Politicians, Preachers, and Sacrifice
George Mitrovich confronts preachers with two unlikely pairs of brothers.
Ana’s Day
Randy Jessen introduces Ana. She has a winning smile;
she’s HIV positive.
Preaching in United Methodism Today
Will Willimon reports on the state of preaching.
When God’s People Pray - God Answers! Margaret Therkelsen celebrates the power of God’s presence.
Boyce Bowden explores the mission field of Oklahoma State University.
General Conference Reconsidered
Tom Lambrecht surveys the worldwide church and education at Ft. Worth.
The 2004 Book of Resolutions: The Voice of the United Methodist Church?
Liza B. Kittle analyzes the origins of resolutions at General Conference.
COLUMNS
Do we have a doctrinal consensus?
Call and we will answer
Next GenerationYouth ministry as wind chime III
The Great CommissionLost in the shadow of a steeple
From the HeartThe Far Side
DEPARTMENTS
Evangelical gathering addresses critical issues
Convocationfocuses on living "the United Methodist way"
Researcher analyzes State of the Church report
Righteous Laughter
Six conservative evangelical United Methodist renewal organizations asked delegates elected to the 2008 churchwide and jurisdictional conferences to pray and plan for a “renewed and dynamic United Methodist church.”
The Renewal and Reform Coalition sponsored the conference Oct. 26-27 at Christ United Methodist Church in Memphis. The coalition includes the Confessing Movement, Good News, Renew, LifeWatch, Transforming Congregations, and UMAction.
The meeting’s purpose was to address what the groups consider the six most critical issues coming before the church’s top lawmaking body: General Conference in the context of a global church; advocacy for women and children; the role of the Judicial Council; doctrine, accountability, leadership and the Council of Bishops; membership standards; and empowering the central conferences.
The 2008 General Conference will meet April 23-May 2 in Fort Worth, Texas. The 1,000 delegates elected by annual (regional) conferences will decide policy and approve a denominational budget for the next four years. Jurisdictional conferences will meet in July to elect new bishops for the five geographic conferences in the United States. Ninety-eight delegates, including alternates, registered for the Memphis event, said Patricia L. Miller, executive director of the Confessing Movement.
“You don’t have to have a sense of direction as bad as mine to know the United Methodist Church is going the wrong way,” said the Rev. Rob Renfroe in opening the first session.
“In terms of membership, we are going the wrong way; in terms of attendance, we are going the wrong way; in terms of being able to raise up young men and young women who want to give their hearts and their passion and their lives to the cause of Christ in ministry of the United Methodist Church, we are going the wrong way,” said Renfroe, a pastor at the Woodlands (Texas) United Methodist Church.
Renfroe said United Methodist evangelicals are indebted “to our brothers and sisters in the central conferences”—which are in Africa, Europe and Asia—because of their commitment to the poor and to Scripture.
The Rev. Eddie Fox, world director of evangelism for the World Methodist Council, praised the central conferences and cautioned delegates about a proposal that may go to General Conference to make the United States a central or regional conference as well.
The proposal comes from the UM Council of Bishops and would change the constitution of the denomination.
“It is not the time to talk about dividing the church,” said Fox. One-third of the General Conference comes from outside the United States. The church is global and has been from the beginning, he said.
“Why change the constitution without knowing what the consequences are? Can you imagine the amount of time and debate we will spend trying to decide what belongs in a national conference and what belongs in a regional conference? Becoming a national entity sets us on a track to be more divisive than it is to create unity for us in our church.”
Judge Ron Enns, Northwest Texas Annual Conference, told participants the most important votes that will be cast at General Conference will be for spots on the Judicial Council, the top court of the denomination.
“Five people on the Judicial Council can change church law,” he said. “It is imperative we elect evangelicals to the council.”
“Am I misreading the signs?” asked the Rev. Maxie Dunnam, an author and speaker who will serve as a General Conference delegate from the Kentucky Annual Conference. “I am not hearing words like dynamic or life-changing to describe The United Methodist Church in the U.S. and Europe. People are asking for bread and too often are given a stone.”
Dunnam said the church’s media campaign of “Open hearts. Open minds. Open doors.” would be “genius” if presented with orthodox and Wesleyan integrity.
“Open hearts, open minds, open doors to whom and to what purpose?” he asked. Dunnam quoted Methodism founder John Wesley: “I am not afraid that the people called Methodist should ever cease to exist either in Europe or America. But I am afraid lest they should only exist as a dead sect, having the form of religion without the power. And this will undoubtedly be the case unless they hold fast to the doctrine, spirit and discipline with which they first set out.”
The Rev. Jerry P. Kulah, superintendent in Monrovia, Liberia, of the Africa Annual Conference, presented a plan for renewal and transforming the church.
“I am delighted to inform you that United Methodists all over Africa strongly hold the conviction that there is hope and a future for global Methodism through our Wesleyan heritage,” he said. “But the fulfillment of this hope and realization of the anticipated future critically depend upon the quality leadership that provides direction for the future, and the choices we make as a church regarding biblical doctrine, Christian discipline, our devotion to the Lordship of Jesus Christ, our submission to the control and empowerment by the Holy Spirit and our commitment to the fulfillment of the Great commission (Matthew 28:19-20).”
Kulah said when Jesus was threatened by King Herod, the holy family fled to Africa. “Today the church in Africa offers itself as a sanctuary for God’s Word for the renewing of his church around the world,” he said.
Other sessions included a presentation on legislation aimed at advocacy for women’s and children’s issues and membership standards.
The coalition also offered an orientation to its six organizations and invited delegates to join them during General Conference, where daily briefing breakfasts will provide highlights of the previous day’s activities and offer delegates a “spiritual lift,” according to organizers.
Audio and text from the conference can be found on the Christ UM Church Web site at http://cumcmemphis.org/default.aspx?pid=335.
Do no harm. Do good. Stay in love with God.”
Nearly 1,000 United Methodists from throughout the world learned those three simple rules in Lake Junaluska, North Carolina, November 9-11 and committed to teach them to others as they extend the church’s mission of making disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world.
The occasion was the first joint meeting in almost 40 years of the United Methodist bishops and their cabinets. Three Simple Rules: A Wesleyan Way of Living, a new book by Bishop Rueben Job, was one of the convocation’s guides.
In the book’s preface, the retired bishop writes that in the fast-paced and complex world of the 21st century, people of faith are ready for a more faithful way of living and discipleship. Methodism founder John Wesley articulated how to live faithfully and then practiced and taught those principles.
“And now it is up to us to see if we will take it, teach it, and practice it until it becomes our natural way of living—a way of living that will mark our life together and our lives as individual Christians,” Job said.
Throughout the convocation, the bishops emphasized a commitment to teaching the rules of United Methodist living in order that people and congregations may be strengthened and grow in faith.
The convocation brought together district superintendents and others charged with leading their annual (regional) conferences to develop clarity around the church’s purpose, mission, and identity and to prepare to lead the church in new ways.
New York West Area Bishop Violet Fisher agreed and delivered a sermon called “We Are the Ones We Have Been Waiting For,” using the title of a song by the African-American group Sweet Honey in the Rock. She said United Methodist leaders live in God’s world as God’s co-workers to enhance the welfare of people.
“We are called out of our insulated individualism into solidarity with the other people, not only at home but also around world,” said Fisher. “The world is waiting for us.”
The United Methodist Church in Africa and the Philippines know how to make disciples of Jesus Christ while the church in the United States is losing members. Huie said United Methodists in the United States need to stop bickering among themselves and focus on spirituality, their identity as United Methodists, and what God is calling them to be and do.
For the Rev. David Muwaya of Uganda, East Africa, the United Methodist way “means working together as (a) global church, building relationships with churches within our own conference and with churches elsewhere, bringing together people to share our history and to determine where we move from here.”
The Rev. Linda Wiberg, director of connectional giving for the California-Nevada Annual Conference, said living the United Methodist way means getting in touch with the Wesleyan spirit and the movement that John Wesley and his brother, Charles, helped to create.
“It is about intentionality and personal piety and social holiness,” she said. “They are in partnership with one another and give us a whole Gospel to proclaim.”
Prior to the gathering, participants read and discussed “The United Methodist Way: Living the Christian Life in Covenant with Christ and One Another,” a paper commissioned for the convocation by the Council of Bishops. The paper is available at http://www.gbod.org/extendedcabinet/UMWay.pdf.
Linda Green is a United Methodist News Service news writer based in Nashville, Tennessee.
The United Methodist presence in the United States today is the same as it was in 1820. And, if trends in aging and membership losses continue at their current rates, the church will shrink to its size at the time of the first Christmas Conference in 1784.
The analysis came from the Rev. Lovett Weems, a United Methodist researcher, speaking November 6 to the denomination’s Council of Bishops in Lake Junaluska, North Carolina, after examining the State of the Church report released in June.
The report provides a baseline of the thoughts, feelings, values, and judgments of a cross-section of United Methodist leaders and members, said Ohio East Bishop John Hopkins, president of the Connectional Table, the leadership entity that coordinates the mission, ministries, and resources for the denomination.
The Connectional Table commissioned the report in 2005 and asked Weems to review the resulting data and feedback and identify emerging questions, contradictions, and implications. Weems is professor of church leadership and director of the Lewis Center for Church Leadership of Wesley Theological Seminary, Washington, D.C.
Weems provided his analysis in the form of questions related to ten areas: 1) theological grounding and spiritual vitality; 2) a global church; 3) church structure; 4) the aging church; 5) finances; 6) young clergy recruitment; 7) diversity; 8) the church’s future; 9) large churches; and 10) pastoral effectiveness.
The questions “lead us to wonder if we can have a future worthy of our past,” said Weems, adding that “without a new vision, the future does not look bright.” However, he also told the bishops that new visions often emerge in times of hardship.
Church leaders have been struggling for decades to understand the gradual decline of the denomination’s reach in the United States, where membership is less than 8 million, a decline of 19 percent since 1974. Forty-one percent of United Methodist churches in the U.S. did not report a single profession of faith in 2005.
Weems said the denomination has a future in the U.S. only if it can reach younger and more diverse people. “As the last century unfolded, the nation changed and the church did not,” he noted.
Today, the U.S. church is smaller and older and less diverse than the country’s population, he said, noting that the denomination has steadily grayed since 1975.
Weems said the issue of race and ethnicity is not as prominent in the State of the Church report as would be expected given that the U.S. is undergoing one of the most dramatic racial and ethnic shifts in its history. He said all mainline churches have statements about inclusiveness, but “there is not a single mainline denomination in the United States that has shown that it can reach any group of people other than white people as well as it can reach white people.”
The United Methodist Church is most effective at reaching whites and African Americans but is even struggling today to reach those groups, according to Weems. “The need for a renewed spirit of inclusion of people is crucial today,” he said. The church’s future will be shaped by “its willingness and ability to respond to the changing face of America.”
Weems called the lack of young United Methodist clergy both a crisis and a “complex, multi-dimensional phenomenon” and asked if they should be declared an endangered species. Over the last 20 years, the denomination’s U.S. clergy under the age of 35 has dropped below 5 percent.
“There is no single cause and no single solution,” he said. The church must recruit young clergy to bring new ideas, creativity, energy and cultural awareness, said Weems.
Weems told the bishops that large churches have attracted young people and diverse congregations for at least 30 years.
Only one percent of the 34,892 United Methodist churches have a worship attendance of more than 500 people, and those larger congregations represent 20 percent of membership, 20 percent of attendance, 24 percent of professions of faith, 25 percent of youth, 26 percent of children, and 29 percent of people of color.
The numbers, he said, “cry out for attention to what we all can learn from these congregations.”
The good news is that the report indicates that United Methodists are immersed in experiences leading to theological grounding and spiritual vitality.
“United Methodist core beliefs are clear,” and there is “remarkable” consensus on key tenets of the Christian faith, he said, with variations of emphasis in the United States and across the globe.
Weems described the church as evangelical in a liberal tradition. “Could such a vision that is both deep (in faith and piety) and open (to new needs and possibilities) sustain us over the years ahead?” he asked.
The report is based on surveys conducted between June and September of 2006, and involved interviewing a cross-section of about 3,000 United Methodist clergy, lay leaders, and members from across the globe. Connectional Table leaders said the project was the first time the church has attempted to produce a comprehensive overview of the life of the church and was designed to stimulate churchwide conversation.
Linda Green is a United Methodist News Service news writer based in Nashville, Tennessee.
We all have favorite things—favorite mugs, favorite brands, favorite traditions. One of my favorite things is a brilliantly colored blanket of deep reds, cheerful yellows, and faded black. It is soft, it is cotton, and it is hand stitched. Recently, I had the rare opportunity to get to know the director of the business that produced my favorite blanket. Sarah Lance, social entrepreneur and director of Sari Bari, represents the ministry organization Word Made Flesh in India. Through Word Made Flesh, the small Sari Bari organization provides employment for women desiring to exit the sex trade. These women create dozens of blankets, like mine, and in doing so create new lives.
Good News: How did you initially get the idea to use old saris to provide opportunities for women to escape sex slavery in India?
Sarah Lance: The Sari Blanket was not a new idea. The poor of India and Bangladesh have been making them for a long time by taking their old saris and recycling them to make a blanket that keeps them warm in the cooler months.
GN: What do these blankets symbolize to the women who make them?
SL: Freedom, new life, hope, and a safe place.
We have been in the red-light areas since 2002, sharing in the lives of the women, and we saw a need to provide a place for them to “go to” from the red-light district. We saw the parallel, of taking something old like a sari and making it new, in the women of red-light districts’ lives. We want to see the transformation of one who had been tossed aside, just like an old sari, and see a life made new.
GN: How many women have found refuge in Sari Bari work? How is their livelihood comparable to their labor in the sex industry of India?
SL: Currently, we have one primary unit employing twelve women and a partnering unit which employs ten women. We will be taking an additional five to eight women for training in December at the primary unit. We have spent many hours praying and wrestling with what fair wages mean and have come to the conclusion that we do not want only to pay fair wages, but just wages. We used the fair wage calculator from World of Good to set the minimum standard and have added multiple additional benefits for the women, including health care, a savings plan, and school assistance for their children. The pay is comparable in some cases, but more often than not, exceeds what the women weremaking in the trade.
GN: What is it like for women with such personal experiences to come together and work on new, tangible projects with other women who have similar but unique backgrounds?
SL: I think the sense of community and family is really powerful among the women at Sari Bari. They are literally working with their neighbors. Most of the women working at Sari Bari come from a handful of brothels and they are responsible for bringing each other out of the trade; we have very little to do with it most of the time. We are just cheerleaders along the road and catalysts for more women to have the opportunity to leave.
Most Sari Bari ladies have remained in the brothels and act as powerful agents for transformation within the red-light community. The Sari Bari ladies walk to work together, share their lunches, and share the commonality of walking the road of exodus out of the slavery of the sex trade.
GN: What do you envision for Sari Bari’s future?
SL: Sari Bari will be two years old in February and we will be celebrating what God has done in the lives of the 22 women who have begun to have freedom on so many levels. We are currently looking for a larger location so that we can have the space to welcome more women into the Sari Bari family. We hope to be able to employ about 40 women by the end of the year and expand the products available. We will continue to dream for the transformation of the red-light districts and the hope of lives being made new, not only through employment, but in the arms of Jesus.
Elizabeth Glass is editorial assistant at Good News. For more information, check out www.SariBari.com.
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