“Bishop Jung has a vision for 100 new faith communities in Ohio by 2029,” said Fresh Starts & New Beginnings Executive Director Brad Aycock, adding that each community has a name, each name has a story, and each story matters to God.

More than 100 lay and clergy leaders from the East Ohio and West Ohio Conferences of The United Methodist Church participated in the recent District Strategy Team (DST) Vision Day at Sunbury UMC. They gathered to hear from Bishop Jung and to begin planning how their respective district teams will develop a new plan for United Methodist communities shaped by its own context, circumstances and local culture.

“The District Strategy Teams exists for more than planning. Our calling is to join in God’s mission of creating and expanding new communities of faith so that lives may be transformed and souls may be saved,” Bishop Jung said. “We find inspiration in the story of Isaac in Genesis 26. Wherever Isaac went, he dug wells. Wells were more than water sources – they were the very foundation of life for a community.”

The bishop shared that Ohio United Methodists face two simultaneous realities: sustaining and revitalizing our existing churches while planting new faith communities and new expressions of church that will attract younger, more diverse populations across the State.

“This is not a competition between the old and the new. It is a shared calling to infuse our area with a fresh culture of passion, renewal, and possibility,” Jung stated.

Aycock explained that culture change must happen from the top down and the bottom up.

“We have to have the support of our bishop – and we do, that’s why you are here today. But the innovation happens on the ground, which is what today is about,” he said. “It takes all kinds of churches to reach all kinds of people.”

Each District Strategy Team will work alongside its superintendent and the Fresh Starts & New Beginnings staff to shape the future of ministry across Ohio. Together they will pray for God’s vision for the district, identify key areas of growth as potential locations for new faith communities, and identify existing district congregations with the potential for refocus and redevelopment for vitality through new opportunities.

“God delights when we come together with Spiritual focus and holy expectations,” Bishop Jung said. “We are not bound by old habits but inspired by the fresh movement of the Holy Spirit, calling us to create a new culture of soul-saving mission.”

In her presentation Great Miami River District Superintendent Rev. Suzanne Allen stated that churches have a lot in common with trees. They each have a life cycle and exist not for themselves but to produce seeds to multiply.

“We have churches that were all planted about the same time, usually like 100+ years ago, and a lot of them are very similar in demographics, and who they reach, and how they function. We now need to plant in some new places, new communities for reaching new people, and we have to do it in different ways to reach different people,” she said.

“This is our concrete call: to build a new culture of renewal, to embrace diversity, and to extend heartfelt love through every community we plant and every church we revitalize,” Jung said. “God is doing a new thing in Ohio Land. Let us strengthen what is rooted, dare what is new, and trust that in both, Christ is bringing life for the healing of the world.”