by Steve | Nov 22, 2019 | Magazine, Magazine Articles, Nov-Dec 2019
By Maggie Ulmer –
Children singing in Pie Town, New Mexico. Photo: Russell Lee. 1940 Farm Security Administration. Library of Congress.
There’s a song. An old hymn called “Give Me Jesus.” The words are to the point: “You can have all this world. Give me Jesus.”
When I think of what I wish most for my children, it’s that they would understand the profound truth of that simple lyric. We’re a clergy family so there’s no shortage of religion in our life, nor should there be — don’t mistake me. We’ve taught our sons the revelation of God’s truth in scripture since they were infants. They know the liturgy. They know the hymns. They know the prayers. They also know there are significant parts of their lives in Christ that their father and I cannot manufacture for them. Intimacy with the Lord is something they must increasingly pursue themselves. The revelation of Christ himself is encountered through relationship and without it the Christian life is not complete.
Paul writes eloquently of the importance of surrendering ourselves, body and mind, to the influences of Heaven and leaving behind our old identity for our divinely designed identity in Christ. “So in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith, for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ” (Galatians 3:26). No one is more emblematic of this transformation than Paul himself. His encounter with Jesus, on the road to Damascus found him unable to recognize the very God whose word he dedicated himself to understanding and defending.
Academic proficiency is not enough to tell us who God is, or who God calls us to be. We need revelation from God to fully understand God’s will and our calling within his will. This is not to say we don’t need study. We do. My children are homeschooled in part so we can spend dedicated time to studying theology. It is within Paul’s well established framework of knowledge that Christ himself reveals to Paul the prophetic clues of his Messiahship. Paul’s studious nature and deep understanding of the Law are paramount to the success of his calling to evangelize the Gentiles of the Roman world. I want my children to know that not only can they be shaped and nourished by scripture, but that they can receive even deeper insight and wisdom from Christ himself.
Entering God’s presence, inevitably illuminates our brokenness. Psalm 24 asks, “Who may ascend the mountain of the Lord? Who may stand in his holy place?” We may be tempted to think it isn’t right to seek God’s presence, or that, the occasional touch from the Holy Spirit is enough, that we shouldn’t be too greedy for him.
To that I say: “Have you ever been in his presence?”
Years ago at my husband’s first appointment there was a woman in the local nursing home who was no longer verbal except for one phrase: “Into the Garden!” She would yell. Lord help me; I’m not a fan of that hymn, but we sang it for her every time we visited. As we’d come to the refrain she’d close her eyes and cry:
“And He walks with me, and He talks with me / And He tells me I am His own/ And the joy we share as we tarry there/ None other has ever known.”
Through the new covenant of Christ’s blood we are given grace by the confession of our faith. We are adopted children of the promise. We belong to the Father, we bear his name and authority. We are forgiven and cleansed. We are new creations who may approach the throne of God with boldness. That is our identity in Christ. If we seek his presence, we’ll know that he calls us his own. I want my children to know they can encounter Christ himself and discover their greatest purpose in him, and the measure of God’s love and the possibility of their calling is not defined by their past sins.
Christians are sometimes wary of expressions of Christianity that emphasize experience and encounter over the word. Fair enough, caution may be advisable in those instances. We can’t understand God apart from scripture and most of us raised in the church began our relationship with God through the word. However, scripture itself suggests that habitual meditation on the word renews our minds not only in our ability to distinguish the lawful from the unlawful, but also the supernaturally sacred from the supernaturally profane.
Presumably this is because the writers of scripture correctly understood the world we inhabit is indeed a world of both natural and supernatural phenomena. When we reject biblical accounts of divine healing, the existence of demons, raising the dead, angelic visitations, or post resurrection appearances of Christ, as either primitive interpretations of naturally explainable events or, as no longer theologically viable in today’s church, we impugn principle objectives of Christ’s very coming. We render ourselves defenseless against the ceaseless waves of narcissistic spiritualism proliferated by culture. And absent the power of God, we arm our children with nothing better than philosophical moralism. As a church family we must press for more, so much more.
The world offers encounters and experiences every day that promise to satisfy the ache that comes with having eternity written in our hearts. St. Augustine names every human’s soul sickness when he says “Thou hast made us for thyself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it finds its rest in thee.”
I want my children, I want all of our children, to meet the Lord. I want them have a revelation of their imperishable, undefiled, unfading inheritance in Heaven, today. I want them to know there is divine love that the world cannot hope to compete with.
Maggie Ulmer is one of the hosts of the Plain Truth: A Holy Spirited Podcast. She holds a degree in Classical French Cuisine from PA Culinary Institute, is the co-founder of a professional theatre company called The Hub Theatre, and is married to a United Methodist pastor.
by Steve | Nov 22, 2019 | Magazine, Magazine Articles, Nov-Dec 2019
By Philippe Kituka Lolonga –
Zacky Kabunga, president of United Methodist Men in Goma, Congo, counsels a group of children who live on the streets in South Kivu. Photo by Philippe Kituka Lolonga, UM News.
There are nearly 3,000 children and youth living on the streets in South Kivu. The United Methodist Church in Congo is working to build relationships – through evangelism, counseling, and other support – to help some of them find a better path.
“Men of God are called to help these categories of people because it is part of the mission of the church,” said the Rev. Clement Kingombe, pastor of Ibanda United Methodist Church in Bukavu, who has been working with the youth for two years. Oftentimes, the young people gather around places that sell alcohol and they cause trouble in the streets, he said.
Mbilizi Bonane, president of United Methodist Women in Bukavu, said it has become a real problem. “There are street kids criss-crossing and bothering us from day to day. They smoke along the way and take strong alcoholic beverages,” she said.
Luc Lukwangomo, head of the Office of Child Protection in the Provincial Division of Social and Humanitarian Affairs in South Kivu, said there are many root causes for the increase in “street children.” Family poverty, divorce, drugs, a lack of education, and armed conflicts in villages are some of the factors that lead young people to live alone on the streets, he said.
Most of these children are runaways ranging in age from 12 to 16 years old, Lukwangomo said, noting that South Kivu alone has 2,976 children who are in difficult situations and find themselves at different sites in the city and its surroundings.
Bonane said United Methodist Women is helping assist the children with food and other needs. In August, the group provided food for nearly 30 street children living in Bukavu. “As a church, we organize locally with our congregations to begin to get closer to these children who sow terror in the city of Bukavu,” she said.
Kingombe said there are opportunities to bring the young people into the church and show them a better way to live. “We go to various places to meet these children in street situations. We sensitize them to participate in our activities of the church. The first way is to bring them the Word of God, and if they accept, we invite them in the church to pray with us. But, some of them refuse,” he said.
Bisimwa Janvier, 15, is grateful for the church’s support. “I thank The United Methodist Church very much for the spiritual, moral, and sometimes material support. This is a feeling of love for street children,” he said.
Zacky Kabunga, president of United Methodist Men in Goma, works with a group of street children each week and said there are others who are beginning to accept help from The United Methodist Church. “It’s hard work that requires patience and also the courage to work with these kids,” Kabunga said.
Janvier said the teachings of United Methodist pastors have led him to let go of his “old habits,” which included stealing from people. “Today, I’ve just made a commitment to educate other street kids to leave this behavior behind,” he said.
At Kadutu United Methodist Church in Bukavu, two street children who were counseled by United Methodist pastors are now working for the church.
Shukuru Amos, 15, said thanks to Kingombe, who visited him regularly on the streets, he is now serving the church and singing in the choir. “I did not have a place to go, but today I live in the house of one the faithful of The (United) Methodist Church who accepted and welcomed us to his home,” he said. “Now, I’ll be willing to talk to other street children to join them to serve God.”
The Rev. Ibrahimu Sumaili, pastor of Kadutu United Methodist Church, hopes to raise awareness about the young people and their potential. “Our mission is to turn these children into disciples of God, so I commit myself each time to meet these children and talk with them,” he said.
The Rev. Ezekiel Mathe, a delegate representative for Bishop Gabriel Yemba Unda in the Kivu Conference, said it’s the church’s responsibility to lift up and encourage these young people to leave the streets and work toward a better future. “If no one is interested in them, if our eyes do not change with them, if we do not give them yet another chance to become like our children: educated, socialized, evangelized, and evolved in a healthy environment … we will prepare for a difficult future for the country and for the church,” he said.
Kituka Lolonga is the Kivu Conference communicator. Distributed by United Methodist News Service.
by Steve | Nov 22, 2019 | Magazine, Magazine Articles, Nov-Dec 2019
By Steve Beard –
“When you pass through the waters. I will be with you; and when you pass through the rivers, they will not sweep over you. When you walk through the fire, you will not be burned; the flames will not set you ablaze. For I am the LORD your God …” (Isaiah 43:2,3).
Those were the life verses of Sally, the wife of photographer Jeff Rogers. When she died in 2007 after a battle with cancer, Jeff felt as if his heart was irreversibly broken. “But to my surprise,” confesses Rogers, “something new began to happen. Scripture became more alive to me than ever before. Readings from the Psalms became clearer and more significant; in my grief and suffering the words jumped off the pages.”
Rogers’ new book Streams in the Desert features scriptural passages on suffering and hope along with 80 pages of his phenomenal images captured from around the globe. Elegantly done. (JeffRogers.com.)
Are Americans losing their religion – or simply replacing it with the orthodoxies, rituals, and dogmas of career, parenting, 
technology, food, politics, and romance?
“Bombarded with poll results about declining levels of church attendance and belief in God, we assume that more and more people are abandoning faith and making their own meaning,” writes David Zahl in his insightful new book, Seculosity. What these polls actually tell us, believes Zahl, is that “confidence in the religious narratives we’ve inherited has collapsed. What they fail to report is that the marketplace in replacement religion is booming. We may be sleeping in on Sunday mornings in greater numbers, but we’ve never been more pious. Religious observance hasn’t faded apace ‘secularization’ so much as migrated … ”
As analyst of the contemporary religious scene, Zahl mixes the kind of grace and smarts that fuels his website Mockingbird (mbird.com).
by Steve | Nov 22, 2019 | Magazine, Magazine Articles, Nov-Dec 2019
By Jim Ramsay –
Migration – the movement of peoples around the world – has been going on since the beginning of time. Due to the intense political debates recently over immigration policy, many in our nation – and in our churches – risk seeing only a very narrow view of the larger phenomenon. Of greater concern, we can risk missing where the hand of God might be in the movement of peoples. Is it possible that migration is actually one of the ways God is fulfilling his mission? If so, perhaps we should be paying closer attention to ways that we can understand and participate in his mission among human populations on the move.
According to recent United Nations statistics, about 260 million people now live outside of their countries of origin. The migration of people is a global phenomenon. The United States is still the largest recipient of international migrants (19 percent of the total), and yet there are huge movements within continents, especially in Africa and Asia, where 80 percent of migration remains on the continent.
Although refugees represent a highly vulnerable and needy population, they comprise less than 10 percent of the overall population of global migrants. It is important for churches to consider how to offer the love of Christ to refugee populations, but most immigrants are not in that category. (For local congregations, World Relief is an excellent resource for churches wanting to learn to engage with refugee populations.)
Migration plays a significant role all throughout the Bible. In the Old Testament it is often in the context of migrations that God revealed himself to his people. In the New Testament the early church was formed on the streams of migration.
Given that most immigrants who come to the United States actually come from Christian backgrounds, it behooves local congregations to ask: How might we in host-culture churches connect with these newer communities? What can we learn from them? How might we partner together for God’s Kingdom in our communities, our nation, and beyond our borders? What might this look like practically? Here some first steps:
Awareness – Who is around you? The U.S. Census web pages provide a wealth of information. For example, I discovered that 25 percent of my county in Georgia (Gwinnett) was not born in the United States. Your church can do this kind of simple research and find out about these communities.
Prayer – As awareness comes, make it a matter of strategic, concerted prayer for the Lord to guide your community. Pray for divine appointments and for mutual understanding.
Connection – Meet with leaders of some of the local churches you discovered in your survey. If you have first- or second-generation international immigrants in your church, perhaps they can share about their experience and their communities.
Cultural Bridges – Identify people in your congregation who can be “cultural bridges” to help connect with communities around you. These can be people from the host culture who have lived and served cross-culturally themselves, or those who navigate both cultures.
Training – Basic understanding of cultural concepts and cross-cultural communication can be vital to building community with people from other backgrounds. It also can help build empathy among those who have never had the experience of being uprooted, living in an unfamiliar setting, or being a minority. Mission agencies can be a resource here.
Followers of Christ can certainly have varied opinions on proper government action in relation to immigration. But we need always to ask, What might God be up to? We then need to consider how we can connect to that. The presence of diverse communities throughout our nation, many of them from Christian backgrounds, presents us with such an opportunity to explore how God might be advancing His kingdom through people on the move.
Jim Ramsay serves as vice president for global operations at TMS Global (www.TMS-Global.org). Through its Activate process, TMS Global can help your church deepen its missional impact locally and globally.
by Steve | Nov 22, 2019 | Magazine, Magazine Articles, Nov-Dec 2019
By B.J. Funk –
For years, a man had stayed at the side of the pool of Bethesda, waiting with many other disabled folks for a chance to get into the water. It was thought that the pool of Bethesda held healing powers, and that when the miraculous water bubbled, the first one in the pool received healing. But this man, identified in John 5:2-9, was not able to move without help. Someone had to carry him to the pool in the morning and come back for him in the afternoon.
By the side of the pool, he had been so close, yet so far away from victory. He felt defeated and helpless to make the move into the bubbly healing waters. He was identified by his defeat. Hopeless Man. Forgotten Man. Lame Man.
He had been ill longer than the years Jesus lived on earth. Jesus died at 33, and this man had been ill for 38 years. But this new day would be different because Jesus happened to walk that way, compelled to stop and speak to this one stuck by the side of the pool. Jesus asked a question that penetrated into his soul.
“Do you want to get well?”
“Sir,” the man replied. “I have no one to help me in the water. While I am trying to get in, someone else gets in before me.”
Jesus said, “Get up. Pick up your mat and walk.” Immediately, this man was healed.
The mat that had held him for 38 years now became the mat that he held. The man who had been helpless was now hopeful. The Forgotten Man was now noticed. Jesus’ command to “Get up,” reached far into this man’s soul. He made the effort. He got up. He had a new name. Healed Man.
William Barclay writes, “Here is the road to achievement. There are so many things in this world which defeat us. When we have intensity of desire and determination to make the effort, hopeless though it may seem, the power of Christ gets its opportunity, and with Him we can conquer the things that for a long time have conquered us.”
As long as he was lying on a mat and not bothering anyone, he was not a problem for anyone. However, as soon as the religious folks learned he was carrying a mat on their holy day, he was immediately a problem. The rules of religion collided with the grace of God, and what should have been a beautiful moment was tarnished with tradition.
Loud words of “We don’t do that!” jumped all over Healed Man as religion pushed through, over, and around his miracle.
“It is the Sabbath! The law forbids you to carry your mat on the Sabbath!”
The United Methodist Church has been stuck by the side of a pool, lying on mats of difficulty and differences for more than 38 years. But, now we have picked up our mats of uncertainty and moved into the encouraging bubbly waters of grace.
As long as we have been lying on our mat and not bothering anyone, we posed no threat to anyone. However, as soon as we starting carrying our mats, others were not pleased. Different opinions clashed as we struggled to keep our beloved church afloat.
Then, Jesus comes along and asks the church, “Do you want to get well?” Something about that question reached deep into our soul.
We do. We are. We want our mats to hold us no longer. We feel confidence as the waters stir and the bubbles rise to the top. We are ready, with Christ, to conquer those things that for a long time have conquered us.
The healing waters of Bethesda show no partiality. Its miracle is for all United Methodist Christians.
You are invited. Come on in. The water is fine!
