How God Used Good News

By Warren Budd

Many Methodists have believed that the ministry of Good News encompassed just lobbying at General Conference and publishing an attractive, informative magazine. But our family – along with countless others – can attest that it involved much more.

The most visible fruit of the Good News ministry has been its assistance in the formation of the Global Methodist Church. But there were other important initiatives pursued by Good News over the years that had a profound effect on United Methodists searching for a genuine expression of Wesleyan scriptural Christianity. Besides producing Sunday school literature, helping initiate the formation of the Mission Society, and spearheading an alternative women’s mission group, Good News produced numerous books and pamphlets on orthodox Methodist belief. Good News also counseled with literally thousands of United Methodists who were experiencing apostasy in their local church, urging them to remain United Methodist and to remember that they were serving on a mission field.

There was another ministry pursued by Good News that allowed evangelical United Methodists to understand that they were not alone. Up until the mid-nineties, Good News held convocations at venues across the United States that brought inspiring speakers and vibrant worship to orthodox United Methodists seeking a deeper relationship with God. There were programs for children and youth as well as informative breakout sessions.

In 1973 I made what I thought was a commitment to Jesus Christ. Yet I really did not understand the nature of salvation. I struggled for six years to discern what God had in store for me. A spark was ignited in 1979 when a pastor friend, Dr. Charles Boland, gave me a couple of Good News magazines. I devoured them. In one of the magazines was a review of Dr. Robert Tuttle’s book John Wesley: HisLife and Theology. After reading it I became fascinated with Wesleyan theology. In the summer of 1980, I saw that the author would be speaking at a Good News convocation in July.

Using all of the persuasive skills I could muster, I talked my wife Courtenay into dragging our (then) four children to a Good News meeting where we knew absolutely no one. She later told me she thought I had lost my mind.

Our oldest child Becky later told me that this convocation had a “staggering” effect on the spiritual lives of our family. The vibrant worship, especially youth-directed outreach led by the New Directions singing group out of North Carolina, and the youth Bible study taught by a godly woman, led our two daughters to give their lives to Christ. God has used both of these women in mighty ways.

At the Lake Junaluska convocation, Courtenay and I had a profound experience with the presence of God, returning home greatly changed.

Becky would tour two summers with the New Directions. Later, as a student at the University of the South, she helped found a chapter of Campus Crusade for Christ and was with them in Russia just after the Berlin Wall fell.

Our younger daughter Dorothy joined Youth with a Mission in Mexico as a high school student. She founded a Fellowship of Christian Athletes chapter at the high school where she began her career as a math teacher and continues leading the group twenty-eight years later. Courtenay has been a leader in the Disciple study in our church, and I have served the church on a national and local level.

The capstone of my Christian walk has been the five years I spent pursuing a Masters of Theological studies at Asbury Seminary. Last year I graduated at age eighty-two.

The five terms I served on the Good News Board introduced me to many very special friends; Jim Heidinger, Ed Robb, Jr., Bob Tuttle, and James Robb, to name just a few. In the nineties these friendships would meet deep personal needs as Courtenay experienced severe health problems, my finances took a plunge, and, after a two-year ordeal, we discovered that we had lost our precious son Bryant.

On the night that we were given that devastating news, I called Jim Heidinger. He said that he would be right down. Jim drove from Wilmore, Kentucky, to Newnan, Georgia, in order to minister to us. James Robb flew down and Ed Robb III and others ministered to us by phone.

On May 20, 2023, I was packed in the Sherman cafeteria with about three-hundred and eighty other soon-to-be graduates of Asbury Seminary. About twenty African graduates began singing a praise song in their native language. Even though we did not understand the words, we joined in, praising and thanking God for his many blessings. We then marched into the Sherman gym which was packed with well-wishers and family. The Rev. Danny Key led the gathering in a robust, Spirit-filled singing of And Can It Be, what many refer to as the Asbury Seminary fight song. As I sang along, I began remembering the ministries, as well as friends I had met through Good News and Asbury Seminary. I looked in the audience and saw that Courtenay and our two daughters had tears in their eyes.

When God’s Spirit urged us to attend that Lake Junaluska convocation, he blessed us ten-thousand squared.

Warren Budd is a member of Midway Methodist Church in Midway, Georgia. A recent graduate of Asbury Theological Seminary, he has been a General Conference delegate, served on the United Methodist Board of Global Ministries (Theology and Mission Task Force), as well as the board of UMCOR. He has been a board member of Good News and is a Certified Lay Minister in the Global Methodist Church. Warren has taught Sunday School for 38 years. Photo: Good News magazine spread from 1980. Insets: (Center) Warren Budd (Right) Cover of “John Wesley: His Life and Theology” by Robert G Tuttle, Jr.

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