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Discovery Week
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All people may take refuge in the shadow of your wings... -- Psalm 36:7
Mark your calendar! You are invited to celebrate the mission of the United Methodist Church in helping plant the seeds of new churches in February as we discover God's leading us in this area of ministry. Come to Camp Wesley Pines on Tuesday, Feb. 23, 2010 beginning at 10 a.m. This is a "whosoever come" opportunity! Everyone is invited, wanted and needed: clergy, laity, charter members of churches, seminary students, college students, churches who hope to foster a church plant.
Five years ago, in February 2005, over 100 of us gathered at Camp Wesley Pines to learn, to connect and to plan for new churches in the Mississippi Annual Conference. This gathering was in response to what you said to Mike and me as we came to Mississippi in the fall of 2004. In 10 of the 11 district gatherings, you expressed the hope of starting new churches. (The only mission dream that was spoken more often -- in all 11 districts -- was the hope for ministries of clergy wellness.) A plan emerged from the gathering that we have followed for five years. This has lead to the planting 9 new church starts throughout the annual conference.
The event of Feb. 23 will be part of a larger Discovery process that will engage many clergy and laity Feb. 22-26. Over these four days, Rev. Candace Lewis and Rev. Gary Shockley of Path 1, the initiative of The United Methodist Church to plant 1,000 new churches in this quadrennium, will be our leaders and spiritual guides. The Discovery process will include gatherings of the cabinet, new church pastors (present and past), charter members of churches across our conference, leaders in congregational development. The goal is to teach, to learn, to inspire, to dream and to emerge with a renewed plan for new church development.
On Friday night, June 11, at the 2010 Annual Conference, we will celebrate our mission to start new churches, to create new places for new people. Every church was once a new church! This is a mission we share always as United Methodist people.
We extend ourselves in new congregations because we believe what the psalmist sings:
How precious is your steadfast love, O God.
All people may take refuge in the shadow of your wings.
They feast on the abundance of your house,
And you give them drink from the river of your delight.
For with you is the fountain of life;
In your light we see light.
-- Psalm 36:7-9
With gratitude for our ministry together,
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