesley’s first
ministries was a health clinic for the poor. Preventable diseases are taking a terrible toll on people around
the world, Hollon said, but added, “We believe we have the power to
make and create change.”
A central partner and inspiration behind the denominational effort
to eradicate malaria using bed nets, United Methodist Communications
has begun creating wide-ranging conversations on the global health
initiative.
“Bed nets save the lives of children in malaria-affected areas of
the world,” said Hollon. “But it is not only about bed nets. It is
about training community health workers in participatory health care…
it is about providing life-enhancing education through radio, mailings
and other communication tools… it is about enlisting and deploying new
missionaries for global health… it is about enlisting health champions
and parish nurses in each annual conference.”
Dr. Cherian Thomas says addressing issues of poverty and global health
requires partnerships. A UMNS photo by Erik Alsgaard.
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The Rev. Gary Gunderson, senior vice president for Health and Welfare
Ministries for Methodist Healthcare in Memphis, Tenn., sounded a
hopeful note. “We have science to drastically reduce, if not eliminate,
the worst offenses of justice and poverty globally," he said. “In just 100 years, the average human life span grew 37 years, a
miracle John Wesley would not been so bold to pray for,” he said.
“God’s abundance is far greater than imagined. In most of the world, we
are already winning and we have hardly gotten our act together. In
Africa and South Asia, we have only begun to fight.”
Dr. Cherian Thomas, a physician who is executive secretary for the
Hospital Revitalization Program of the Board of Global Ministries, said
that issues of poverty and global health require partnerships.“We have
United Methodists in Pittsburgh who are helping fight cholera in
Zimbabwe,” he added as an example.
The key to moving forward is investment in ideas and people, he said.
The Rev. Gary Henderson challenges participants to provide a “healing
ointment” to the world.
A UMNS photo by Erik Alsgaard.
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“We have to train people in sub-Saharan Africa and south Asia. We
have to have people to move forward,” he said. “We need to develop
programs as well as people. It’s not money we need, it’s ideas and
investment in people. This is my dream for today and for years to
come.”
The Rev. Gary Henderson, executive director of the Global Health
Initiative for The United Methodist Church, challenged the participants
to provide a “healing ointment” to the world.
“If we are going to turn the world upside down, this will require
resurrection faith,” he said. “We hope that the clear ministry areas of
focus would ignite a passion in you…a resurrection faith.”
* Pinkston is director of media relations for the United Methodist
Board of Discipleship in Nashville, Tenn. Alsgaard is director of
communications for the Florida Conference in Lakeland, Fla.
News media contact: Linda Green, Nashville, Tenn., (615) 742-5470 or newsdesk@umcom.org.
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Resources
Quadrennial Training Event
Board of Discipleship
United Methodist Communications
Board of Global Ministries
Board of Church and Society
Board of Higher and Ministry
Florida Annual Conference
Path1
Commission on Christian Unity and Interreligious Concerns
Commission on Religion and Race
Commission on Status and Role of Women
Board of Pension and Health Benefits
Finance and Administration
Publishing House
United Methodist Men |