by Steve | Dec 8, 2023 | Nov-Dec 2023
Warm Hearts and Extended Hands –
By Kimberly Reisman –
One of the joys of leading World Methodist Evangelism (WME) is witnessing the transformative work of the Holy Spirit through the worldwide Wesleyan Methodist movement. The children of John Wesley have a unique way of becoming channels of the Spirit, crossing boundaries of geography and tradition to work together for the good of the Kingdom.
Recently WME provided evangelism training and leadership development in both Brazil and Ecuador. These gatherings were exciting times of learning, growth, and celebration as leaders from many manifestations of the Wesleyan Methodist movement joined together to connect, collaborate, and continue to reach out in the spirit of John Wesley.
Each time I gather with the broader family, I become more and more grateful for our Wesleyan heritage. We may differ in culture and language, we may not organize ourselves in the same way, or have identical approaches to worship; but the foundational understandings of grace and holiness that permeate our DNA cut across all those differences – impacting even those outside our tribe, though they may not be aware.
Wesleyan theology is compelling. Several years ago, we provided training in Ukraine, Russia, Eastern Europe, and Eurasia. In each of these places, we were joined by Baptists, Presbyterians, and others who were drawn to Wesleyan distinctives such as prevenient grace, sanctification, and Scriptural holiness.
The Wesleyan Methodist family has also been in theological dialogue with the Roman Catholics and I’m reminded of the joy Pope Francis expressed when I met him at the 50th anniversary of those dialogues and told him that I (and Methodists all over the world) was praying for him.
The Wesleyan Methodist movement was launched by a heart strangely warmed, and people have been drawn to Jesus ever since through the continued warm heart of our movement. Wesley was willing to extend his hand to those who shared his heart, even if they didn’t agree on every detail of Christian doctrine.
Recently, we’ve had several new and wonderful examples of the way in which Wesley’s warm heart has extended beyond the confines of the movement he began. The Pope received his Wesley bobble head doll (photo previous page) with as much joy as he received word of my prayers (photo below). And who would have imagined that John Wesley’s picture would grace the big screen in a church in Korea – the largest church in the entire world (photo on page 34)!
I imagine John Wesley is smiling at the thought that the Holy Spirit has used his warm-hearted legacy to impact not only his own movement, but those beyond it. And I pray that his movement, our movement would continue to extend our hands to others as channels of the Holy Spirit so that hearts might be warmed, and lives transformed.
Kimberly Reisman is the Executive Director of World Methodist Evangelism. Dr. Reisman earned her PhD in theology from Durham University in the United Kingdom. Photo is courtesy of Dr. Ted Campbell, Albert C. Outler Professor of Wesley Studies, Perkins School of Theology at Southern Methodist University. “On the eve of Aldersgate Day (May 24), here’s how John Wesley showed up last week at the largest Christian church in the world – the Yoido Full Gospel Church in Seoul, with ca. 800,000 members,” reported Dr. Campbell. “The pastor of the congregation, Young Hoon Lee, has explicitly identified this Pentecostal (‘full gospel’) congregation as part of the broader family of Wesleyan churches – that’s what he was saying when he showed this slide – and he and the congregation sponsored a meeting of Wesleyan (Methodist/Holiness/Fourfold Gospel/Pentecostal) leaders at Yoido.” The pastor attended Dr. Campbell’s lecture on Puritan and Wesleyan ways of describing the “way of salvation.”
by Steve | Dec 8, 2023 | Nov-Dec 2023
Gulp of Forgiveness –
By B.J. Funk –
Nowhere is the sting of hurt more prominent than in your church.
Pain received is more hurtful in church because it’s just not supposed to happen there. That’s the one place we can count on to be filled with love. That’s the one place we can go where love should move from pew to pew in such a way that we leave feeling more filled with the Spirit of God than when we came in.
But that’s not always what happens. And if you are the recipient of that hurt, something inside of you dies. Sometimes the pain is so real that you don’t want to go back. Though you try not to, you dwell on the hurt daily, questioning more and more how this person who hurt you does not recognize the impact of the hurt she/he has given you. It was personal. It was deliberate. It had the power to suck life away from you.
That’s how I felt when it happened to me. I struggled with a thorn in my flesh called unforgiveness. The things I knew didn’t matter. What did I know? I knew that I could not teach God’s Word if my heart was in the sewer of unforgiveness. I knew that I could not hide the foul smell of the gutter unless I escaped that stench. I knew I had to be a clean vessel in order for the Holy Spirit to use me. I knew all of that. It didn’t matter. I was hurt, and hurt by any name is still hurt. It jumps into your heart with a deceptive grin, saying “You’re right. He’s wrong. Stand up for yourself.”
I prayed daily. Hourly. Consistently. “God, show me what to do. Talk to me. Please give me guidance.”
One night before I went to bed, a scripture came to mind. Suddenly. Out of nowhere. Before I closed my eyes in sleep, I recalled, “Father, forgive them. They don’t know what they are doing” (Luke 23:34).
“Oh, I think this person did know, Lord. It was intentional. Manipulative. Targeted. Personal.” Then I went to sleep.
I don’t know how to explain to you what happened next. I guess I could say that during the night, I had a visitor. My mind wasn’t involved and that was good because then I could not argue with the thoughts implanted in my spirit. It had to have been a Holy Spirit encounter. An encounter that needed my brain to hush. Explaining this in simple terms, I think the Holy Spirit brought a broom, mop, suds, scrubbing brush, and Clorox and worked on me while I slept. The Holy Spirit cleaned out the debris of unforgiveness that I harbored. When I awoke the next morning, I immediately knew I was different. The tumor of unforgiveness was gone!
A definition on forgiveness jumped into my heart: “Forgiveness is giving up my right to hurt you for hurting me.”
When my brain struggles with this definition, I win the contest between right and wrong every time. Simply put, I am right. My brain has an extensive list to combat the actions of the perpetrator. A list of all the things this person has intentionally done to hurt me. When my brain gets involved, I do have the right. I can bring out that numbered list and go straight down it, one by one, reminding myself why I can hold that unforgiveness until the other party confesses and comes to me to repent.
News flash. Excuse my language, but “that ain’t happening.”
I got out of bed that morning feeling lighter. I was no longer living with the unforgiveness tumor. I felt wonderful. I felt free.
The thought that jumped in my head was: You just had a gulp of forgiveness
Ahhhh yes. It was a large gulp. A refreshing gulp. A gulp of freedom. Layer after layer of unforgiveness slipped off of me as I moved around my home. I knew something beautiful and dramatic had happened.
Thank you my “always there for me Jesus.” Thank you for not holding it against me while I had the tumor.
Thank you for loving me enough to take it away. Thank you, Jesus.
B.J. Funk is Good News’ long-time devotional columnist and author of It’s A Good Day for Grace, available on Amazon.
by Steve | Dec 8, 2023 | Nov-Dec 2023
Global Methodism’s Nationwide Roll-Out –
By Walter Fenton –
With the recent authorizations of a transitional district advisory team (TDAT) in Virginia and one covering nine western states (Alaska, Arizona, California, Hawaii, Idaho, Nevada, Oregon, Utah, and Washington), the Global Methodist Church is now operating or organizing in all 50 states in the U.S.
Transitional district advisory teams and transitional conference advisory teams (TCATs) are composed of clergy and laity who work together to create provisional districts and provisional annual conferences that connect GM local churches in their regions. In the U.S., the GM Church now has 12 operating provincial annual conferences and one provisional district. Over the next several months the Church plans to celebrate the launch of four more provisional annual conferences and two provisional districts in the country.
Clergy and Laity in the heart of Texas were among some of the first groups to move from the status of a TCAT to becoming an official provisional annual conference of the GM Church. After several months of organizing, the Mid-Texas Provisional Annual Conference commenced operations on November 1, 2022, and then in January of this year held its convening annual conference in Waco, Texas.
“Creating an annual conference was not something any of us had done before. It was simultaneously exciting, challenging, and frustrating,” said the Rev. Dr. Leah Hidde-Gregory, the President Pro Tem of the Mid-Texas Conference, and a member of the GM Church’s Transitional Leadership Council. “Working with the GM Church’s Transitional Leadership Council we had to figure out everything from onboarding local churches and pastors to properly incorporating the conference in the state of Texas. What helped us move forward was the cooperation we received from The United Methodist Church’s Central Texas Annual Conference. The conference created two opportunities for local churches to disaffiliate under fair and reasonable terms.”
Where UM Church disaffiliation or withdrawal terms were reasonable, TCATs or TDATs were able to gather enough local churches together to help launch provisional conferences or districts. Many of these were initially in the south central and southeastern parts of the U.S. where UM bishops and annual conferences adopted an amicable and orderly process for leaving the denomination.
“I feel bad for sisters and brothers in some other UM Church annual conferences where exiting the denomination is nearly impossible,” said Hidde-Gregory. “The terms are unduly onerous and expensive, particularly in much of the northeastern and western parts of the country. Given the circumstances, it’s no surprise standing-up a GM Church provisional conference or district is taking more time in those areas.”
The GM Church has made it a priority to work with local leaders in the U.S. and around the world to create provisional conferences or districts as soon as possible. Over 3,200 local churches have already joined the fledgling denomination, and Church leaders believe more will do so before the end of the year. They believe it is critical to get local churches connected with other congregations and introduce them to local leaders who can answer questions and help them navigate challenges.
Six of the twelve U.S. provisional annual conferences have held convening conferences, complete with ordination services. Most of the other conferences have held large gatherings with worship and workshops as they plan for their own convening annual conferences. According to local and general GM Church leaders, attendance at the conferences and gatherings has been strong and enthusiastic.
“The joy I have witnessed at GM Church convening annual conferences, ordination services, and other gatherings have been among the most Holy Spirit filled events I have ever had the privilege of being a part of in all my years of ministry,” said Bishop Scott J. Jones.
Jones, along, with Bishop Mark J. Webb (pictured below), are the GM Church’s two active bishops. They currently share the responsibility of presiding at all annual conferences in the U.S. and around the world, and they work closely with provisional annual conference leaders, and the TCATs and TDATs that are in the process of organizing conferences and districts.
“Our DNA as Methodists is connectional,” said Webb. “It has its practical dimensions, but far more importantly it binds us together as the body of Christ. It celebrates and gives life to the way congregations work together to support one another, share resources, and carry out mission and ministry. Despite all the challenges we have faced, I am finding that GM local churches long for authentic connectionalism. They want to be part of an annual conference or a provisional district, so we’re doing all we can to get them connected as soon as possible.”
Undoubtedly, the most challenging region for organizing is in the Western U.S. For decades, the UM Church’s Western Jurisdiction has experienced steady decline, and it is widely regarded as the denomination’s most progressive region. Over the years, many conservative UM members left the denomination, taking a toll on the number of traditionalist local churches in the jurisdiction. Many of those remaining are now seeking to disaffiliate from the UM Church but are confronting some of the most difficult disaffiliation terms in the denomination.
The Rev. Mark Maddox, Lead Pastor at Journey Global Methodist Church in Las Vegas, Nevada, and Ms. Kathy Cosner at Silverdale Community Church, in Bremerton, Washington, are co-leaders of the 24-member Western States Transitional District Advisory Team. Stretching from Alaska to Arizona, and Utah to Hawaii, the region is easily the largest and most challenging area where the GM Church is currently organizing.
“Creating a GM Church connectional structure in the West poses unique problems,” said Maddox. “But we’re approaching it like climbing one of our great mountains – one step at a time. We have a great team that is realistic about the challenges, but we are also very passionate about seeing the Global Methodist Church flourish in the Western States.”
The team meets regularly by video calls, and it has created various sub-committees to complete the necessary work to stand-up a provisional district. Working closely with Bishop Webb, the team’s first goal is to gather at least 30 local churches so it can seek approval to launch a provisional district. Generally, the GM Church’s Transitional Leadership Council requires a minimum of 30 local churches to launch a district and 120 to start a provisional annual conference.
“We want to help local churches and small groups meeting in houses get connected as soon possible, so we’re aiming for provisional district status first,” said Cosner. “We all know the challenges we face, but we also know Jesus’s Great Commission. The Western States are wide open for growth, and we intend to help local churches disaffiliate and join the GMC, plant new ones, and just multiply churches from there. We are confident our brothers and sisters around the country will partner with us as we reintroduce a warm-hearted, Wesleyan expression of the Christian faith in the West!”
Walter Fenton is the Global Methodist Church’s Deputy Connectional Officer. You can read news reports and developments from Rev. Fenton at GlobalMethodist.org. Photo: In January 2023, Melissa Neal Castleberry was ordained a deacon into the Global Methodist Church. From The Church at Greens Creek, in Dublin, Texas, she was the first person in the world to be ordained into the GMC. Photo: Maddie Forrester.
by Steve | Dec 8, 2023 | Nov-Dec 2023
Laborers for the Harvest –
By Scott J. Jones –
Jesus said to his disciples, “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; therefore ask the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest” (Matthew 9:37-38).
God is doing a new thing in the Methodist movement by forming the Global Methodist Church. God is calling men and women to serve as laborers in the mission field. We know that disciples who follow Jesus need to belong to a local church. And we know that local churches need preachers who will proclaim the gospel, administer the sacraments, teach the faith and order the life of the church.
The apostle Paul put it clearly in Romans 10:14-15 saying, “But how are they to call on one in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in one of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone to proclaim him? And how are they to proclaim him unless they are sent? As it is written, ‘How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!’”
God is raising up and sending a new generation of clergy to participate in this Wesleyan movement. Praise the Lord!
In just eight months, I have participated in sixteen different provisional annual conference sessions this year, including the preliminary gatherings that were preparations for the formation of provisional annual conferences. Most of them have included services of ordination, and as of late August, I have ordained or assisted in ordaining 440 women and men. And I have four more ordination services scheduled between now and the end of the year! A recent photograph from the North Alabama Annual Conference included the 68 persons I ordained and those who had transferred in from other denominations. Seeing such a crowd gives one confidence about the future leadership of the Global Methodist Church.
Each of these ordinations is special to the person being ordained and their family. Some of these persons are recent graduates of seminary. Others have served as licensed local pastors for decades. Some were qualified as elders but rejected as too conservative for their former denomination. Others were deacons who now feel called to be elders in addition to being deacons.
For each of these persons I would have preferred the opportunity to get to know them and their story better than I do. But one in particular stands out. Josh Groce was called into ministry as a second career. He was still a young man. He received his call while he, his wife, Alicia, and their two children were members of Hernando United Methodist Church in Hernando, Mississippi. He attended Asbury Theological Seminary and joined the staff of his church. Given the turmoil within his denomination, he delayed ordination until his church voted to disaffiliate. He then applied and was approved for ordination in the Global Methodist Church.
Tragically, Alicia was diagnosed with rapidly advancing ALS syndrome. Earlier this year it became clear that she would not have long to live. But she had supported her husband through his call to ministry and his theological education and she wanted to see him ordained. The Mississippi-West Tennessee Transitional Conference Advisory Team asked if I would ordain Josh in a special worship service. So on April 18, with members of the TCAT and the Hernando Methodist Church present, I ordained Josh as both deacon and elder. Alicia and their children were present. She died August 5 at the age 35.
Despite major challenges, both personal and corporate, God is raising up clergy for the Wesleyan movement in general and the Global Methodist Church in particular. It is a great privilege to be part of that process in which the Holy Spirit is working!
Three points about clergy leadership should be emphasized. Like other Wesleyan denominations, the GM Church believes in education, certification, and ordination for its clergy.
While John Wesley described himself as homo unius libri, a man of one book, he also insisted that his clergy should read many books and study to improve their preaching and leadership. For many years Methodist preachers followed a course of study. With the founding of seminaries, a system of formal education was established for clergy. The GM Church continues to value educated pastors, so it requires those who hear a call to ministry to pursue a formal education by attending seminary or availing themselves of other pathways the denomination has approved.
In addition to the educational requirements, each candidate must pass through a certification process. That process begins at the local church level, then involves critical engagement with an annual conference board of ministry, and culminates in a vote of approval for ordination by an annual conference’s clergy session.
Finally, the GM Church, like most Methodist denominations, has an episcopal form of church governance. Therefore a bishop (the title comes from the New Testament Greek word, episkopos) has the solemn duty and honor of ordaining approved clergy candidates for service in the church. The GM Church’s ordination liturgy involves the bishop examining the candidates in front of the whole conference. The bishop speaks about leadership in God’s church and the specific tasks of deacons and elders. The ordinands are asked for their commitments to preach the gospel and maintain the church’s faith. Then the bishop lays hands on each person’s head and prays that the Holy Spirit might be poured out on him or her for the office and work of their new status. And in the case of an elder, the bishop invites the ordinand to take authority to preach the gospel, administer the sacraments, and order the life of the church. That episcopal ordination connects the newly ordained clergyperson back to John Wesley through the chain of bishops ordained by him in 1784.
It is a joyful and awesome experience for the whole church to participate in ordination services. Men and women come forward believing God has called them to serve as clergy. Mentors have walked alongside them as they continued to discern that call. Teachers have enriched, challenged, and tested them as they have grown in faith and wisdom. And boards of ministry affirmed their calls through close examination and prayer. It is no wonder ordinands and bishops approach the altar with fear and trembling and often tears of joy at ordination services. It is a mighty thing to be ordained by a bishop and then sent forth as a humble laborer in God’s great work to redeem the world through his Son, Jesus Christ.
Bishop Scott J. Jones is an episcopal leader in the Global Methodist Church (globalmethodist.org). Reprinted by permission. Photo: Bishop Scott Jones and the newly ordained clergy of the North Alabama Global Methodist Church. Photo courtesy of the North Alabama Global Methodist Church.
by Steve | Dec 8, 2023 | Nov-Dec 2023
Original Sin in Methodism –
By Paul Stallsworth –
Since congregations and clergy began disaffiliating from The United Methodist Church, those remaining United Methodist have been defensively repeating this mantra: “Our doctrinal standards have not changed and will not change. So there is no need to depart.”
But what if most United Methodists do not give a darn about our church’s doctrinal standards? Or they do not even realize such standards exist? What if that is our status quo?
This article attempts to swim against the stream. What follows attends to one doctrinal standard of The United Methodist Church: the doctrine of original sin.
In Romans 5:12, St. Paul plants the truth of original sin in the Church’s apostolic faith: “sin came into the world through one man…” (NRSV). Original sin is the sin of Adam, which is born in all human beings who follow Adam. This doctrine asserts not only the contagion of Adam’s corrupting sin to all of humanity but also the Fall’s catastrophic impact on all of creation. This world is broken, as is every person in it.
Original Sin Goes Away. When was the last time you heard a sermon on original sin? Better yet, when was the last time you heard original sin even mentioned in a sermon? A long time ago. Right? This phrase, original sin, seems to have been banished from United Methodist sanctuaries, if not from the everyday United Methodist vocabulary.
There is a reason – an historical reason – why original sin is among Today’s Least Popular Sermon Topics. Here is one way to tell that story.
In the early 1900s, Reinhold Niebuhr (1892-1971) was a young pastor in Detroit. Later he became an influential professor and public theologian at Union Theological Seminary in New York City. His sermons were so eagerly followed that they were sometimes covered by The New York Times on page one. Niebuhr was gifted at taking biblical categories and truths, and applying them to the social and political realities of his time and place.
Unlike many American theologians of that time, Niebuhr took sin seriously. Dr. Sidney Ahlstrom (1919-1984), in his Religious History of the American People (Yale University Press, 1972), wrote this about Dr. Niebuhr: “Above all, [Niebuhr] sought to make [people] fully aware of the depths of human sinfulness” (p. 942).
In 1939, Reinhold Niebuhr delivered the Gifford Lectures at Edinburgh University in Scotland. The lectures were later published in two volumes under the title The Nature and Destiny of Man (Niebuhr’s book titles are rather grandiose). In his Preface to The Nature and Destiny of Man, Niebuhr reflected: “I believed and still believe that human evil, primarily expressed in undue self-concern, is a corruption of its essential freedom and grows with its freedom. Therefore, every effort to equate evil purely with the ignorance of the mind and with the passions of the body is confusing and erroneous. I used the traditional religious symbols of the ‘Fall’ and of ‘original sin’ to counter these conceptions. My only regret is that I did not realize that the legendary character of the one [‘Fall’] and the dubious connotations of the other [‘original sin’] would prove so offensive to the modern mind…” (Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1943/1964, Vol. I, p. viii, emphasis added).
Reinhold Niebuhr’s brother, H. Richard Niebuhr (1894-1962), described the liberal theology, which his brother often challenged, as “vacuous.” Furthermore, H. Richard provided that memorable summary of liberal theology: a “God without wrath brings men without sin into a kingdom without judgment through the ministrations of a Christ without a cross” (The Kingdom of God in America, 1937). (Thanks to Dr. James V. Heidinger II for his reference to H. Richard Niebuhr in his excellent book The Rise of Theological Liberalism and the Decline of American Methodism [Seedbed, 2017].)
According to Dr. Joshua Mitchell of Georgetown University, as early as the middle of the Second World War, Reinhold Niebuhr realized that he had failed to return original sin to the faith and message of the Protestant churches in the United States.
Original Sin Goes Woke. Evicted from then-mainline Protestant churches, the doctrine of original sin did not die. Dr. Mitchell reports: “People have abandoned the churches because the churches wanted the God of Love but not the God of Judgment. So the churches have gone their merry way speaking [only] about … God as love. But if the Bible is right, the first human experience is the experience of transgression [or sin; think Adam and Eve or original sin], [and if] the churches’ turn away from it, the people will look for a way of thinking through transgression that the churches are not offering.”
Leaving the Church of the God of Love, sniffing around for an account of transgression, some of the seekers wandered into the realm of politics. In identity politics, people learn that the world should be divided into the innocent and the guilty, the pure and the impure, the sin-free and the sin-full. The innocent are not corrupted by original sin. Only the guilty are stained and twisted and corrupted by the sin of Adam. Needing a way to be forgiven, the guilty are forever dealing with, and striving to overcome, their guilt.
So the identity groups willingly take out their rage, that stems from their experience of injustice, on those they deem guilty of original sin. These identity groups scapegoat a particular group, and they take out their suffering, betrayal, and anger on that scapegoated group. This scapegoating never leads to reconciliation or resolution or even conclusion. This scapegoating goes on and on and on.
Original Sin Returns to the Gospel. The Church’s historic faith is dramatically, totally different from identity-group ideology that divides the innocent from the guilty, the pure from the impure. The Church’s holy scripture declares the words of St. Paul: “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23, NRSV). The Church’s apostolic faith declares: the sin of Adam is the sin of every person (except Jesus Christ).
The truth of original sin is buried in The United Methodist Church’s doctrinal standards. These standards are seldom studied, read, or consulted. Even so, Article VII in The Articles of Religion addresses original sin. It boldly declares: “Original sin standeth not in the following of Adam (as the Pelagians do vainly talk), but it is the corruption of the nature of every man, that naturally is engendered of the offspring of Adam, whereby man is very far gone from original righteousness, and of his own nature inclined to evil, and that continually” (Book of Discipline [2016], Paragraph 104. Section 3, p. 67).
Therefore, for Methodists, original sin is not about making a few bad choices, here and there, throughout life – especially before age 30. Original sin is not about living like Adam. That downplays the cataclysmic impact of Adam’s Fall on all of humanity and on all of creation.
Original sin is about the corruption – corruption! – of every human being.
• That corruption originates with Adam and Eve, and it is passed to all.
• That corruption pushes every person far from original righteousness, from God.
• That corruption bends our nature – our heart, mind, and body – toward evil.
• That corruption directs us toward evil in a continuing way.
Article VIII – Of Free Will follows Article VII. This article on free will actually asserts that natural humanity, apart from God, does not have free will! The article warns that each and every human being is so corrupt that, on our own, we cannot choose to leave evil behind. On our own, we cannot resolve morally and spiritually to improve ourselves. On our own, we cannot decide to repent. Without God’s help, we cannot have faith in God. Without God’s grace, we cannot love God or our neighbor.
Because of original sin, lacking free will, humanity is stuck in sin and corruption, evil and death. According to the doctrinal standards of The United Methodist Church, each and every person has no escape from original sin. That is misery.
Into this misery comes the Word: “‘For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life’” (John 3:16, NRSV).
God the Father sends God the Son, Jesus Christ, into this world, into history, into Israel. At the end of his public ministry, dying on a cross outside Jerusalem, Jesus accepts onto himself the sins of the world. Jesus becomes the scapegoat for all – not just those deemed guilty by identity groups.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer noted: “While we are distinguishing the pious from the ungodly, the good from the wicked, the noble from the mean, God makes no distinction at all in his love for the [fallen] man. He does not permit us to classify men and the world according to our own standards and to set ourselves up as judges over them” (Ethics, p. 71).
As the love of God, Jesus pays the price for the sins of all – not just for the sins of one group.
“He breaks the power of canceled sin, he sets the prisoner free; his blood can make the foulest clean; his blood availed for me” (“O For a Thousand Tongues to Sing”).
Paul Stallsworth is a United Methodist elder in the North Carolina Conference of The United Methodist Church. Retired from pastoral ministry, he leads the Taskforce of United Methodists on Abortion and Sexuality and edits its newsletter Lifewatch (which concerns Christ and His Church, life and abortion, and marriage and sexuality). With his wife Marsha, he lives in Wilson, North Carolina. This article first appeared in Lifewatch (www.lifewatch.org). To contact the ministry, email Lifewatch@charter.net. Reprinted here by permission. Photo of Rev. Stallsworth by Krystal Baker. Photo: Shutterstock.
