by Steve | Mar 5, 2013 | Magazine Articles
Seminary vantage point
Wesley Seminary’s Ministerial Education Fund (MEF) distribution was mentioned in the January/February Good News article: “Money Well Spent? The Future of Theological Education.” I want to share the perspective from my institution. The revised MEF formula is weighted toward both the number of ordinands (based on a three-year average) and the number of United Methodist students who have become Certified Candidates. To begin to understand any school’s distribution would require looking at both the number of ordinands and the number of students. But this mathematical analysis is insufficient. Here’s the bigger picture.
Wesley gives preference in our scholarship program to our United Methodist students and, even as the MEF distribution has declined, we have increased our financial aid to them, totaling $783,958 last year. The UM Church is the principal beneficiary of our Lewis Center for Church Leadership, under the direction of Lovett Weems, with a budget of $533,000. We chose last year to spend $341,000 on programs to prepare United Methodist pastors from the Central Conferences, at the request of their bishops. And we have expanded our offerings in the Course of Study. By comparison, our total MEF distribution was $1,354,000 last year.
Beyond that, 60 percent of our full-time faculty are UM, as are all the members of my senior executive team. At least 66 percent of the members of our Board of Governors are required to be United Methodist and our chair is a pastor who leads the Virginia Conference delegation. Each of us serves the church at all levels and we work closely with Cabinets and Boards of Ordained Ministry.
Committing resources to programs like these – offering preferential scholarships, hiring faculty and staff, and recruiting board members – are all long-term investments that we are able to make because of the surety of MEF support we receive from the church which established us, and to which we are responsible. I know the other 12 proprietary schools of our denomination have similar stories.
David McAllister-Wilson
President
Wesley Theological Seminary
Washington D.C.
Mission statement
Let me begin by saying how much I have appreciated the past few issues of Good News. The November/December issue continues to call attention to the aging and thinning of our congregations.
Dare I suggest that we should examine again our Mission Statement. So long as we focus on “transformation of the World” we will be kept in constant tension – and contention. Our recent national election demonstrated how polarized the citizens of our great land have become.
Our church is divided on similar issues. Our efforts are expended on utopian ideals of social justice regardless of scriptural support, or using Scripture to avoid caring for a hurting society. We can neither ignore clear commands of Scripture regarding abortion, sexual impurity, and homosexual practice, nor can we afford to ignore the commands both under Moses and in Paul’s instruction to the Church to care for the less fortunate.
If we cannot agree on what the goal of the world’s transformation should be, we are spinning our wheels, digging ever deeper into the mud.
I suggest our mission is rather to “make disciples of Jesus Christ totally committed to intimate, obedient fellowship with our Lord and Savior.” Only then will the Holy Spirit’s sovereign will transform our church and have, then, any hope of influencing the unbelieving world in which we live. Perhaps we would do better to remember our first mission statement, Matthew 28:20, “teaching them to observe all that I commanded you.”
Our goal is too small. We are, or should be, seeking to partner with our Sovereign King.
Bill Wood
Brewster, Washington
Pew-warmers
The article, “Will Our Church Go Off the Cliff?,” by Thomas A. Lambrecht in the November/December 2012 issue was excellent. I showed it to my pastor and asked if it could be copied and given to everyone on our Leadership Team. I applaud the efforts of Good News to try to get the UM Church back to its Scriptural roots but sometimes when I come home from some of our meetings I do wonder if the denomination is already too liberal and too infiltrated with the world to be brought back.
I realize that the pastors are urged by the district superintendents and superintendents are urged by their bishops to do everything the bureaucracy sets forth, but at the same time, I wonder why they can’t seem to see (or acknowledge) what is happening.
My first question concerns how we can have “Vital Congregations” without teaching and discipling the present congregation? Possibly over half of our congregations are what many would term “pew-warmers.” They don’t have a vital, growing relationship with the Lord themselves, therefore, they aren’t interested in any reach-out programs. So much emphasis is being put on numbers and “doing” and too little on “being.”
I appreciated the article on John Wesley in the January/February issue. I can’t help but wondering what he would think of what the UM denomination has become today.
Keep doing your best for Him. It encourages me to know there are still some United Methodists out there that believe the Scriptures are the Word of God and are to be obeyed.
Rose M. Doubrava
Ellsworth, Kansas
Not Civil Rights
Bishop Sally Dyck was quoted in the January 14, 2013 edition of Perspective sent out from Good News: “Marriage equality is a civil rights issue; it provides for all what is afforded to some. … Because I believe in marriage, it’s my belief it will be a benefit for this law to pass.”
I was very disappointed in the response to the Dyck statement that no one challenged her statement that “Marriage equality is a civil rights issue.”
Have we like the frog in the frying pan become so acclimatized to the hue and cry of the “progressives” that we no longer react to the erroneous statements made by the progressives?
Were this issue a purely humanist issue, I would not now be commenting. I would have to agree that according to humankind’s laws passed by a culture that largely ignores God and passes laws to replace God’s will, marriage equality is a civil rights or at least a rights issue of some sort.
There is one huge problem that prevents this from being so. God! God created the marriage institution, mankind did not. God defined what constituted marriage, mankind does not get to do so (at least not permanently). God has provided from the beginning the precepts and concepts man is to live by. Mankind should not supplant those God given conditions and definitions. Having tried to replace God all these many centuries, mankind should not be surprised when God changes all of mankind’s meticulously crafted laws that supplant God’s will.
It really doesn’t matter if humanity deems some issue from the Lord, “not fair.” We don’t get to make that judgment against our Lord. Our job is to follow him, not question him.
His responsibility is to “direct our paths” if we will allow by our free will, for him to do so.
Therefore because God’s perfect will supersedes human law and will, “marriage equality” for people who choose marriage outside of God’s institution, is not a civil rights or any other rights issue. Would that Good News had said so.
Byron Fitch
Ritzville, Washington
by Steve | Mar 5, 2013 | Magazine Articles
By Jim M. Ramsay
A church in Alabama was discussing the issue of unreached people groups as part of their mission focus week. Church members were surprised to discover that at the local university, there were more than 70 unreached people groups represented among the student body! Unreached people in Alabama? Indeed. In fact, in my own county of Gwinnett in the metro Atlanta area the 2010 census states that 25 percent were born outside the United States. A local parent told me there are 30 nations represented at his children’s local elementary school. Many people within the American church community are simply unaware of the huge migrations of people from all over the world that have been taking place over the past couple decades.
This has enormous implications for local churches who want to respond to God’s mission to call the nations – people groups – to Himself. There is a variety of people groups now in most communities across the United States. Yet often the church is either unaware or ill-equipped to know how to engage them.
Throughout the Bible, God used the geographical movements of people to grow awareness of Himself. Consider Abram leaving his homeland, the Exodus, the Exile, and the persecution of the early church. Can we equally see the movements of people into our nation as something God might want to use for His purposes – so that more people from diverse backgrounds can know Him and worship Him? If so, what should be the American church’s response?
A comprehensive plan is beyond the scope of this column. But there are some practical ideas that could get the ball rolling. For any church in a university city, it is highly likely that there are students from other countries. According to the Institute of International Education, there were nearly 200,000 students from China and more than 100,000 from India alone studying in the USA this past academic year! The Bible is very clear on how God’s people are to treat people who come from distant lands. Yet statistics suggest that 75 percent of foreign students never set foot inside an American home while in the USA, much less the home of believers. International Students, Inc. (www.isionline.org) is a good resource for getting involved in this area. Many colleges and universities have adopt-a-student programs for international students and are in need of host families.
In most urban settings there are usually enclaves of specific ethnic populations, often with their own stores and restaurants. Those are great places to get to know people and build relationships. People often love to tell how they ended up here; asking them to tell their story is a great conversation starter. For many world cultures, hospitality is a high value, so people from these cultures are usually blessed by the offer and likely will offer it in return. In fact, a sense of rejection can come from the fact that new immigrants often are not invited into homes. They would find that unthinkable should the roles be reversed and a foreigner were to have arrived in their community.
Given increased tensions related to Islam, it is a critical time for American Christians to become equipped to build relationships with their Muslim neighbors. Christians must not give into the same fear that seems pervasive among many Americans. Most Muslim immigrants, many who left desperate circumstances to find their way here, are eager for friendships. A friend once shared that he asked a Muslim in a local community if the Christians spoke with him. He said, “Yes, they sometimes invite us to their churches, but never into their homes.” There are some excellent resources to help American Christians learn how to build deep relationships with people from Muslim backgrounds and engage in constructive conversations about our faith in Jesus. Seminars such as Jesus and the Quran (www.jaq.org) can help Christians gain this understanding.
As members of the body of Christ, we should be at the forefront of welcoming people, helping them in their new home, and sharing our faith in ways they can hear it. If we will embrace the opportunity God has laid before us, perhaps we might experience a bit of Revelation 7:9 in our own communities.
Jim M. Ramsay is director of field ministry for The Mission Society (www.themissionsociety.org).
by Steve | Mar 5, 2013 | In the News
United Methodist representatives to the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice (RCRC) are once again promoting a lopsided and jaundiced view of our denomination’s view of abortion. Staffers from the United Methodist Women (UMW) and the General Board of Church and Society recently marked the 40th anniversary of the controversial Roe v. Wade decision by bizarrely claiming “we seek to be a voice crying out to prepare the way for the Lord to bring about a new era of reproductive justice for our families and communities,” a warped apparent reference to John the Baptist. The Bible teaches that John the Baptist leaped in his mother’s womb when he was in the presence of Jesus Christ, who was still in the womb of Mary.
As United Methodists, we do not believe that Jesus Christ came to “bring about a new era of reproductive justice.” Instead, Jesus said that the “Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10).
Aside from making a mockery of biblical imagery regarding life and death, when will United Methodist personnel in Washington D.C. and New York stop acting like an abortion rights lobby group and begin to tell the whole truth about United Methodism’s position on abortion?
While United Methodism does recognize “tragic conflicts of life with life that may justify abortion, and in such cases we support the legal option of abortion” (Discipline, Para 161J, emphasis added), our nuanced stand does not end there.
An honest portrayal also reports that United Methodism “cannot affirm abortion as an acceptable means of birth control, and we unconditionally reject it as a means of gender selection or eugenics.” (Guttmacher Institute consistently reports that more than 90 percent of all abortions are for birth control reasons. Additionally, studies have shown that more than 90 percent of pregnancies with a diagnosis of Down Syndrome are aborted.)
Furthermore, United Methodism overwhelmingly opposes “late-term abortion known as dilation and extraction (partial-birth abortion)….”
The Church and Society/UMW statement fails to mention any of United Methodism’s opposition to abortion.
There is a great disconnect between the men and women in the pews and pulpits in local UM congregations and the abortion enthusiasts associated with the RCRC, Church and Society, and the UMW. Local congregations will continue to struggle to justify sending apportionments to agencies who fail to tell the whole truth about United Methodism’s stand on abortion.
Why have we never seen the Board of Church and Society address the crisis of utilizing abortion as a means of birth control? Why have we not seen the briefing paper from the UMW addressing the sickening use of abortion for gender selection in the United States and around the globe? Why is there a deafening silence regarding the practice of late-term abortions? Where is the outcry over the abortion of mentally or physically challenged infants?
Instead, United Methodist abortion advocates utilize the 40th anniversary of Roe v. Wade to repeat overused and vacuous slogans such as “keep abortion safe, legal, accessible, and rare.” (Their full statement is available on the General Board of Church and Society’s website.)
Nowhere in the Church and Society/UMW statement is there a hint of the modern-day tragedy of 1.2 million lives lost every year in the U.S. due to abortion or the widespread use of abortion for birth control, gender selection, or eugenics in the world. Where is the equal regard called for in our denominational position, where “we are equally bound to respect the sacredness of the life and well-being of the mother and the unborn child” (¶ 161J)? The narrow scope of the Church and Society/UMW statement is out of touch with the mainstream position of The UM Church.
Good News supports efforts to address maternal mortality by providing better “pre-natal services, birthing assistance, and post-natal follow-up.” We support access to contraception in keeping with the individual consciences of women and providers, as well as comprehensive sex education, to reduce unintended pregnancies. However, we firmly believe that the answer to unintended pregnancies and maternal mortality is not increased access to abortion.
Instead, the Church and the broader society need to provide emotional and material support to women with unintended pregnancies. That is why our denominational position says, “The Church shall offer ministries to reduce unintended pregnancies. We commit our Church to continue to provide nurturing ministries to those who terminate a pregnancy, to those in the midst of a crisis pregnancy, and to those who give birth. … The Church and its local congregations and campus ministries should be in the forefront of supporting existing ministries and developing new ministries that help [young adult] women in their communities. … We particularly encourage the Church, the government, and social service agencies to support and facilitate the option of adoption. (See ¶ 161L) We affirm and encourage the Church to assist the ministry of crisis pregnancy centers and pregnancy resource centers that compassionately help women find feasible alternatives to abortion” (¶ 161J).
It appears that RCRC and our United Methodist representatives are not interested in ministries that would reduce the number of abortions. That is why they also call for a “careful analysis of the church’s support for crisis pregnancy centers that may not offer all options of counseling.” From their pro-abortion perspective, such suspicion of crisis pregnancy centers that provide “feasible alternatives to abortion” undermines their call to keep abortion “rare.” Instead, the extremists at RCRC favor no restrictions on abortion, at any time in pregnancy or for any reason.
Good News wants to know when our United Methodist agencies will advocate for the full and balanced position of our church on abortion. It appears that our agency staff persons have greater allegiance to the external coalition of RCRC than they do to our own denomination’s Social Principles. Our church’s membership in RCRC is distorting our advocacy in the church and public arenas. It is past time for our denomination to withdraw its membership from RCRC.
– The Good News editorial team
by Steve | Mar 5, 2013 | Magazine Articles
By Duffy Robbins
Jon is one of those kids who never shows up for prayer breakfast or Sunday school, and always seems to have unavoidable conflicts that prevent his helping out with fund raisers and work projects. Spiritually, he ranks somewhere between “plant life” and “lower primate.”
The picture isn’t completely negative, though. There are two areas for which Jon has shown tremendous enthusiasm: one is food, and the other is girls. Whenever a youth group activity allows for a large gathering of either, you can count on Jon to be there! Jon doesn’t make any pretense about it. He doesn’t have any real commitment to Christ, but he does have a strong commitment to having a good time. In short, Jon is a fairly average teenage guy.
There are students like Jon in the orbit of virtually every youth ministry I’ve ever known. I call them “Come Level” students.
In the last issue of Good News we talked about the notion of targeted programming: We need to work very hard to meet kids where they are – wherever they are – in the odyssey of faith. This means thinking about where our students might be in their various faith journeys, and then developing and targeting programs that meet them in that place. If your youth group is typical, you probably have kids all over the spiritual map!
The first Level of Commitment is the Pool of Humanity, namely the teenage population within your geographical sphere of influence.
Jon is in the second Level of Commitment. These are students in your Pool of Humanity who have some contact with your ministry, but if, and only if, you have something they like on a given occasion. And frankly, sometimes students like Jon discourage us. After all, we’re called to build disciples, and it’s frustrating to invest time and effort on kids who don’t seem willing to get serious about their walk with Christ.
But let’s be honest: first of all, most teenagers on the outside of our ministries aren’t somehow mysteriously born with a felt need for good doctrinal teaching; and secondly, a majority of the students on the inside of our groups aren’t either. If we only target our programming for the spiritual heavyweights, we’re going to touch the lives of very few kids. In fact, what Paul seems to strongly suggest in Romans 1 is that we are – all of us – natural-born experts at avoiding, denying, and counterfeiting any knowledge of God.
At least these kids come. Most of the teenage population never even comes. Let’s be grateful for the opportunity. You can’t embrace someone you can’t touch. When we find ourselves frustrated and discouraged, let’s remember that every one of us reading these words was at one time very likely one of these “Come Level” kids.
“The ways by which the Holy Spirit leads men and women to Christ are wonderful and mysterious,” wrote Anglican Bishop J. C. Ryle (1816-1900). “He is often beginning in a heart a work that shall stand for eternity, when an onlooker observes nothing remarkable. In every work there must be a beginning, and in spiritual work that beginning is often very small.”
Ryle wants us to remember a biblical example: “Do we see a careless brother coming to church and listening to the gospel after a long indifference? When we see such things, let us remember Zacchaeus. Let us not look coldly on such a person because his motives are at present very poor and questionable. It is far better to hear the gospel out of curiosity than not to hear it at all.
“Our brother is with Zacchaeus in the tree! Who can tell but that one day he may receive Christ just as joyfully? …It may be difficult to see how salvation can result from a man climbing a tree. That’s because you see a man in a tree, but God sees a man lost and searching.”
by Steve | Mar 5, 2013 | Mar-Apr 2013
By Blossom Matthews
It was my first theology class, and I was a bit surprised by how much I enjoyed it. Having been raised non-denominational, dipping my toes in the waters of the religion department at a Southern Baptist university made for a life-changing experience. I was vaguely familiar with Calvinism and knew it wasn’t for me, but as we studied Calvinism, we also studied its counterpoint: Arminianism. Though the professor didn’t intend to affirm Arminianism, I realized I had finally put a name to my theological perspective.
As the Holy Spirit nudged me to embrace my call to ministry, it was only a hop, skip, and jump until I found my theological and spiritual home: United Methodism. With family members who had been Nazarene pastors, Methodist pastors, and even circuit riders, Wesleyanism was in my blood. As I settled into my new home, a few qualities of United Methodism stood out above the rest:
Women in Ministry
One aspect of United Methodism that I believe most warms the heart of God is our support of women in ministry. Consider the generations of women who were never allowed to live out their call to pastoral ministry. In God’s name, churches have accused and judged these women as misguided, at best, and rebellious, at worst.
Growing up non-denominational, I got a lot of mixed signals regarding women in ministry. Even churches that didn’t outright stand against women in ministry seemed to have the view that, “Yes, God can call women to preach and teach, and maybe pastor – depending on who you are and how famous you are. And as long as you are under the headship of a man.” Unless I married into ministry, it wasn’t going to happen.
Coming into a denomination in which women are respected and treated as equals was a breath of fresh air. In fact, it was more than that. The United Methodist Church became a liberating place to live out my faith and call. While it will take time to fully cultivate a church culture in which women are as eagerly received as men into the local church pastorate, clergywomen know that we are supported by bishops, district superintendents, and fellow clergymen who support us in answering God’s call. I give thanks for this safe place, The United Methodist Church, in which I can simply be the woman God has called me to be.
We are Open
One’s greatest strength can also be their greatest weakness; this is certainly true for The United Methodist Church. Those of us who support orthodox faith and practice are deeply concerned about the loss of theological clarity within our denomination. Being “open minded,” as our denominational slogan claims, has the potential of leading us down a path that contradicts the Gospel of Jesus Christ. We remember the warning found in Ephesians 4:14, that “we must no longer be children, tossed to and fro and blown about by every wind of doctrine.” While the growing lack of conviction regarding foundational matters may concern us, let us not forget that our openness is also one of our greatest strengths.
Coming from a near-fundamentalist background, I appreciate the open nature of our denomination. Our willingness to think about new ideas, to embrace scholarship, to respect those with whom we disagree, and to open wide our doors and hearts to all who are spiritually hungry gives me hope that God can use our denomination to reach the least, the last, and the lost. While we are fully aware of the dangers and pitfalls of our surrounding culture, we have the ability to live in the world without being of it, to love the world without being formed by it. We can love our neighbor who thinks and acts differently than we do without compromising our faith and conscience. Our openness need not reflect moral weakness or theological confusion, but rather, the open heart of our risen Lord.
The best of Christendom
I love the fact that The United Methodist Church is a place where both Roman Catholics and Southern Baptists can feel somewhat comfortable. In our congregation, we may profess the Apostle’s Creed on the same Sunday that we have an altar call. United Methodists have the ability to bring liturgical, revival, and contemporary traditions together in celebration of God’s work through the Universal Church.
We also bring together doctrines that some would consider mutually exclusive. Do we believe we are saved by grace through faith? You bet! But what about good works? We believe in those, too! Well, do United Methodists believe in free will or in providence? Yes and yes. Our theology is rich and nuanced. We affirm and bring together seemingly contradictory beliefs to present a balanced, biblical view of God and life.
John Wesley taught the importance of both personal holiness and social holiness. As United Methodists, we have the potential of ministering to the whole person: spirit, soul, and body. Our evangelical experience of the heart strangely warmed calls us forward to do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with our God. We are not an either/or church, but a both/and church, pulling together and holding in tension the great doctrines of the Universal Church.
From our open hearts and inclusive spirit to our rich theology, the United Methodist Church provides good soil in which God may raise up new disciples for Jesus Christ.
Blossom Matthews is the pastor of First United Methodist Church of Pampa, Texas, where she co-pastors with her husband, Nick Matthews. She is the proud mother of Ruth, Josiah, and Malachi.
