Being Christian Without Losing Your Mind
In the years leading up the 2019 General Conference of the UMC, I had been a strong supporter of the “One Church Plan.” That proposal was intended to keep United Methodism from fracturing over the issue of human sexuality. It would have empowered local churches, conferences, and clergy to decide about LGBTQ+ ordination and same-sex …
There’s a genius in the complex, miraculous beauty that frames this world. Unfortunately, there’s also a genius behind the force that seems hell-bent on destroying that beauty. Its most insidious expression is when it convinces people to do evil while thinking they’re doing good. Jesus summarized it well in his final conversation with his disciples: …
I struggle getting past the anger that rises each time I read about a congregation disaffiliating with the United Methodist Church. I ask myself rhetorical questions that turn up the inner thermostat. What is it that makes them feel they have to break fellowship with those who are just as earnestly trying to follow Christ? …
A quirky passage in Deuteronomy frames the breaking apart of the United Methodist Church quite nicely. Deuteronomy 15:1-6 presents a beautiful, idyllic vision for the Israelites. Personal debts would be forgiven/cancelled every seven years. If everyone honored such grace, Israel would find itself being a utopia: “Of course there won’t be any poor persons among …
Intending to look mortality squarely in the eye, I recently attended the 50th reunion of my high school class in Poplar Bluff, Missouri. It turned out to be a lot of fun. Something strange happened, though. Someone brought up the name of Sam Giambelluca. He had been a leader in local sports when I was …
I am relieved by the proposal recently hammered out by the inclusive, high-level mediating group dealing with the future of our denomination. If it ends up being presented at, and approved by, the 2020 General Conference in May, then the decades-old wrangling over gay ordination and same-sex marriage may finally come to an end. It …
Abraham Lincoln followed a vision that transcended partisanship. In his second inaugural address, with the Union’s victory assured, he could have piled on. He could have condemned the South and spoken about an eye for an eye. Indeed, our current political climate would have repeatedly fostered animosity through endless tweets. But Lincoln saw the bigger …
According to an article in the Christian Post, the Missouri Synod Lutheran Church recently passed a resolution affirming belief that God created the world “in six natural days.” This might come as a surprise to the Creator, since we know earth to be over four billion years old. There’s irrefutable proof of that, as Bill …
Light shone down from heaven in a seminary classroom one afternoon. It’s stuck with me all these years. The theology prof provided this moment of clarity when he said that there are basically only two theological orientations. We all fall, in varying degrees, into one of them. He called one “redemptionist.” This is the group …
The Missouri Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church recently completed its three-day meeting in Springfield. We elected delegates, lay and clergy, who will represent us at the 2020 General Conference, the policy making body of our denomination. The people we elected (with surprising quickness) all endorse full inclusion of the LGBTQIA+ community into the …