Navigating Special Times of Refreshing
Navigating Special Times of Refreshing By Suzanne Nicholson What do you do when the streams of living water suddenly burst into a flood? The spiritual outpouring that began at Asbury University on February 8, 2023, was spontaneous and unexpected. After an ordinary...
Silencing United Methodist Voices
By Rob Renfroe I have now been banned in two states. Ok, that’s a bit of an overstatement. Two annual conferences, each covering an individual state, have determined that I may not speak to their churches. Even though I am still a United Methodist elder. Even if I am...
Raising the Dead in Church
By Shane Bishop - I believe it happened in the springtime, sometime after Christmas and before Easter. 1999. I don’t remember the specifics of the “when” but I will never forget the “what” of this story. I arrived at church about 9:30 through the front glass doors...
Witness to the World
Since God first stirred the hearts of John and Charles Wesley to feed the hungry, visit those in prison, oppose slavery, and care for those in need, Methodists have believed in joining hands and hearts in the service of God and others, following the words of James...
Wither Sunday School?
By Donald W. Haynes - The American Sunday School Union was organized in 1827. By the 1840’s churches across America were beginning to build “wings” of classrooms for children and youth to be taught at the church, replacing the catechism which based Christian nurture...
Rekindling Language of the Soul for Kids
By Justus Hunter - I loved Sunday school. The gray-haired ladies corralled us into small rooms lined with hand-me-down toys. A flannelgraph easel occupied one corner, a sentry threatening our chaos with order. We learned Bible stories and hokey songs and how to keep...
U.S. Regional Conference: Defeated Idea Revisited
By Tom Lambrecht - In the aftermath of the highly contentious General Conference last February in St. Louis, many ideas have surfaced as a way to attempt to resolve the conflict dividing our church. One of these ideas is a proposal from the denomination’s Connectional...
Missionary God
By Max A. Wilkins - God is a missionary God. From the moment of creation as told in Genesis, God makes his missionary nature known. With Jesus’ earthly mission, God burst forth into creation showing his missional heart. Jesus not only modeled a missional life, he also...
