Indianapolis Plan and Amicable Separation

by Steve | Nov 22, 2019 | Magazine, Magazine Articles, Nov-Dec 2019

A delegate holds her voting device aloft on the last day of a Special Session of the General Conference of The United Methodist Church, held in St. Louis, Missouri. Photo by Paul Jeffrey, UMNS.

By Thomas Lambrecht

On September 18, the conversation group working on the Indianapolis Plan submitted the final version of a plan for an amicable separation in The United Methodist Church. As the document states, “We seek to move away from the caustic atmosphere which has often marked conversation in the United Methodist Church into a new season where we bless one another as we send each other into our respective mission fields to multiply our witness for Christ.” This plan (of which I am one of the authors) envisions the UM Church giving birth to new denominations of United Methodism.

• A Traditionalist UM Church would maintain the current stance of the Discipline regarding same-sex marriage and the ordination of LGBT persons.

• A Centrist UM Church would remove all the restrictions related to same-sex marriage and LGBT ordination, allowing individual annual conferences and local churches to make those decisions (essentially a “One Church Plan” denomination).

• A Progressive UM Church that celebrates and mandates same-sex marriage and LGBT ordination in all its churches could form immediately, and/or progressives could find a home in the Centrist UM Church.

• Other denominations could be formed by any annual conference or group of 50 congregations.

These new denominations would be separate from one another, with different Books of Discipline, separate finances, and different theological perspectives. However, all would share a common Wesleyan, United Methodist heritage and doctrine. Each could use the name “United Methodist” with a modifier to distinguish it from the other denominations. Each could use a version of the cross and flame logo modified to fit their particular denomination.

What are the unique values and advantages of the Indianapolis Plan?

It is the only plan that was crafted by persons representing diverse theological perspectives. The group contained five traditionalists, five centrists, and two progressives. (Attempts were made to enlist more progressives, but those approached were unable or unwilling to participate. However, progressive groups were consulted as the plan developed.) As such, this plan seeks to take into account the values and interests of all three groups. It represents a compromise among the three for the sake of ending the fighting and helping the church move into a positive and fruitful future.

The Indianapolis Plan is supported by the leaders of the Wesleyan Covenant Association, the Confessing Movement, Good News, and UM Action/IRD. At the same time, the plan was not drawn up by these traditionalist groups. Instead, it was formulated in negotiations among diverse participants mentioned earlier.

It is the only plan that seeks division/separation rather than expulsion. By now, the leaders of all three groups – traditionalists, centrists, and progressives – have publicly stated that separation of some kind is the only way to move forward in a positive direction. Most other plans, however, envision a forced departure of one group or another from the church. The UMC Next Plan would essentially force traditionalists to leave the UM Church by changing the church’s definition of marriage and allowing LGBT ordination. Continuing to perfect the Traditional Plan by increasing accountability and closing loopholes would essentially force progressives to leave the UM Church or be subject to complaints and disciplinary procedures.

Only the Indianapolis Plan treats all perspectives equally, forcing no one to “leave” the church, but at the same time creating new denominations and allowing anyone to choose which new denomination to be part of. Nowhere in the plan is this more clearly seen than in the ability of central conferences, annual conferences, and local churches to make the decision on which denomination to align with by majority vote, rather than a super-majority (2/3) vote. If one group is “leaving,” a super-majority vote would make sense. But if all are choosing between equal alternatives, then a majority vote is more appropriate. Under the Indianapolis Plan, there are no winners or losers, people “leaving” and people “staying.” The plan attempts to treat all parties equally.

The Indianapolis Plan does not dissolve The United Methodist Church, but provides for its legal continuation through the Centrist UM Church. This is necessary in order to avoid constitutional amendments, which would require a 2/3 vote of General Conference and a 2/3 vote of all the annual conference members. This plan can be passed by a majority at General Conference and implemented immediately, rather than having to wait up to two years for the ratification vote. Legal continuation of the UM Church is also necessary because of legal issues that may need to be cared for in the process of separation that we may not even be aware of at this point.

But the Centrist UM Church will not simply be a continuation of The United Methodist Church as it currently exists. It will “do business as” the United Methodist name with a modifier. It will change its 48-year moral teachings and requirements around LGBT persons. It will consider making the United States its own central conference, able to adapt the Discipline differently in the U.S. than in other countries. It will undoubtedly change its structure to address the loss of perhaps one-third of its U.S. membership. Even the UMC Next Plan (from the centrists and progressives) envisions the creation of a “Commission on the 21st Century Church” that would “prepare a comprehensive structure and governance plan” to be enacted by a future General Conference. The Centrist UM Church will be in this sense a new denomination.

The Indianapolis Plan seeks to minimize the need for local congregations to vote as much as possible. Taking ideas from the Commission on a Way Forward proposals, this plan envisions central conferences and annual conferences voting on which denomination to align with. Only those local churches disagreeing with their annual conference alignment would need to vote. Because the General Conference cannot mandate that central conferences and annual conferences vote, the plan provides that U.S. annual conferences that do not vote would automatically become part of the Centrist UM Church. Central conferences and annual conferences outside the U.S. that do not vote would automatically become part of the Traditionalist UM Church. These defaults were determined based on our understanding of where most annual conferences would probably end up.

At the same time, it will be easy to trigger a vote in an annual conference. If the annual conference does not announce its intention to vote, any member can make a motion during the session of annual conference that it does take a vote. If the motion passes, the conference would have to take a vote. In addition, the plan allows the annual conference itself to call a special session of the annual conference if needed in order to take such a vote on alignment.

If the goal is to gain support across the theological spectrum for a fair and equitable plan that allows the different parts of the church to move easily into new denominations that can operate independently based on different theological perspectives, the Indianapolis Plan is best suited to accomplish that goal.

All denominations formed under the Indianapolis Plan could use (but are not required to use) the “United Methodist” name with a modifier to distinguish one denomination from another (e.g., Liberationist United Methodist Church, United Methodist Church of the Philippines). The use of the name is not important for many United Methodists in the U.S. However, it is an extremely important issue for some in the central conferences outside the U.S. In Africa, the United Methodist name is a well-established and trusted brand that opens doors and protects the church from capricious governmental actions that might threaten the property or ministries of the church there. They also told us how difficult, cumbersome, and expensive the process is to change a corporate name. We heard from many that they could not support a plan that would require them to change the name of the denomination they are part of. The same is true of the cross and flame logo, which is widely used in Africa and the Philippines to demarcate the United Methodist Church brand. Denominations could continue to use (but are not required to use) the logo with modifications to distinguish one denomination from another.

The Indianapolis Plan provides a new, less costly way to handle pension liabilities. Rather than require an up-front payment of pension liabilities (as in the current local church exit provision), this plan allows Wespath to reallocate those liabilities to the new denominations based on which annual conferences, local churches, and clergy choose to align with each denomination. We engaged in extensive conversation with legal experts at Wespath about how to handle pensions. They were eager to cooperate (without implying any endorsement of our plan) and provided significant legal language for the Indianapolis Plan legislation that they believe addresses the concerns over pensions. Since the money for unfunded pension liabilities may never be needed, it makes more sense to transfer the liability, rather than requiring churches and annual conferences to pay the liability up front. Local churches that withdraw to become independent would still be required to pay for unfunded pension liabilities before withdrawing.

The Indianapolis Plan envisions a General Conference-approved equitable plan for allocating general church assets among the resulting new denominations. While the UMC Next Plan proposes the gift of some financial resources to a new Traditionalist UM Church, the Indianapolis Plan envisions an equitable division of general church assets among all denominations formed in this process. Such a division of assets would not require any boards or agencies to be dissolved or any property to be sold. Rather, liquid assets and investment properties could be divided proportionally based on membership. Where there are donor restrictions on assets, those restrictions would be maintained. While the Indianapolis conversation group did not have time to agree upon a formula for allocating assets, different groups have submitted proposals for how such an allocation might be done. The General Conference and its legislative committee will determine how the process would work. The group agreed that disputes would be settled by appeal to an arbitration board, making any resort to civil courts or lawsuits unnecessary.

The Indianapolis Plan offers a short timeline, allowing expeditious movement into the new denominations for those who are ready, while leaving the door open for alignment decisions for the next eight years. The plan envisions annual conferences making alignment decisions before the end of 2020, with local churches that disagree making their decisions by mid-year 2021. General Conferences forming the new denominations would take place in fall 2021. The new denominations would be fully functional under their new governing documents on January 1, 2022. This timeline allows the new denominations to form and get on with ministry, rather than being mired in the decision-making process. At the same time, annual conferences or local churches (more likely) could change their alignment through the end of 2028. This allows those who are not ready to make a decision right away to live into the possibilities and make a decision later. However, no annual conference or local church could take a vote to reconsider its alignment unless three or four years had passed since its previous vote on the matter.

The Plan creates an interim implementation for those ready to move immediately into a new denomination. Annual conferences and local churches that make a quick alignment decision could begin to live under their new denomination beginning August 1, 2020, on an interim basis. In addition, jurisdictions would be encouraged not to elect new bishops in 2020 but wait until 2021 or 2022 to do so, based on the annual conferences that remain in the Centrist UM Church. This would avoid having a surplus of bishops who do not have an annual conference in which to serve. Central conferences would likely not see any change in their annual conference alignments and could elect bishops as planned in 2020.

The interim implementation will allow immediate change to how churches and annual conferences function, in order to curtail further conflict. Traditionalists would immediately be free of the pressure to change their position on marriage and sexuality and could begin moving in a robustly proactive ministry direction. At the same time, centrists and progressives would immediately be free of complaints, trials, and disciplinary processes over same-sex weddings or the ordination or appointment of self-avowed practicing homosexuals.

Some have pictured amicable separation as a divorce. Our group has instead pictured this process as The United Methodist Church giving birth to new children. The UM Church as it has been will exist no more. But it will exist through the new denominations that inherit the characteristics of the parent denomination. Each of the “children” will be different from each other. But they will all be part of the United Methodist family and heritage.

The underlying motive for taking this path is to broaden and multiply the mission of the church. As different denominations, we will be able to reach more people with the good news of Jesus Christ, make more disciples, and see more ways in which the presence of God’s Spirit transforms the world. We will be able to focus our energies and resources on mission and ministry, rather than fighting, power, and control. Each new expression of the church will be able to reach people that the other denominations cannot reach.

As the plan states, “We envision an amicable separation in The United Methodist Church which would provide a pathway to new denominations of the Methodist movement so we can all make new disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world. These new denominations, though separate, will continue the rich heritage of the Methodist movement while being free to share their respective witnesses for Christ unhindered by those with whom they have been in conflict. We will release one another to joyful obedience to Christ’s call on our lives.” May it be so.

Thomas Lambrecht is a United Methodist clergyperson and the vice president of Good News.

Sinners in the Hands of a Singing God

by Steve | Nov 22, 2019 | Magazine, Magazine Articles, Nov-Dec 2019

Original art from Sam Wedelich (www.samdwedelich.com)

By Steve Beard –

Set in 19th century France, Victor Hugo’s Les Miserables is an epic tale of the spiritual consequences of sin and the search for redemption. In the 1998 movie version, there is a noteworthy scene with the story’s protagonist Jean Valjean (played by Liam Neeson), a reformed thief and factory owner, and Fantine (Uma Thurman), one of his former employees who is deathly sick. Fantine has been ruthlessly fired from her job at the factory because they discovered the truth of her illegitimate daughter, Cosette (Claire Danes). Unemployed, Fantine is forced to work as a prostitute in order to care for Cosette.

In an act of mercy, Jean Valjean cares for Fantine, attempting to nurse her back to health. “When you are better, I will find work for you,” Valjean says.

“But you don’t understand. I am a whore,” responds Fantine. “And Cosette has no father.”

“She has the Lord,” he responds. “He is her Father and you are his creation. In his eyes, you have never been anything but an innocent and beautiful woman.”

After Fantine’s death, Valjean fulfills the role of Cosette’s father and protector. Later in the movie, as a young woman, Cosette described Valjean in elegant terms. “My father is a very good man. I grew up in his love,” she said. “His love was my home.”

The Les Miserables dialogue has unique spiritual significance within our contemporary culture. For many Christians, there is a seemingly direct correlation between the way they interact with their earthly father and the way they view their heavenly Father. After all, it is not difficult to understand how someone who has experienced trauma or abuse in a relationship with an earthly father could be fearful, apprehensive, or reluctant about pursuing an intimate relationship with a spiritual Father. The same could be said of those who experienced an absentee father or an extreme disciplinarian. This kind of spiritual logjam can only be healed through grace-filled pastoral care and prayer so that God’s love can become – to borrow from Cosette – our home. The psalmist described God as a “father to the fatherless, a defender of widows” (Psalms 68:5)

The Westminster Shorter Catechism (1647) declares that the “chief end of man” is to “glorify God, and to enjoy him forever.” Similarly, John Wesley declared: “One design you are to pursue to the end of time: the enjoyment of God in time and in eternity.” Enjoyment of God?

Basking in the unceasing graciousness of a heavenly Father is far more difficult than it sounds. For too many people, God seems remote, impersonal, and unknowable. Because of that, even Christians may suffer from an inability to feel forgiven or they may be riddled with nagging doubt, mistrust of God, and even bouts with hyper-perfectionism.

The late Dr. David Seamands, author of Healing for Damaged Emotions, discovered in counseling sessions that even straight-A seminary students would say, “I don’t know if God cares about me; I’m not sure he knows I exist. If he does, I’m not sure he’s concerned.” In contradiction to their theological concepts of God – the manifestos they wrote for their seminary classes – they felt in their hearts that God is untrustworthy, mean, and unforgiving. Many felt that they were trying to please an unpleaseable God.

We all have mental pictures of God. Quite often we affirm one theological creed but secretly believe something altogether different. There is a big difference between what one may think about God and what one may feel about God. To some extent, we all make God into our own image, shrinking divinity into a puny caricature.

“Most of our failure to love and trust God stems from our pictures of God as unlovable and untrustworthy,” observed Seamands. “And most of our anger against him is not really against the true God but against our unchristian or subchristian concepts of God.” This is one of the crucial factors of the incarnation, the theological concept of flesh being applied to God. Only when the Word became flesh was it possible for us to get an honest and true picture of God, “full of grace and truth” (John 1:14).

Minor prophet, major revelation

Six hundred years before Jesus came to earth, the prophet Zephaniah drew a unique and startling picture of God. “The LORD your God is with you, he is mighty to save. He will take great delight in you, he will quiet you with his love, he will rejoice over you with singing” (Zephaniah 3:17).

When an irreplaceable friend showed me this verse 25 years ago, it transformed my perceptions. At the time, I had no problem visualizing Jesus as the patron saint of the weak and lowly and outcast. But my mental image of the God of the Old Testament was a Zeus-like figure who flexed with twin lightning bolts of anger and judgment. Yet in the midst of this brief segment of scripture centering on divine wrath, the prophet Zephaniah up-ended my incomplete picture of God. One observer fittingly referred to this verse as the John 3:16 of the Old Testament and it deserves a more focused look.

• “The Lord your God is with you, he is mighty to save.” God is right here, right now. Too frequently this reality is overlooked or not realized. The phrase “is with you” means “in the midst of.” In the midst of trials, temptations, and tribulations, God is there for us. We are never separated from his love and strength.

One translation states: “a warrior to keep you safe” (NEB). Another states: “a warrior who gives victory” (RSV). In the book of Deuteronomy, this big-hearted warrior “defends the orphan, the widow, and the alien” (10:17).

• “He will take great delight in you.” The King James Version reads: “he will rejoice over thee with love.” It can be profoundly surprising to discover that the Creator should derive delight from our relationship with him. But the biblical picture of God expresses such unsurpassed joy over his people.

“[T]he LORD will take delight in you as a bridegroom rejoices over his bride, so will your God rejoice over you” (Isaiah 62:4-5). That is the insatiable, ravishing heart of divine love. “I will rejoice over Jerusalem and take delight in my people; the sound of weeping and of crying will be heard in it no more” (Isaiah 65:19).

In Luke chapter 15, Jesus paints an illuminating portrait of unbridled joy: “I tell you that in the same way there will be more rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who do not need to repent.” A few verses later he reiterates: “I tell you, there is rejoicing in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.” This is a different image than the grim portrait of a dour-faced street corner prophet with “REPENT” painted on a sandwich board sign yelling at passersby. In the hands of Jesus, repentance – turning our heart toward God – is the trigger point for both joy in heaven and redemption on earth.

• “He will quiet you with his love.” This has been translated: “he will be silent in his love.” The King James Version reads: “he will rest in his love.” Bible interpreters have speculated on a host of different meanings for this phrase. Some have suggested that: 1) because of his love, God will keep silent regarding his people’s sin; others believe that 2) God’s love will be so strong and deep as to hush motion or speech; still others hold that 3) the silence is due to God planning good deeds toward his people.

However you look at it, the concept is stirring. It is difficult to imagine the God who literally shook the mountain in front of Moses being quietly content in his love. At the same time, God desires to calm our anxieties. “He will cause you to be silent so that you may have in the secret places of your heart a very quiet peace and a peaceful silence,” observed Martin Luther.

Jesus expressed the silence of God in a different way. At his trial and crucifixion, he remained silent although he could have called on ten thousand angels. “Like a sheep that before its shearers is silent, so he did not open his mouth” (Isaiah 53:7).

• “He will rejoice over you with singing.” The word rejoice suggests “dancing for joy,” or “leaping for joy,” or “to spin around with intense motion.” Can you allow yourself to imagine God spinning around wildly over you? For many of us, that may shatter our stained-glass, one-dimensional impression of God.

The word for singing in this verse is more like a shout of rejoicing or loud cheering in triumph. With imagination, one could picture God dancing over his beloved people with singing or shouting with a thunderclap of joy.

The picture of a joyful Redeemer was eloquently conveyed to the writer of Hebrews: “Looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God” (12:2, emphasis added).

The author of joy breaking out into singing! The God of history dancing a jig! The pleasure of heaven bursting forth like a fiesta! “Remember that it was merely a spoken word that brought the universe into existence,” observes Bible teacher John Piper. “What would happen if God lifted up his voice and not only spoke but sang?”

What are the songs of heaven? In Jeremiah, the chorus may have been: “I will make an everlasting covenant with them: I will never stop doing good to them and I will inspire them to fear me, so that they will never turn away from me. I will rejoice in doing them good and will assuredly plant them in this land with all my heart and soul” (32:40-41, emphasis added).

The song in Romans might be that all things work together for good for those who love God (Romans 8:28). The psalmist may have heard a song and reported that “no good thing does [God] withhold from those who walk uprightly” (Psalm 84:11), and that those who delight themselves in the Lord will receive the desires of their heart (Psalm 37:4). What about goodness and mercy pursuing us all the days of our life (Psalms 23:6)? The song in Exodus proclaimed that God is “merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love” (34:6).

Singing and silence

When my son was born, his mom and I agreed that we would sing “Jesus Loves Me” over him after his birth. Once the nurses and doctors and relatives cleared out, it was just the three of us. And we were, unmistakably, joined by the looming presence of God. We knew what we had planned, but I was unable to follow through. Instead, I wept. Mom ended up singing alone. Dad couldn’t utter a word.

At that moment, our son was christened into this world through a Zephaniah prism. He was greeted with singing and silence, tears of joy and a song from the heart.

Of course, there are many factors that hold us back from hearing the rhythms of heaven. In The Pleasures of God, John Piper observes, “Zephaniah labors under the wonderful inspiration of God to overcome every obstacle that would keep a person from believing – really feeling and enjoying – the unspeakable news that God exults over us with singing.” Some of the obstacles to intimacy with God are still found in our modern day.

• Guilt. Zephaniah proclaims: “The Lord has taken away the judgments against you” (3:15). The old hymn declares: “Jesus paid it all, All to him I owe; Sin had left a crimson stain, He washed it white as snow.” As Philip Yancey has written: “The one distinct thing about Christianity is that God loves immoral people and that he has extended himself to the least deserving. Once you understand grace, you understand that none of us deserve it.”

Yancey goes on to explain: “In logical terms, grace is unnatural, even scandalous. It grinds against the American sense of fairness and justice, lavishing good things on undeserving people. The shepherd leaves his flock of 99 vulnerable to rustlers and wolves in order to search for a single, lost, beloved sheep,” he writes in What’s So Amazing about Grace? “A woman takes a pint of exotic perfume, worth a year’s wages, and pours it on Jesus’ feet. A widow who drops two small coins in the temple bucket ‘has put more into the treasury than all the others,’ Jesus says. The boss pays a vineyard laborer who has worked just one hour the same amount as those who work all day.” Grace always defies logic.

• Fear. When gripped by an uncertain future, verdict, or diagnosis, it is difficult to remember that God is protectively watching over you. “At that time I will deal with all who oppress you” (Zephaniah 3:19). We are invited to allow fear to be swallowed in the assurance that the Lord and the forces of heaven are vigilantly protective.

• Worry. If we are honest, it is tempting to believe that God is too big and his love unfathomable. Nevertheless, the Bible seems to say that he is able to love you in his fullness and run the universe. Somewhere between microparticles and galaxies, God loves us with an undivided and undistracted heart. “The king of Israel, the Lord, is in your midst” (Zephaniah 3:15). Elsewhere in scripture God is described as dwelling “in a high and holy place, and also with him who is of a contrite and humble spirit” (Isaiah 57:15).

• Shame. To those who have been wounded by rejection, God is able to empathize. Scorn was heaped on Jesus. He was slandered and belittled. While on the cross, he “became a curse for us” (Galatians 3:13). It was in those anguish-filled hours when Jesus said, “Father into your hands I commit my spirit” (Luke 23:46). He trusted his heavenly Father. We can too. “I will save the lame and gather the outcast, and I will change their shame into praise and renown in all the earth” (Zephaniah 3:19).

His nearness, our dearness

Jonathan Edwards is considered to be one of the finest theological minds in American history. He was a prominent leader in the Great Awakening as it spread through New England in the 1730s. There were 50,000 converts out of a total 250,000 colonists at the time. Edwards was most famous for his 1741 sermon, “Sinners in the hands of an angry God” – a lengthy and vivid message about the dangers of sin and the horrors of hell.

It was his wife Sarah, however, who gained such a profound revelation of heavenly love. She was whole-heartedly captivated by the overwhelming presence of God for several days. The title of her testimony was: “Her Uncommon discoveries of the Divine Perfections and Glory; and of the Excellence of Christ.”

There is a segment in her lengthy essay where she offers a poignant description of spiritual intimacy with God. “The great part of the night I lay awake, sometimes asleep, and sometimes between sleeping and waking,” she wrote. “But all night I continued in a constant, clear and lively sense of the heavenly sweetness of Christ’s excellent and transcendent love, of his nearness to me, and of my dearness to him; with an inexpressibly sweet calmness of soul in an entire rest in him. I seemed to myself to perceive a glow of divine love come down from the heart of Christ in heaven, into my heart, in a constant stream…. It seemed to be all that my feeble frame could sustain, of that fulness of joy, which is felt by those, who behold the face of Christ, and share his love in the heavenly world” (emphasis added).

It is one thing to extol or even embrace the grandest thoughts about God. It is quite another thing to experience the radiation of divine love. Admittedly, faith and epiphanies are great mysteries. While certainly not always so beautifully described, there have been trustworthy souls within Christian history who describe being enraptured with a similar mystical and incomprehensible sense of God’s presence.

Most compelling is Sarah Edwards’ description of friendship with God as “his nearness to me, and of my dearness to him.” May we all be afforded the opportunity to experience the truth of being a sinner in the hands of a singing God.

Steve Beard is editor of Good News.

Release to the Captives

by Steve | Nov 22, 2019 | Magazine, Magazine Articles, Nov-Dec 2019

There are currently 2.3 million men and women incarcerated in the United States. They need your prayers and the love of Jesus.

By Shannon Vowell –

Prison Ministry: Kairos Training” reads the hand-lettered sign on the upstairs door. Inside, the smell of coffee competes with the smell of bacon in a crowded space that is surprisingly silent. A woman moves toward me on tiptoe. Her eyes are full of tears. She blinks them away as she smiles at me and gestures for me to come in. Two little girls with long braids akimbo sprawl on the floor with coloring books and crayons. They are right in front of me; I step over them, carefully. The circle of adults, chairs clustered in a circle and heads bowed, don’t look up when one of the children erupts in high-pitched giggles.

“Mama,” she chirrups, “Mi cabello es morado!” (My horse is purple!)

The teary-eyed woman nods, putting her finger to her lips. Quiet fills the room for a few more minutes. Then someone says, “Amen,” and the space instantly gets loud. The adults – mostly men – stand to stretch, grin, and trade jokes; the little girls – liberated to laugh – make a soprano background track. Someone starts tuning a guitar; someone else comes in with a tray of fragrant cookies.

A Kairos training day, I quickly learn, is a truly rich sensory experience. Participants eat, sing, pray, laugh, cry, and practice together, from early morning to late afternoon, fueled by caffeine and a level of passion that initially mystifies me. Their objective: preparation for a Kairos weekend.

During the Kairos weekend, some of these trainees will go inside a prison to bring the gospel of Jesus Christ to incarcerated persons. Others will work as the “outside team,” preparing meals, covering the proceedings in prayer, sending the “inside team” out in the morning and welcoming them back in the evening with worship music and celebration. A few here won’t be serving on either team, but will provide “agape” in the form of home-made cookies, personalized paper placemats, or other prison-approved tokens of love. Collectively, they hope to bring light into the some of the darkest, most forgotten corners of our society – and offer freedom and hope to those who have lost both.

God’s special time. The Greek word kairos means, loosely, a time of favor, opportunity, or propitiousness. In scripture, “kairos” often indicates a time of grace – God’s timing (see, for example, Romans 13 or 2 Corinthians 6). Team members here define Kairos simply as “God’s special time.” Frequently, kairos is posited as the counterpoint to chronos, the Greek word for sequential, calendrical time. Kairos ministry helpers point out that these distinctions in ancient language have urgent application for incarcerated persons; Kairos represents the only freedom possible for people literally locked in chronos, “doing time.” In prison, time is both currency and debt. Locked away from the world to “serve time,” prisoners – ironically – have nothing but time on their hands, yet even their time is not their own.

Invisible, unlovable, disposable. Listening in on this Kairos training, I am startled by the raw power of various trainee’s words. A retired cop testifies to the healing power of being in ministry to people he formerly saw as “perpetrators.” His own redemption, he says, depends on this redeeming work; his own freedom consists in offering Christ to those who are locked up. A big, burly man, he lets tears fall unashamedly as he speaks. Other retirees – an accountant, an IT exec – nod as the ex-cop talks. Through Kairos, during their retirement years, they say, they have found their life’s work.

But even more striking are the testimonies from the ex-offenders who received Christ through Kairos while in prison. These men – now free – volunteer their time to go back into prison to offer Christ to others.

The husband of the teary-eyed woman (also father to the little girls coloring purple horses on the floor) describes his life before Kairos as less-than-life, and himself as less-than-human before he met Jesus. “I was an animal,” he says into the microphone. “And I lived like an animal. But no more. Now I am a son.” (No wonder his wife’s eyes are perpetually streaming, I think, wiping my own.)

Other ex-offenders talk about being imprisoned by their addictions, secrets, and alienation long before they were actually in prison. A common theme in their stories is the sense of having been invisible, unlovable, and disposable, until they encountered Jesus. Without evidence or counsel to the contrary, these men lived for decades convinced that what they did – good or bad – had no significance, because who they were had no significance. To a man, they claim “freedom in Christ” as a spiritual reality – a changed identity – that pre-dated freedom from incarceration and that changed their notion of “freedom,” forever.

These testimonies punctuate rehearsals of assigned talks which will be delivered in prison during the Walk. The talks must follow a prescribed format but also feature the talk-giver’s unique perspective. Critique – sometimes jovial, sometimes sharp – follows each run-through. More laughter; more coffee. The moderator reviews prison rules – lots of them – as the day progresses. There is more singing; there is more food.

At the end of the training, I watch interactions. Men who have been together all day linger to pray in small groups; nobody hurries to leave. Habituated to other church meetings, during which folks multi-task with their phones and from which folks speed to their cars, I marvel at this group who focus so fiercely for hours and can’t seem to get enough of one another’s company. Many here have travelled from other cities, most won’t see one another until the next training day; their intimate ties clearly transcend geography, socioeconomic parity, or personal history. I realize that I am watching people love one another the way Jesus commanded, and I tear up again.

Principle of pilgrimage. Some of the language used to describe a Kairos Walk sounds familiar to those who have been on a Walk to Emmaus. That’s because the movements are siblings – both descendants of the Catholic renewal movement begun in post-civil-war Spain. At the heart of Cursillo was a principle of pilgrimage: “Pilgrimage is a spirit of restlessness, a spirit of dissatisfaction with spiritual lukewarmness, a spirit of moving onward. It is also a spirit of brotherhood – of the brotherhood among fellow pilgrims who are striving together to reach the goal” (www.cursillond.org).

Where the Walk to Emmaus movement seeks to revitalize local churches by igniting individual pilgrims, Kairos envisions “a Community spiritually freed from the effects of imprisonment reaching all impacted by incarceration, through the love, hope, and faith found in Jesus Christ.” Both the Walk to Emmaus and Kairos are volunteer, laity-led movements. Both are global in scope and local in leadership.

There is, however, a critical distinction: where the Walk to Emmaus seeks to fill a void within the Church, Kairos seeks to bandage a wound that affects civilization itself.

In America, ever-increasing levels of incarceration mean that ever-increasing numbers of children lose one or both parents for critical years. Statistics suggest that a child with an incarcerated parent will be six times more likely to become incarcerated themselves. And the expectation of recidivism – not just among parole officers, but among prisoners – undergirds the deep cynicism that such statistics foment.

Kairos posits that cynicism simply cannot address the reality of incarceration and its effect on society. The prison population in Texas alone numbers 140,000 men. Of those, 95 percent will be released back into society. Given this statistical reality, Kairos asks the question, “Are you really willing to write off all these people as inevitable criminals?”

Miracles of transformation. The difference between criminals and Christians, in a Kairos understanding, is access – access to scriptural truth, access to encouraging community and Christian accountability, and access to the power of prayer. But to give incarcerated people access to these life-changing resources, one must first gain access to the incarcerated people. Kairos offers both kinds of access: a proven, trusted methodology and structure for access to populations in prison – and a proven, trusted methodology for giving those populations access to the truth and life of Jesus Christ.

What happens when Kairos gets access to prisoners and prisoners get access to Jesus? In a word, miracles.

“I’ve seen a former grand wizard in the Aryan Brotherhood embrace a black table mate,” says Mark Vowell, senior pastor of First Frisco United Methodist Church and Kairos participant. “I’ve seen a man known on the inside as an ‘enforcer’ kneel, sobbing, when he received love letters from people he’d never met. I’ve seen miracles of transformation.”

The power of Kairos proceeds from a disciple-making pedagogy that borrows straight from the Master’s playbook. One example is the process of ordinary decision-making.

Vowell explains, “In normal life, people typically make hundreds of decisions each day. Everything from what to put on in the morning, what to eat for breakfast, what radio station to listen to on the way to work. Most of us make these decisions automatically, seamlessly. But in prison, decisions are primarily made for people. Ironically, that means you have folks whose poor decisions have put them in prison, spending years without the chance to learn to make better decisions. Jesus changes that.”

How? “When you claim Jesus as your Lord and Savior, suddenly you have all these decisions to make, every day: how to follow him in this situation? How to honor him in this relationship? How to keep your mind on him? Jesus is the great disciple-maker, even in prison.”

Jesus famously used bread and fish, multiplied, to sustain followers who wanted more of his teaching. Kairos uses homemade cookies for similar purposes. “These guys haven’t had cookies in years. They have been eating institutional food – no fresh vegetables, no fruit, everything processed or from a can. When we show up with chocolate chip cookies, fried chicken, salad – all of it fresh and home-made – it totally overwhelms them. God’s agape love by the plate-full – literally!” Steve Whatley, a Kairos Team Leader, enthuses. (Whatley points out that baking cookies for a Kairos walk is a great way to participate in the ministry if one is unable to commit to being a team member. Typically, a walk gets through forty dozen cookies – or more.)

Cookies. Prayers. Talks. Handshakes. Then hugs. Each component of Kairos contributes to making the miracles happen.

Re-making the world. Gary Currie, the 32-year veteran of Texas prison management and the Warden at Bridgeport Correctional Center, outlines the way those miracles are re-making the world.

“In Texas, as we have embraced faith-based volunteerism in our prisons, we have had something very rare happen: we have closed prisons, because there weren’t enough offenders to fill the beds. We have closed units, for the same reason. It works like this: Faith-based volunteers offer these guys the most valuable commodity in the world, their time. They tell these guys what nobody else has ever told them: that they matter, that they really can achieve something with their lives. And they show them that they mean it by showing up. They believe. And it changes everything.”

Based on his long career in corrections, Currie articulates a choice: “We can do nothing today. We can ignore the prison population and think to ourselves that we don’t want that convict living in our neighborhood. But that convict is going to be our neighbor. So, if we choose to do nothing today, we are going to have choose to do a whole lot tomorrow to keep ourselves, our property, and our children secure.”

Based on his own faith, Currie puts it slightly differently: “We as a Christian people have to share our faith and belief in the best of mankind. Where better to do that than where the worst of mankind is on display?”

Real transformations. Whatley and Vowell both see Kairos not just as a transformational gift to incarcerated persons, but also as a critically important mission for the life and health of the local church.

“When we go to prison to love people, as the scriptures direct us to do,” Whatley says, “We are blessed as much as the prisoners are. We are changed as much as the prisoners are.”

Vowell concurs, “This ministry puts people in place to see the power of the Holy Spirit at work. Real transformation, real impact, up close and personal. My experience is that Kairos transforms prison populations. And Kairos transforms congregations, too.”

Caring for the prisoner. The Methodist movement began with John Wesley’s call to transform communities through social holiness, and Wesley’s life-long devotion to prisoners and prison reform is well documented. But it’s worth reviewing the scriptural basis for this priority of Wesley’s, particularly as Methodists work to stay true to their scriptural heritage.

The Bible contains dozens of references to prisoners and the mandate to care for them, and chronicles periods of imprisonment for many heroes of the faith (Joseph, Daniel, Isaiah, Jeremiah, John the Baptist, and the apostle Paul, to name just a few).

And Jesus book-ended his ministry with teachings that specifically directed care for prisoners. In Luke’s gospel, Jesus inaugurated his public ministry by reading from the prophet Isaiah:

“The spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me, because the LORD has anointed me; he has sent me to bring good news to the oppressed, to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and release to the prisoners; to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor…”

When he had finished reading and handed back the scroll, Jesus told the perplexed crowd at his home-town synagogue, “Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing” (Luke 4:18-20, excerpted).

And in Matthew’s gospel, Jesus concludes his public teaching with a vision of the Judgement of the Nations, when people will be divided into two groups – the saved and the damned – based on their service to Jesus as disguised as “the least of these.” Among those singled out as priorities by Jesus are the prisoners.

John Wesley and Methodist tradition have clearly prioritized the prisoner, in obedience to Jesus’s teaching.  Kairos offers individuals and congregations today the means to do likewise.

Shannon Vowell writes and teaches on loving Christ and making disciples.