by Steve | Nov 20, 2024 | Front Page News, Nov-Dec 2024
Coming out of Exile –
By Riley B. Case –
The 1960s were not a good time for evangelicals. For one thing, the Methodist liberal establishment did not even want to admit evangelicals were evangelicals. When I went to the head of the chapel committee at my Methodist seminary and asked if we might be able to include some evangelicals among the chapel speakers, he informed me everyone at the seminary was evangelical, and just who did I have in mind. When I explained he replied, “I believe you are talking about fundamentalists and we’re not going to share our pulpit with any of them.”
When Billy Graham came to Chicago and some of us wanted to ask Graham to visit our campus, the president of the school said, “No, because we do not wish to be identified with that kind of Christianity.”
The prevailing seminary and liberal institutional view was that “fundamentalism” was an approach to Christianity of a former day and was not appropriate for Methodists, neither in the present day nor for the future. Methodism was set in its direction. In a survey of seminaries conducted in 1926, every single Methodist seminary had declared its orientation as “modernist.” As early as June 1926, the Christian Century had declared that the modernist-fundamentalist war was over and fundamentalism had lost. It announced its obituary in these words: “It is henceforth to be a disappearing quantity in American religious life, while our churches go on to larger issues.”
Other larger issues in the 1960s included war, race, COCU, economic disparity, Death of God, the Secular City, liberation theology, rising feminism, process theology, and existentialism.
Institutional liberalism was out of touch – and I was frequently bemused in those seminary days by how out of touch it was. When someone mentioned revivals in seminary, the professor indicated that revivals were a thing of the past and he had not heard of a Methodist church that had held a revival for years.
It so happened that a friend of mine from Taylor University days, Jay Kesler, was at that very moment holding a revival and would preach at 152 revivals during his years at college, most of them in Methodist churches. Youth for Christ was on the scene, as was Campus Crusade and Billy Graham’s ministry. Evangelical schools were flourishing.
That was the situation when Chuck Keysor, a pastor from Elgin, Illinois, wrote an article for the July 19, 1966 issue of the denomination-wide Christian Advocate entitled, “Methodism’s Silent Minority.”
“Within the Methodist church in the United States is a silent minority group,” Keysor wrote. “It is not represented in the higher councils of the church. Its members seem to have little influence in Nashville, Evanston, or on Riverside Drive. Its concepts are often abhorrent to Methodist officialdom at annual conference and national levels.
“I speak of those Methodists who are variously called ‘evangelicals’ or ‘conservatives’ or ‘fundamentalists.’ A more accurate description is ‘orthodox,’ for these brethren hold a traditional understanding of Christian faith.”
Keysor explained in the article that this minority was often accused of being narrow-minded, naïve, contentious, and potentially schismatic. This was unfortunate because these people loved the church and had been faithful Methodists all their lives.
In making his case Keysor mentioned that there were many more of them than official Methodism was counting. At least 10,000 churches, for example, were using Bible-based Sunday school material instead of the official Methodist material. The 10,000 figures brought strong reaction and led to charges of irresponsibility and plain out lying. But Keysor knew whereof he spoke.
Trained as a journalist he had served as managing editor of Together magazine, Methodism’s popular family magazine. He had then been converted in a Billy Graham crusade and spent some years as an editor at David C. Cook, an evangelical publisher. The 10,000 churches figure had come from his years at Cook. He knew more about what churches were not using Methodist materials than did the Nashville editors at the time. At Cook, he also became aware of the evangelical world.
Keysor’s article drew more responses than any other article Christian Advocate had ever published. The responses followed a common theme: “You have spoken our mind. We didn’t know there were others who believed like we did. What can we do?” Keysor called together some of the most enthusiastic responders. Hardly any of those early responders would be recognized today. Nor were they recognized then. They, after all, were the “silent minority.” They were the little people, the populists — rural church pastors, long-suffering lay persons, conference evangelists.
The obvious step forward for Keysor, a trained journalist, was for a magazine. A notable voice of encouragment was from Spurgeon Dunnam of Texas Methodist (eventually becoming The United Methodist Reporter). In the September 6, 1968, issue Dunnam editorialized that the church needed a conservative voice. The liberal voice was presented by the official Methodist press with Christian Advocate and Concern (Dunnam was one who believed that an official “press” was too often public relations-oriented and thus reflected the views of the leadership) but there was no conservative voice and Good News could fill the void.
“The Texas Methodist is pleased to make known to its readers that within the past year a responsible ‘conservative’ journal of opinion has been born within the United Methodist Church. It is called simply Good News, and we think it is just that.”
Coming out of exile. Would it be possible for evangelicals to get together? On August 26, 1970, the first national convocation was held. Sixteen hundred registered and crowds on some evenings swelled to over 3,000. The speakers included luminaries such as evangelist Tom Skinner, Bishop Gerald Kennedy, Harold Ball of Campus Crusade, and E. Stanley Jones. Dr. K. Morgan Edwards of Claremont School of Theology gave the keynote address. People who came to the convocation prayed and hugged and worshipped and wept and said “Amen” and “Hallelujah” without fear of disapproving stares around them. Twenty percent of the attendees were between 20 and 35 years old. Keysor wrote of the event, “We are coming out of exile.”
The critics cried, “divisive.” Again Spurgeon Dunnam responded. In an editorial titled “Constructive Divisiveness” Dunnam commented:
“The question which remains is: are the evangelicals a divisive force within the church? Yes, they are divisive. Divisive in the same way Jesus was in first century Judaism. Divisive in the same way Martin Luther was to sixteenth century Catholicism. Divisive in the same way that John Wesley was to eighteen century Anglicanism. And, strangely enough, divisive in the same way that many liberal ‘church renewalists’ are to Methodism in our own day.
“A survey of Methodism in America today reveals these basic thrusts. One is devoted primarily to the status quo. To these, the institution called Methodism is given first priority. It must be protected at all costs from any threat of major change in direction….
“The other two forces do question the theological soundness of institutional loyalty for its own sake. The progressive, renewalist force has properly prodded the Church to take seriously the social implications of the Christian gospel…. The more conservative, evangelical force is prodding the church to take with renewed seriousness its commitment to the basic tenets of our faith…”
When Dunnam was writing those words, the Reporter was reaching a million persons per week and was the largest-circulation religious paper in the world. Under Dunnam’s leadership, it investigated both liberal and conservative activities. Even when Dunnam disagreed with Good News, he always treated us with integrity.
In the midst of all this activity, Good News was not on solid ground financially and staff-wise. Then a providential person and offer came on the scene. Dr. Dennis Kinlaw, president of Asbury College in Wilmore, Kentucky, was cheering Good News on from the sidelines, but he came up with an idea to help Good News as well as Asbury College. He offered Keysor a job of teaching journalism part-time at Asbury with the understanding that the rest of his time could be used to edit the magazine. For the fledgling Good News board it was an answer to prayer. The move was made in the summer of 1972.
At the time Good News was not even recognized as an advocacy group in the church. Engage magazine listed the special interest groups at the 1972 General Conference: Black Methodists for Church Renewal, the Women’s Caucus, the Young Adult Caucus, the Youth Caucus, the Gay Caucus. There was no evangelical caucus. By 1976 things had changed. Good News was able to generate 11,000 petitions, most having to do with maintaining the Discipline’s stand on marriage and sexuality in response to an aggressive progressive agenda.
Keysor knew that these controversial cultural and theological issues would divide the church. The institutionalists responded with the kind of language that would be used frequently of evangelicals of the Good News-type in the years to come: “reactionary,” “out-of-step,” “fundamentalist,” “highly subsidized,” “hateful,” “seeking to undermine the church’s social witness,” “not serving the interests of the church.”
One critic, Marcuis E. Taber, summed up the accusations in an article that appeared in the Christian Advocate (May 13, 1971) entitled, “An Ex-Fundamentalist Looks at the Silent Minority.” According to Tabor, Good News was an “ultrafundamentalist” movement with an emphasis on literalism and minute rules which was opposed to the spirit of Jesus. It had no future in a thinking world.
The Christian Advocate gave Keysor a chance to respond and so he did in the fall of 1971. The response, classic Keysor, was perceptive, straightforward and prophetic. It said basically that Tabor and others were reading the church situation wrongly. Storms were battering the UM Church and soon it will be forced to jettison more of its proud “liberal” superstructure. Meanwhile evangelical renewal was taking place: the charismatic movement, the Jesus People, Campus Crusade, stirrings in the church overseas. If there was a right side of history, it was with evangelical renewal. This is what it meant to be “a new church for a new world.”
Was Keysor right? Looking back on our history, this is worth a discussion.
Riley B. Case is the author of Evangelical & Methodist: A Popular History (Abingdon). He is a retired United Methodist clergy person from the Indiana Annual Conference and a lifetime member of the Good News Board of Directors. This article first appeared in the January/February 2017 issue of Good News.
by Steve | Nov 20, 2024 | Front Page News, Home Page Hero Slider, Nov-Dec 2024
There is More! Carolyn Moore’s message to the GMC General Conference –
By Carolyn Moore –
Days before being elected as a bishop of the Global Methodist Church at its General Conference meeting in Costa Rica, the Rev. Carolyn Moore preached the opening sermon during the first evening worship on the campus of the Methodist School in San José.
There is a scene in the book of Acts that has grabbed my attention. It seems like a word for this moment in our history, so turn with me if you will to Acts 19.
“While Apollos was at Corinth, Paul took the road through the interior and arrived at Ephesus. There he found some disciples. He asked them, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?” They answered, “No, we have not even heard that there is a Holy Spirit.”
So Paul asked, “Then what baptism did you receive?” “John’s baptism,” they replied.
Paul said, “John’s baptism was a baptism of repentance.
He told the people to believe in the one coming after him, that is, in Jesus.”
On hearing this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus.
When Paul placed his hands on them, the Holy Spirit came on them, and they spoke in tongues and prophesied.
There were about twelve men in all.
Paul entered the synagogue and spoke boldly there for three months, arguing persuasively about the kingdom of God.
But some of them became obstinate; they refused to believe and publicly maligned the Way. So Paul left them. He took the disciples with him and had discussions daily in the lecture hall of Tyrannus.
This went on for two years, so that all the Jews and Greeks who lived in the province of Asia heard the word of the Lord” (Acts 19:1-10).
This is the story of God for the people of God. Thanks be to God!
To get at everything this moment in history has to teach us – the ones standing in another significant moment of history – we need the backstory. This conversation between Paul and these disciples actually begins some stretch of time before we get to this scene, with a Jewish guy named Apollos, who was preaching in Ephesus before Paul ever showed up.
We learn in Acts 18 that Apollos knew about Jesus, was enthusiastic about the gospel, but was preaching only the baptism of John. Somehow he’d missed the message that there is more. And if we learn nothing else from Paul in this scene, I hope we can absorb and begin to live out of that word: there is more.
For Apollos, it wasn’t until two more seasoned disciples – a couple named Priscilla and Aquila – heard him preach that he got the whole gospel. They took him to their house, fed him a good meal, and explained to him, “Friend, there is more to the story!”
Can you imagine finding out after you’d been preaching a while that you didn’t know there was more? Or maybe I need to say that this way. Some of us who have been preaching a while may not have realized (or may have forgotten) there is more. In fact, some of us probably need to take a moment to identify not with the good folks who knew but with the well-meaning preacher who missed it, because some of us may need to grieve the fact that there are dimensions of God we still don’t know … and then … after we’ve acknowledged the lack, we need to get excited about the fact that there are dimensions of God still to explore!
So Apollos gets schooled. We need to appreciate his humility in this moment – his teachability – when he finds out John’s baptism was a prequel to the main event, which was the coming of Jesus, the Messiah, and the subsequent outpouring of the Holy Spirit. John said so himself: “I baptize you with water, but the one who comes will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.” Which is not to minimize John’s baptism. His was a deeply personal work of initiating grace – a getting ready for what was to come: a freedom from invitation, freedom from the tyranny of sin, freedom from a sacrificial system that tied them to a temple and to a Law that was meant to give life but that had become so cumbersome as to be deadening.
John had an important message for those waiting for God’s Messiah, that where we start from … matters. If we want the “more” that this gospel promises, we must begin by confessing all that has kept us stuck in the shallow end of grace. We must be willing to name aloud the demons that have pestered and paralyzed us, and we must do so believing in the supreme power of grace to cover all that lacks in us and all that lacks in those around us.
Grace is the beginning of “more.” Justifying grace is our invitation into deeper waters. So the baptism of John was an initiation into grace, as if he were saying, “Don’t step into this river until you’re ready to leave the pond behind. Don’t make the mistake of dragging out of stagnant waters your bitterness and your anger and your judgments. Don’t bring those into the river of sanctifying grace now flowing from the throne of God.”
Do you hear that grace, Church? Can you receive it? Where we start from … matters.
Some years ago, I was speaking at an event in Atlanta. A colleague and I both happened to arrive at the hotel at the same time, so we both found out at the same time that the hotel was overbooked. There was no room for either of us at the inn. The hotel rebooked us at a place near the airport about half an hour away from where we were. Since I had a car, I offered to give my colleague a ride to the new hotel. I used my phone to find a route and with total trust in the direction my GPS was taking us, we started out.
As it turns out, that app on my phone will give me one option if I’m driving and another option if I’m walking. I don’t know what demon controls that choice on my phone but sometimes when I get directions to a place, it’ll show up as if I’m walking. As life would have it, the first time it ever did that was the night I was driving myself and my colleague across Atlanta, so I didn’t notice we were being directed as if we were walking from downtown to the airport.
I don’t know how I missed it – I was tired, it was late … pick your excuse. The upshot was that for the whole drive we never touched one of Atlanta’s fine freeways, a fact that baffled me but somehow didn’t cause me to stop and recalculate. I just kept driving. For ninety minutes of that thirty-minute drive, we drove the most awkward back way through the darkest streets in the most sketchy part of town at night on a weekend.
If I’d been the passenger in that car, I’d have assumed I was being kidnapped.
Imagine for a moment (I often do when I remember this event) how much more intelligent I might have looked if when we first got in the car I’d taken a moment (ten seconds!) to scan the screen and make sure all the facts were in place. If I had started us off right, I would not still to this day feel immediate shame when I see that colleague.
Pro tip: How you get started … matters. Your starting place theologically will determine your trajectory and impact where you land. Likewise, your starting place spiritually will determine your trajectory and impact where you land.
So yes! In your pursuit of the Holy Spirit start where John and Jesus started. As you believe, repent. As you go seeking a baptism in the Spirit, be immersed in sorrow for all you’ve done to oppose the Kingdom of God, whether you knew what you were doing or not. Find your heart for humility and soak in it until there is nothing left but Jesus, because on the other side of repentance, there is more. We who believe in justifying grace also know that repentance is just the beginning of all the grace. There is a sanctifying more. This is the essence of Methodism. Ours is a “freedom to” faith led by an audacious optimism (as my friend, Kevin Watson puts it) in the sanctifying more of the gospel.
So Paul’s question to those folks in Ephesus was an invitation to believe in the “more.” Something in that conversation makes Paul suspect these people are missing the rest of it so he asks them, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?”
Brilliant diagnostic question!
If your answer, as with those precious souls Paul found in Ephesus, is, “For way too much of my life, I didn’t even know there was a Holy Spirit,” there is good news for you straight out of the first-century church. It is never too late to go after the more!
Notice what happened. Look at Acts chapter 19:6, When Paul placed his hands on those Ephesian disciples of John and baptized them in the name of Jesus, the Holy Spirit came on them and they spoke in tongues and prophesied!
Talk about course correction! I’m just guessing no one was expecting that! But there they were, with an immediate supernatural response to the presence of the Holy Spirit. It had to feel like leaving the back roads and hopping on an expressway! John Stott says of these people Paul finds in Ephesus still living in a justification world, having never moved on to the sanctifying joys of the Spirit, that “Pentecost finally caught up with them!”
Don’t you love that?
My brothers and sisters in Christ on the verge of this great move of God, are you ready for Pentecost to catch up with us? Because we can do this the hard way. We can do the spiritual equivalent of traveling down every back road and dark alley, taking the longest possible route, waiting until after we’ve organized and systematized and elected and ordained and commissioned and created all our policies and procedures (I mean, we are Methodists after all! We do love “method”). We can wait until after we’ve expended all our own effort before we attempt to retrofit our movement with whatever of the Holy Spirit we can squeeze into the margins. Or we can start now, while we’re still flexible, moldable, still maybe a little messy (the term I prefer is wild). We can start now while our movement is still young and our hearts are still soft, while we still have some sense of adventure and joy and creativity about us, and we can cry out for the Holy Spirit to infuse our DNA with love and power in equal measure.
What will it be, my people called Methodist? Are you ready to let Pentecost catch up with you? Because where you start from determines what we receive, and what we receive makes all the difference.
There is more. What a powerful question Paul asks of us in this room: “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?”
Can we as Global Methodists receive the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit as a non-negotiable as we begin? Can we cultivate a compelling vision for a Spirit-filled Methodism and let that be our witness to the world and our contribution to the Body of Christ? You know, right here in this message would be my obvious opportunity to lay out a three-point plan for developing such a thing in our movement, but I’m not that good. It seems a bit arrogant to say I know how the Spirit wants to move among us. But I do have some suspicions about where a healthy, Spirit-filled, global Methodism might begin. For starters, I think we might all benefit from a holy curiosity characterized by a willingness to experiment. This seems like a very good place to begin if we really want to get beyond the status quo.
What if we could develop a posture of holy curiosity toward historic Methodism that allows us to mine the best of the ancient ways while remaining curious about and open to all the Spirit-filled life can be?
What if we try some things together — experiment a little, become more open to the moves of the Spirit, less interested in excellence-and-order for the sake of nothing more than excellence-and-order, and more interested in things Jesus actually commended to those first followers, like casting out demons and curing diseases, proclaiming the Kingdom as we heal the sick? Are you willing to come into this movement with a spirit of holy curiosity toward the supernatural dimensions of God still waiting to be explored?
My friends, are we willing to let Pentecost catch up with
us?
And if we’re going to experiment, I suspect we might also benefit from a fresh understanding of spiritual leadership, one marked by its commitment not to a more excellent organizational chart but to a more vibrant life in the Spirit? I notice in the Church that we often talk about spiritual gifts when we are looking for volunteers but we use a business model for structuring ourselves. Why is that? Why do we structure ourselves for maximum control and efficiency when Paul – the one who first envisioned what church can be – challenges us to structure ourselves spiritually? His leadership chart began with apostles, prophets, evangelists, shepherds, and teachers – all activated through the infilling of the Holy Spirit. How committed would you be to advocating for that kind of spiritual leadership for our movement, from the volunteer lay speaker to the ordained elder to the bishop?
Do we have the imagination for that? Can we unleash a new generation of leaders who move in the supernatural power of God?
Leaders, are we willing to let Pentecost catch up with us?
And how might that influence the culture of our local churches? What kind of spiritual atmosphere might be cultivated under that kind of leadership? I’m not talking liturgy or worship style or the org chart. I’m talking about the intangibles, the pervading presence of the Holy Spirit … the sound we make when we pray. Can we learn the vocabulary of real, deep-end, contending, Spirit-driven prayer as a primary language … so the world will know there is more?
Church, are we ready to let Pentecost catch up with us?
When Paul finds this group in Ephesus, there are just a handful of people (twelve, the story says) doing their best to understand what God was doing in the world. Ten verses later, the story tells us that under the influence of the Spirit of God, they’ve gone from twelve guys to all the Jews and Greeks who lived in that part of the world having heard the word of the Lord! From a handful of people to the evangelism of a whole city … in ten verses! Jesus said the Kingdom of God is like that. Its like yeast that a woman takes and mixes into about sixty pounds of flour until it has worked it way all through the dough. That’s how its done in the Kingdom of God under the influence of the Holy Spirit. It starts with a handful (or a roomful?) of people and before you know it, the whole world knows there is more.
Let’s pray together. There is a beautiful woman who lives in my neighborhood and goes to my church. Her name is Laura. She didn’t grow up in church so her perception of God was based on a “freedom from” kind of religion — a lot of guilt, not much grace. As she put it, she believed that if she did bad, she was bad. For Laura, that became something of a self-fulfilling prophecy.
It really is true, theologically, that where you start from … matters.
Laura came at life from a place of guilt and shame and that led her to spiral into habits to numb the pain. She became a serious addict. Eventually after losing the ability to care for her three kids, she ended up on the street. Homeless, Laura resorted to making money in ways she never thought possible.
She ended up in prison and that’s where she first opened a Bible and got hungry for more. She had a cell mate who loved Jesus and that intrigued her. She didn’t get delivered of her demons. So when she got out of prison, she ended up back on the street and back to her old ways … but the hunger she found while she was in?… that never left.
I want to share with you in her words something that happened to her while she was on the streets. Laura writes, “You may know that the Gideons supply Bibles for every hotel room. In one of those rooms, I found myself picking up that Bible … even in the midst of my chaos. A man … this was a client, folks … came into my hotel room and noticed the Bible and my reading glasses on the night stand. He proceeded to ask me why I was reading the Bible while I was doing these things I was doing. An immediate feeling of conviction and shame fell on me and out of nowhere, I heard my voice yell, ‘Let’s pray together!’ I said it over and over. I must have scared him to death. He bolted out of the door.”
Laura said that for her, that was the beginning of the end. The Lord had set her up. She was so hungry for more that when she was eventually arrested again, she felt nothing but relief. She ended up in a recovery house and saw how real faith could be lived out not just as “freedom from” but as a “freedom to” adventure. That was so compelling to her. She wanted more and God delivered.
Laura is now two years sober. She’s home again and raising her children. The whole family is in church – our church, a Global Methodist church! – and Laura is sharing her testimony everywhere, talking about the freedom she has found in the more of a Christ-centered, Spirit-filled life. She leads a 12-step group at our church and another one at a local recovery house and she has even been invited to speak at local and regional gatherings of the Gideons.
Isn’t that the best? This is how the Kingdom grows! Its like what happened in Acts 19: “This went on for two years so that all the Jews and Greeks who lived in the province of Asia heard the word of the Lord.”
Friends, this is the whole reason we go after the Holy Spirit. It is not just so we can have a more enjoyable quiet time. We go after the igniting power of the Holy Spirit because someone is still out there hungry for more. And we go after it because we have a charge to spread scriptural holiness throughout the land and across the globe. We go after the whole gospel so we can cast out the demons that have our friend bound up in fear and pain, and we go after it so we can lay hands on people and watch Jesus heal the sick, and we keep going after it until the whole world knows there is more!
Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?
If you missed it, if we missed it – and friends, I suspect somewhere along the way, Methodism missed it – if we missed it, the good news according to this scene in Acts 19 is that its not too late. This is our moment! We’re just getting started! We can let Pentecost catch up with us! We can get on our knees tonight and cry out for more … tonight … for ourselves … for our movement … for a world that is hungry to know the whole optimistic, curious, joyful, Spirit-drenched gospel. Are you willing right now to cry out for more? If you are, I invite you to begin where the scriptures invite us to begin – with repentance and infilling – because where we start from … matters.
I invite you to hear Paul’s encouragement: there is more. Are you ready to pray for that fresh move of the Spirit, both in your life and in this new movement? If so, I invite you to cry out and ask boldly for God to fill us freshly.
Carolyn Moore is a newly-elected bishop of the Global Methodist Church. She is a church planter and former senior pastor of Mosaic Church in Evans, Georgia.
by Steve | Nov 20, 2024 | Front Page News, Home Page Hero Slider, Nov-Dec 2024
Tears of Joy at GMC General Conference –
November/December 2024 –
Climbing up the rough side of the mountain –
I cried today. The opening worship of the convening General Conference of the Global Methodist Church [September 20] touched my core. The quality of the music, impressive and earnest, was not the trigger. Nor was the impassioned and spiritual multi-lingual concert of prayer that followed. It was just… the moment. Methodist Christians from all over the world stood to praise Jesus at a moment of kairos, an Ebenezer of God’s faithfulness. In the years leading up to this day, it had pleased Providence to baptize us in fire… fightings without and fears within… in order to find out if we are yet alive. Today we knew and confessed, we are. No one was there by accident. Each one paid a price known only to them. The Global Methodist Church is better than it ever could have been with a Protocol, Connectional Conference Plan, or other such amicable re-shuffle of the same old deck. Climbing up the rough side the mountain has made us stronger, humbler, and all the more determined.
– Chris Ritter
(Via PeopleNeedJesus.net)
I’m Finally Home
As an evangelical, Wesleyan, female pastor, I’ve never felt like I “fit” anywhere, really. I was a lifelong United Methodist, but saw the proverbial writing on the wall for years. I knew a day would come when I would have to leave, but there would be no place to go. I even got a second Masters degree in another field because I assumed I would one day be churchless and jobless.
There are other Wesleyan denominations who supposedly ordain women, but you rarely see said women leading. That’s why, for me, this week has been an emotionally overwhelming experience. I ran into a seminary colleague today and she said, “We’re home! We’re finally home!” That’s what being part of this new expression of Methodism has meant to me.
I stood sobbing today (a familiar reaction this week) after the first ballot for bishops had been cast. We had 3 elections on that initial ballot: an African man and two women. It wasn’t an identity politics result. It was three people who genuinely have the gifts and graces for the office and rose to the top, not to fill an agenda, but because the Holy Spirit chose them.
As a female, it meant something incredibly significant to have the only two women on the slate be elected in the first round. It was a resounding affirmation that I’d finally found a place to “fit”. These are my people, this is my tribe.
When my friend declared, “We’re home! We’re finally home!”, she was speaking a new reality over my lifetime of spiritual homelessness.
I am home. I’m finally home.
– Tina Dietsch Fox
Fletcher, Ohio
(Via Facebook)
Different kind of tears
There were lots of tears at the Global Methodist Church’s first General Conference, held this week in San José, Costa Rica, to officially found the new denomination. They were tears of joy, relief, and gratitude for the holy love of God.
“I cried,” said Jeff Kelley, pastor of a Global Methodist church in McCook, Nebraska. “I haven’t cried in worship in a long time. And then we had worship the next day, and I cried again.”
John Weston, pastor of a Silverdale, Washington, church and one of 21 candidates to serve as an interim bishop during the denomination’s formation period, said he felt like he couldn’t stop crying. And Emily Allen, an Asbury Theological Seminary student serving as a delegate for churches in the Northeast, wept in worship too.
“The times of worship every day have prepared us to be the church we need to be,” Allen said. “To hear the Word of God declared very boldly, to hear the invitation to receive the Spirit, to receive the holy love of God? I was just kneeling and crying.”
Many of the more than 300 delegates and 600 alternates and observers from 33 countries remembered there had been tears in past years at past conferences too. The internal strife in the United Methodist Church and the ongoing quarrels over basic theological issues, including human sexuality, the authority of Scripture, and the responsibilities of bishops, had often emotionally wrecked them. In Costa Rica, establishing a separate Methodist denomination, the tears were different.
– Daniel Silliman
(Via Christianity Today)
More freewheeling
During the conference, delegates rejoiced in exuberant worship and praise music, often with arms uplifted. This somewhat charismatic worship style is not typical even for most evangelical or conservative Methodist congregations. Most such churches are still fairly sedate and liturgically Mainline Protestant, with organ music and often solemn silence. But Global Methodist leaders when they gather are more freewheeling, somewhat reminiscent of early Methodism in Britain and America, in which revivals often included dramatic emotions and outbursts. The delegates in Costa Rica were fully united with many overseas delegates, especially from Africa, whose own worship style is likewise exuberant. The name “Global Methodist” is no accident. United Methodism’s global nature, with millions of church members in Africa, long kept it from liberalizing on sexuality issues, as other Mainline Protestant denominations did years ago. These battles built strong alliances and friendships between American evangelical United Methodists and their brethren in Africa.
–Mark Tooley
(via The Dispatch)
The fire of revival
I’ve gone back to the hotel, in part to rest, but more importantly to process the emotions I’m feeling (something that is foreign to me). This morning did not start out easy, and to be frank I didn’t know how we would be able to worship. Our music stands for the band and orchestra were missing, the cables that connect the organs to the sound system were missing, and everyone needed my attention when I really just wanted to go off and figure out a game plan. The Devil (and I truly mean that) was fighting what was about to take place in that space. When I was at my lowest this morning, Doc Abiade came and asked me to pray, and everything changed.
The Holy Spirit took control. I heard the song in my head “There are Angels Hoverin’ Round” and I remembered my mentor praying for God to place angels at the corners of my house for protection, and I’m confident God sent down angels to protect us today.
Here’s what happened – everyone pitched in! Professional musicians used chairs as music stands, a non-Methodist church put a member on a motorcycle to race across town to get us cables, and the room came to life! The orchestra played, hymns and praise songs were sung, Bishop Mark Webb guided us in confession and pardon, my friend, Roberto Paracasio prayed with the anointing of the Holy Spirit, MaryLou Reece read scripture, Bishop Scott Jones preached, Bishops Robert Hayes and Mike Lowry led Communion, and then the Spirit took over completely. Revival broke out!
I never understood what revival was until 2022 at New Room, but I didn’t fully appreciate it until today when I knew God is in control of not only The Global Methodist Church, but also every person in that room. The fire of revival is happening! We went 45-minutes over schedule and as my friend, Tom Lambrecht said, no apology was needed. Today was incredible!
I walked in my hotel room and began weeping again, and I’m weeping as I type this because I was so amazed by what happened. This must be what the people at Pentecost felt. I’m so glad Jennifer Allen and Hannah Grace were there to experience it.
Today was not about a denomination or polity or business, it was about Jesus taking complete control of his church. I surrender all to him! Use me however I can serve the Kingdom. If you want to experience the same, find your way to a place of submission and surrender to God.
Thank you, God! Thank you, to the GMC for letting me be a part of it! Praise God from whom all blessings flow!
–Sterling Allen
Worship Director of the General Conference
(via Facebook)
Editor’s note: We are deeply grateful for the ministry and gifts of the entire GMC organizational team on-site at the convening General Conference in Costa Rica. We are especially thankful for the visuals from the Global Methodist Church communications team and Max Otter Productions.
by Steve | Nov 20, 2024 | Front Page News, Nov-Dec 2024
God is Enough: To the Convening General Conference of GMC –
By Bishop Mark J. Webb –
November/December 2024 –
I believe in one God, the Father, the Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, of all that is, seen and unseen!
I believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ, the only Son of God, eternally begotten of the Father, God of God, Light from Light, true God from true God!
I believe for us and for our salvation he came down from heaven, incarnate of the Holy Spirit and the virgin Mary and became truly human!
I believe for our sake he was crucified, suffered death and was buried!
I believe on the third day he rose again, ascended to heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father!
I believe he will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead and His kingdom will have no end!
I believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life, who proceeds from the Father and the Son, who with the Father and the Son is worshipped and glorified!
I believe in one holy catholic and apostolic church! I believe in one baptism for the forgiveness of sin!
I believe in and am looking for the resurrection of the dead, and the life of the world to come.
I believe God has a purpose and a plan for those he created!
I believe that God chases after humanity with an unconditional, unimaginable, passionate love!
I believe Jesus is the bread of life, the light of the world, the good shepherd, the door by which all enter, the vine we are called to be connected to. I believe Jesus is the resurrection and the life! I believe Jesus is the way, the truth and the life!
I believe in the principalities and powers of darkness! I believe Jesus defeats the principalities and powers of darkness!
I believe God is enough! God is enough for all that we need, all that we seek and yearn for, and all we desire to be!
This is our faith! This is what we say we believe. This is what we trust! This is what shapes and equips us as a Church! This is the truth we are called to share with the world!
There is one more important thing I believe: I believe God birthed, empowers, and sends the Church to take the name and person of Jesus into a world ruled by the principalities and powers of darkness, so that at least one more person may move from darkness to light – so that one more person may know the mercy of God and be ushered into the kingdom of heaven.
The amazing, unthinkable, irrational plan of God is that through us – you and me – the world will know the truth, love, and life only offered in and through the person of Jesus Christ. Jesus has called us. The Spirit of God has equipped us, and the power of God is within us to accomplish the plan – to fully live out the mission. We have been tasked with offering the Gospel story – the reality of Jesus to the world. We are the ones sent so that the world will know that God is enough!
I love the words we find in Luke 10: The sending of women and men to live out the task of sharing the story of Jesus. “The seventy returned with joy, saying, Lord, even the demons are subject to us in Your name. And He (Jesus) said to them I was watching Satan fall from heaven like lightning” (verses 17 & 18). I love the urgency – the reality of need. I love the practicality and simplicity of instructions. I love the promise of change, the promise of success. I love the results.
Yes to the Call. In almost every state of the United States and in over 19 countries around the world, disciples of Jesus Christ known as Global Methodists have responded to the call to be the church and to take the name of Jesus to the people of their communities. We have said yes to God’s call to be the church, and God has blessed that, yes, but the call continues, and we must continue to claim the task we have been given. We must continue to decide to be a part of the plan God has for the transformation of the world.
Right now, right here, we get to say yes to being a part of the mission. Right now, right here, we get to say yes to boldly sharing the good news of Jesus in action and in word. Right now, right here, we get to say yes, so that the world will know that God is enough.
A few years ago, I had the opportunity to be in Berlin, Germany. One evening, I had a conversation with a young clergy couple, serving in a German town about an hour outside Berlin. They were talking about the congregations they served, the struggles they face, and I asked them: “What is your greatest hope for the church?” They looked at me and then one of them responded: “that we would trust God, allow ourselves to be changed by God, and believe that through us the world will know the hope of Jesus.” That’s a good 3-point sermon. That’s a good commentary on what we find in Luke 10.
Our call. In Luke 9, Jesus called the twelve together and gave them power and authority and sent them out to proclaim the kingdom of God. Luke 10 shares the account of Jesus increasing the army as he sends out 72 with the same authority and command. These passages are a prelude to the final commission that Jesus gave to his disciples and to all who would follow: “All authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth. Go, therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”
Recently I preached a sermon where I talked about the word GO. It is a huge, little word. It’s a word we use all the time. Think about it – we use the word GO to cheer someone on toward something good. We use the word GO to warn someone to move away from danger. We use the word GO to encourage someone to persevere, to correct someone who is heading in the wrong direction, to instruct someone in the way they should be going. GO is a word we use all the time.
Did you know that the word GO – according to Strong’s Concordance – is found in the Bible 1,485 times. GO is a huge, little word and it’s a word that God uses often. A word that God speaks into my life, your life, and our life together. We are called just as the 72 to GO. And we are given the same instructions for how to live out that call.
We Have to Trust God’s Truth. “I send you out as lambs in the midst of wolves.” You are going to have to trust me! “Carry no money belt, no bag, no shoes.” You are going to have to trust me!
Our response to the mission depends upon our response to God’s call upon our lives, and that is a call to trust! Let’s not get confused. Before God calls us to go anywhere for him, he calls us to follow him. Every call story begins with “follow me and I will . . .” Trust me and I will.
If the Church of Jesus Christ is going to be used by God to bring revival to the world, the church must first be willing to be renewed and transformed by the presence and grace of God. That only happens if we are willing to trust. What are we being called to trust?
• Jeremiah 31.3: “The Lord appeared to him from afar, saying, I have loved you with an everlasting love; Therefore, I have drawn you with lovingkindness.”
• Ephesians 2.4-5: “But God, being rich in mercy, because of God’s great love with which God loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved).”
• Ephesians 2.8-9: “For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast.”
It is God who loves first! It is God who chooses first! Our first call is to respond to God’s choice toward us. If we are going to be the people God desires us to be, we must settle this issue of trusting who God is. We must go deep in understanding the nature of God toward us. We must accept the grace that meets us right where we are and then molds us and shapes us and moves us to where God wants us to be and to whom God created us to be.
Responding to the call of God in our lives can never be about trying to appease God or please God, or shape God into our image or agenda. Responding to the call of God must always be about responding to who God truly is and who we truly are in relation to God.
As we continue in ministry and mission together, the ability to live out the task is directly related to our ability to trust who God is – to go deeper in our understanding of God’s amazing love for us. I hope you will continue to grow in the gifts God has given you for ministry and mission. I encourage you to become the best leaders, preachers, teachers, worship leaders, mission strategists that you can be. But none of that will allow you to live the task God has called you to if you are not first claiming God’s amazing love for yourself and responding to that love, by falling deeper and deeper in love with God.
Joseph Stowell tells of having dinner with Billy Graham at a dinner for the staff and board of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association. Billy was eighty at the time, and Dr. Stowell asked him a question: “Of all your experiences in ministry, what have you enjoyed most? Was it you time spent with presidents and heads of state? Or was it….” Before he could finish his next sentence Billy Graham responded: “None of that, by far the greatest joy of my life has been my fellowship with Jesus. Hearing him speak to me, having him guide me, sensing his presence with me. This has been the highest pleasure of my life!”
The hope of the gospel story being shared through the people of God of the Global Methodist Church is found in the people of God of the Global Methodist Church going deep in an intimate relationship with Jesus Christ. Don’t neglect your own spiritual formation. Don’t stop trusting who God is in your life and toward your life. Believe that God loves you first, and chooses you first – right where you are, just as you are.
We Must Trust God’s Power. The account in Luke 10 demonstrates the need to trust in God’s power and the results when you do. They were called to proclaim the kingdom of God and to heal the sick. When they returned, they testified that even the demons were subject to them in the name of Jesus. “You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria and to the ends of the earth” (Acts 1:8).
I will confess to you that there are times when I feel like giving up. There are times when I wonder about the purpose of continuing in this task that God has called me to be a part of. But then I am reminded that those times show up in my life when I am trusting more in my power, my abilities, and my strength, rather than the power of God.
As God calls us to the task of sharing the story of Jesus with the world, God provides the power to accomplish that task.
• The same power that parted the red sea,
• The same power that allowed Joshua to cross the Jordan on dry ground,
• The same power that allowed Elijah to call down fire,
• The same power that allowed David to kill Goliath,
• The same power that enabled Esther to speak up,
• The same power that protected Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego in a fiery furnace,
• The same power that turned water to wine, caused the blind to see and the lame to walk, the power that rolled away a stone and raised Jesus from a grave is the very power that invades our lives and fuels the task that God has called us to.
“For nothing will be impossible with God” (Luke 1:37).
Don’t forget that not even the dust of the world that clings to our feet has power over the message of the Gospel.
Church, it’s time for us to stop trusting our human wisdom and knowledge, our programs and outreach strategies, our abilities, credentials, and degrees. It’s time for us to claim and trust the power of God. The power of God that Jesus proclaimed when he acknowledged the faith of Peter and said: “I will build My church; and the gates of Hell will not overpower it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; and whatever you bind on earth shall have been bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall have been loosed in heaven.”
God has not called us to a difficult task – God has called us to an impossible task and God gives us the power to accomplish the impossible.
To those to be consecrated bishops: We are grateful for your leadership. We have seen you pursue Christ. We have seen the gifts of the Holy Spirit in you. We believe God has called you to lead us in this season.
Lead us to our first call – to trust God with everything we have – to more intimately know the nature and truth of the God we worship. Teach us how to grow more deeply in our spiritual disciplines.
Show us how to be servants of Christ. Not elected to prominence but service. Don’t get full of yourself – be filled with the Holy Spirit!
Lead us to understand and trust the power of God in our lives. Show us how you do it! Help us trust the gifts the Holy Spirit has given each of us. Remind us of the faithfulness of God’s power in the past, the reality of God’s power now, and the promise of God’s power in the days ahead.
Lead us in the mission – Proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ and teach us how to do it as well. Show us how to reach the least, the last, and the lost through your actions and then your words. Hold us accountable when we make anything more important than going to where God has called us to proclaim the kingdom of God.
Living the Mission. We have been invited to be a part of an amazing task. The task of sharing the story of Jesus – the task of living the mission – and just like those first disciples, we have the hope of returning with joy saying, “Lord, even the demons are subject to us in your name.”
Our success at living the mission – our vitality as people called by God to share the gospel of Jesus Christ – is not just possible, it’s guaranteed, it’s promised when we trust who God is and we trust God’s power.
There’s a story about a missionary who gave a Bible to a man. When it was given to him, the man hugged it close and expressed great appreciation for the precious gift of God’s Word that the missionary had given him. He read it and was transformed by the truths of God that it revealed. He saw the missionary again and thanked him for the gift of the Bible and told him how it had changed his life. He said it was the most precious gift ever given to him and he would treasure it his entire life.
A few months later when the missionary saw him, he noticed, much to his dismay, that the Bible looked like it was already falling apart, and that many of its pages were missing.
The missionary asked him, “What happened? What did you do to your Bible? When I gave it to you, I thought you considered it to be a treasured possession.”
The man replied. “Indeed, it is a very precious possession. It is the finest gift I have ever received. It is so precious that I knew I had to share it, so I very carefully chose a page and tore it out and gave it to my mother. Then I tore out another page and gave it to my father. And I tore out another page and gave it to my wife. Finally, I gave a page of God’s Word to everybody who lives in my village.”
Let’s be people who are transformed by the the truth of God. Let’s be people who trust the power of God. Let’s be people who believe that the message of the Gospel wipes away the dust of the world. Let’s be people who can do nothing else but Go into the world and give a page of God’s word, proclaim the Gospel of Jesus to everyone we meet and everywhere we go. It’s God’s plan! It’s God’s purpose! We are the ones that God sends . . .
So the world will know there is hope during the hopeless
So the world will know there is joy amid despair
So the world will know the amazing, unconditional, unrelenting love of God
So the world will know the forgiven life, new life, abundant life, the holy life, and the eternal life found in Jesus
So the world will know that God is enough!
Mark J. Webb is a bishop in the Global Methodist Church. Before transitioning to the GMC, Webb was the leader of the United Methodist Church’s Upper New York Episcopal Area.This sermon was delivered at the convening General Conference of the Global Methodist Church in September.
by Steve | Nov 20, 2024 | Front Page News, Nov-Dec 2024
Unleashing Latent DNA –
By Paul Lawler –
November/December 2024 –
The late Dr. William Abraham passed from this life into glory before seeing the birth of the Global Methodist Church, yet while he walked on this earth, he believed the day would come when a reset of Methodism would come forth. Dr. Abraham once said, “When Methodism relaunches in a new form, a wave of latent DNA will be unleashed, deeply affecting generations to come.” After serving as a delegate to the 2024 GMC General Conference in San José, Costa Rica, I am convinced Dr. Abraham’s observation was prophetic.
We celebrated the election of a diverse group of bishops consisting of two women, an African American and two Africans, as well as one North American white male. We celebrate the enhancement of structures through petitions and legislation, which will provide guidance for our being a movement again. These are great steps worthy of celebration, and yet there is much more that has been unleashed.
Here’s a brief characterization of the unleashing of latent DNA through the Global Methodist Church:
1) The Unleashing of Latent Gifts and Talents. Think about what it would take to launch a worldwide company in 24 to 36 months with more than 4,700 outlets in North America, Africa, the Philippines, and Eastern Europe. This is the challenge of launching a new, global movement. Planning a General Conference is a gargantuan task, and planning a General Conference in another country is a gargantuan task of gargantuan proportions. We’re all deeply appreciative of the work of the Commission on General Conference and its leaders, the GMC staff, and the Bishops who labored to make this historic gathering a reality. But let the record show that there has been a great unleashing of a wave of latent DNA with impressive gifts and talents in a movement that is already larger than the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA) and the Anglican Church in North America (ACNA).
2) The Unleashing of Missional Focus. The Global Methodist Church adopted a new mission statement at the General Conference. It reads, “The Global Methodist Church exists to make disciples and spread scriptural holiness across the globe.” While I’m excited about our new mission statement, I’m even more excited about all it means for local churches, communities, cities, and nations.
Historically, John Wesley understood the essential relationship between reforming the nation and scriptural holiness. Without scriptural holiness, there is no reforming of nations. Wesley knew reform would never be birthed and sustained apart from the transformation of the hearts of people coming to know Jesus Christ and entering deep, formative relationships (community) with one another. This is the way scriptural holiness works.
The new Global Methodist Church mission statement is accurate for a people called Methodist, but its implications for churches, communities, cities, and nations are worthy of prayerful excitement.
3) The Unleashing of Global Waves of Church Planting. Global Methodist Christians in Africa are already involved in planting hundreds of new churches. There are Global Methodist Christians in the Philippines already involved in planting more than half a dozen new churches in their homeland. There are Global Methodist Christians from the Philippines planting new churches in the Middle East. Numerous GMC church planters are currently training through The River Network and Planter’s Field in North America. The seeds of being a movement are being unleashed. This is but one of the reasons the local church I serve joined the Global Methodist Church. We knew we could be a part of disciple-making and church planting on a global scale, which would not be possible if we became independent or joined a small network of churches. Waves of disciple-making and church planting are being unleashed.
4) The Unleashing of Young Clergy and Their Hunger for God. While most General Conference delegates were over 40 years of age, I was impressed by the quality of our young clergy serving on delegations. God continues to build upon an emerging momentum among the young in the GMC. Our young pastors and lay leaders are bright, capable, hungry for God, and longing for God to spread scriptural holiness and awakening across the globe through the Global Methodist movement.
5) The Unleashing of Going After the Manifest Presence of God. I have never been to a denominational meeting and experienced God’s manifest presence the way we did through times of worship at this first General Conference. We chose to posture our lives before God in worship, confession of sin, and repentance. While the conference was a series of 13-hour workdays for most of us, the Holy Spirit breathed new life into us. As God’s presence became palatable, we were captivated, humbled, and found great satisfaction in God. How long has it been since anyone described a denominational meeting this way?
Many of us were reminded of what John Wesley recorded in his journal from a New Year’s Eve all-night prayer meeting on Fetter’s Lane on January 1, 1739:
“Mr. Hall, Kinchin, Ingham, Whitefield, Hutchins, and my brother Charles, were present at our love-feast in Fetter Lane, with about 60 of our brethren. About three in the morning, as we were continuing instant in prayer, the power of God came mightily upon us, insomuch that many cried out for exceeding joy, and many fell to the ground. As soon as we were recovered a little from that awe and amazement at the presence of his Majesty, we broke out with one voice, ‘We praise thee, O God; we acknowledge thee to be the Lord.”
And we, too, broke out in one voice in song! Repeatedly.
Many delegates had never been to a General Conference where there had not been deep division and wounding. By contrast, the Global Methodist General Conference was unifying and deeply edifying. There were times when I thought about the people who make up all our local churches, wishing they could be present with us, experiencing the repeated waves of joy and renewal that emanated from God’s presence that would settle upon us through times of worship.
As the Global Methodist Church has been formed, a new wave of Methodism has been reformed and birthed. Waves of latent DNA are being unleashed. Perhaps Billy Abraham is smiling as we live into a new vision for a new day. May the new Global Methodist Vision statement stir us all to rise to new heights for God’s glory:
Through the empowerment of the Holy Spirit, the Global Methodist Church envisions multiplying disciples of Jesus Christ throughout the earth who flourish in scriptural holiness as we worship passionately, love extravagantly, and witness boldly.
Paul Lawler is the Senior Pastor of Christ Church Memphis, a Global Methodist Church in Memphis, Tennessee. He is a contributing author to two books: She is Safe — Stories of Resilience and Hope from The Wellhouse and Reconstructing Methodism.
by Steve | Nov 20, 2024 | Front Page News, Nov-Dec 2024
Be Full of the Holy Spirit –
By Luther Oconer –
According to Luke, “In those days when the number of disciples was increasing, the Hellenistic Jews among them complained against the Hebraic Jews because their widows were being overlooked in the daily distribution of food” (Acts 6:1).
In this text, we encounter the first recorded internal conflict in the early church as recorded in Acts. What was the issue at hand, anyway? Well, here, we see that the early church in Jerusalem was comprised of two distinct groups of disciples.
The first group were the Hebraic Jews. These were native Jews, born and raised in the Province of Judea, who spoke Aramaic.
The second group were the Hellenistic Jews. These were Jews from the diaspora, including Gentile converts to Judaism, coming from various nations around the Mediterranean. Most likely, they were among the pilgrims who had traveled to Jerusalem for the Festival of Weeks. As foreigners, they spoke Greek and have embraced the Graeco-Roman culture of the time.
Remember, in Acts 2, these were the same people who understood the various languages spoken when the Holy Spirit was poured out on the 120 disciples on the day of Pentecost. They were also among the 3,000 individuals who were “cut to the heart” by Peter’s sermon, leading them to repent and be baptized. Following this, in Acts 2:42-47, the new and old disciples alike “devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching, fellowship, the breaking of bread, and prayer.” We also know that they shared everything in common, selling property and possessions to meet the needs of the growing community of believers. With more people being added to their number daily, the responsibility to provide for everyone became quite enormous.
However, a conflict arose. The Hellenistic Jews began to complain that their widows were being neglected in the daily distribution of food. Beneath the surface, this conflict appears to reflect a growing resentment among the Hellenistic Jews toward the Hebraic Jews. As a minority within the early church, they were subject to the bias of the Hebraic Jews. They were sort of a second-class type of Jews.
So, recognizing the seriousness of the situation, the twelve apostles needed to take decisive action. “So the Twelve gathered all the disciples together and said, ‘It would not be right for us to neglect the ministry of the word of God in order to wait on tables’” (6:2).
The apostles called together all the disciples for what could be considered their first-ever general assembly or, should I say, their convening general conference! Luke notes that “all the disciples” were brought together. Based on Acts 4:4, they were over 5,000! During this meeting, the apostles made it clear that their primary responsibility was spiritual leadership, not administrative duties. They may have been involved in managing the food distribution, in the temporal affairs of the young church, but they recognized that their focus needed to shift to their spiritual calling. They advised: “Brothers and sisters, choose seven men from among you who are known to be full of the Spirit and wisdom. We will turn this responsibility over to them and will give our attention to prayer and the ministry of the word” (6:3-4).
So, the apostles proposed to delegate the responsibility of food distribution to seven deacons, so they [the apostles] could focus on prayer and the ministry of the Word. Importantly, they established a clear criterion for selecting these deacons, as stated in verse 3: “they were to be men known to be ‘full of the Spirit and wisdom.’”
Notably, the apostles did not specify representation from the Hellenistic Jews, which might be our instinct today if faced with a similar issue. Let the Hellenistic Jews have a say in the distribution of food! Surely this would be the most logical thing to do if they were to remain a movement from many nations. Representation was key. However, to the apostles, they approached the issue in quite an unexpected way. They simply believed that this crisis could be addressed by selecting believers “full of the Spirit and wisdom.”
People of the Global Methodist Church, may we learn from this. As we navigate what it truly means to be a global church, a movement from many nations, may we aspire to be a Church of Pentecost first. And I’m saying this as a global south Methodist. Before we even try to figure out what it means to be a global church, let us be a church of Pentecost first. For it is the church of Pentecost that will usher in the church of Revelation, the one that was described in Revelation 7:9-10, composed of people from every tribe tongue, crying out, “Salvation belongs to our God, who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb.”
As followers of Jesus, let us prioritize our identity as people of the Holy Spirit before identifying ourselves as North Americans, Europeans, Hispanic, Pacific Islanders, Filipinos, Koreans, Africans, and most especially Texans! [Laughter] Why is this important? Because we are a people born of the Spirit first and foremost. Remember when Jesus explained the new birth to Nicodemus in John 3:8? “The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit.”
If you consider yourself born again – by the way, as Methodists it’s okay to call ourselves born again, amen! – you are born of the Spirit. Therefore, as we engage in the business of this conference, let us resist being guided by the color of our skin or the language we speak or even our own personal or group. Instead, let us be purely led by the Spirit. Remember, we are a new creation in Christ.
For the apostles, when they emphasized being “full of the Spirit,” they were in essence outlining for the disciples what normative Christianity looks like – that a true disciple of Jesus is one who is full of the Spirit. For there is a quantitative dynamic to the indwelling of the Holy Spirit upon the believer. Quantitative because yes, they were all baptized in the Spirit but it didn’t necessarily mean that they were full of the Spirit already. They may have a measure of the Spirit’s infilling, but they are not full of the Spirit. This is why Paul admonishes the believers: “Do not get drunk on wine, which leads to debauchery. Instead, be filled with the Spirit” (Ephesians 5:18).
And by being “full of the Spirit,” wisdom follows. Wisdom is the ability to make wise decisions. Wisdom is needed for the work that the seven deacons will undertake. If you are full of the Spirit, you will have wisdom. Actually, in Isaiah 11:2, wisdom is one of the gifts of the Spirit.
How did this convening General Conference of the first Christians take the proposal of the apostles, anyway? Remarkably: “This proposal pleased the whole group” (6:5a). Wow, there was no more debate. No one tried make an amendment to the proposal. No one said, Let’s perfect this proposal a little bit. No, they simply trusted the leading of the Spirit through the Apostles who were full of the Spirit. Even the Hellenistic Jews, the minority group who were complaining earlier, agreed to this solution.
We are not told how the whole group did it, but they eventually choose the first seven deacons, and here’s a twist—and it’s an amazing twist. For as Luke continues, “They chose Stephen, a man full of faith and of the Holy Spirit; also Philip, Procorus, Nicanor, Timon, Parmenas, and Nicolas from Antioch, a convert to Judaism. They presented these men to the apostles, who prayed and laid their hands on them” (6.5b).
So, if you look at all these names, none of these are Jewish or Hebraic names. All of these names are Hellenistic names, hence, the seven were all Hellenistic Jews! Let that sink in for a moment, church. What a twist, isn’t it? This means that even the Hebraic Jews gave up their right for proper representation in the distribution of food. So in a way, what we see here is a change of heart on the part of the more dominant Hebraic Jews. They were willing to entrust their needs to the minority group. They became radically generous. This was repentance. This was revival!
They [including the Hellenistic Jews] were delivered from a what’s in it for me or what’s in it for my group mentality. Church, I do believe that if the Spirit shows up in our proceedings here at the General Conference, we will be of one heart. Why, there will be no more trust issues. We will be more gracious with one another and operate from a place of trust and not out of fear.
And so that’s why what we see in v. 7 is no accident. “So the word of God spread. The number of disciples in Jerusalem increased rapidly, and a large number of priests became obedient to the faith.”
Church, do we want the world to know? Then let us be a church that is full of the Spirit. In 1786, John Wesley wrote, “I am not afraid that the people called Methodists should ever cease to exist either in Europe or America. But I am afraid lest they should only exist as a dead sect, having the form of religion without the power.”
Church, what we have seen here in these past few days is a rebirth of Methodism. And now I see us here legislating, and what we’re really trying to do is we’re trying to revive and update Methodism. It’s like there’s this old collectible car, old precious car. And we realize it doesn’t belong to the museum yet. So, we work on it, we restore, and we even make a few updates here and there. We even update the engine. But let’s not forget it still runs on gas. It ran on gas before, it’s going to run on gas again. We need the power of the Holy Spirit, the same power that enlivened early Methodism during the time of John Wesley and the early American Methodists, we need that same power again.They were full of the Spirit.
Church, it is my prayer today that we truly become a church of Pentecost. A church that is full of the Spirit. And to be full of the Spirit means we will allow the Holy Spirit to fill every space in the life our movement. And when I say every space, I don’t mean for him to just fill the gaps. Or confine him in just one place. We want him to fill everything.
Let him fill our churches, let him fill our programs, let him fill every fiber of our movement. Let us make room, and we’re not just going to give him one room. We will give him access to all the rooms. And that means we’re making room for him to move even in how we conduct our remaining proceedings in this general conference. In the petitions we will decide on. In the election of new commission members. And most possibly, when we elect new interim bishops. Can we make that commitment today? To let the Holy Spirit fill every space. But before that happens, we need to surrender. And he will give us a new heart.
Luther Oconer is Associate Professor of Global Wesleyan Theology at Asbury Theological Seminary in Wilmore, Kentycky. This article is adapted from the sermon he preached at the convening General Conference of the Global Methodist Church in Costa Rica. Dr. Oconer has served on the faculty at United Theological Seminary in Dayton, Ohio, until 2021. He teaches on the area of Methodist theology and doctrine, the Holiness Movement, Pentecostal/ Charismatic Movement, and church renewal. He is also the conference superintendent of the Mega Manila Annual Conference of the Global Methodist Church.
