Dearest friends in Christ Jesus:
By the time you receive this note I will have affixed my signature by hand 696 times to the Disaffiliation Agreements for 348 local churches that sought or are seeking to sever their connection to the West Ohio Conference. You may be puzzled by the numbers above. As it turns out my signature is called for twice on each agreement. Let me say to you without fear of contradiction that signing any binding document is sobering. But in this case, I am signing a binding document (by the way others sign these agreements as well) that unbinds us from one another. Maybe the right word is not sober but sad. I wish that it were not so. I am clear however, that we cannot go back. There are no do-overs. This is true for all of life. Our only choice is to face the future with faith, courage, hope and love. And face the future we will. You have my word on that.
That said, it is expected that on November 1 following a Special Session of Annual Conference, the West Ohio Conference of the United Methodist Church, will be made up of 613 local churches. That’s a heaven of a lot of churches. Especially when you look at the geographic footprint of our conference. So, for me the sadness is passing, because I see nothing in front of us but missional opportunity. Six hundred plus churches is more than enough to impact the world with the liberating, life-giving Gospel of Jesus Christ. So, my ask of you is that every congregation, every member, every pastor and member of church staff would be single minded in engaging the mission of making disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world. Let’s bring the pity party to an end.
Let’s remember who we are in Christ Jesus. Let’s share humbly and courageously our Wesleyan take on the Gospel. Let’s choose to filter out the distracting noise that so easily distracts us from the work of being church. The Apostle Paul put this yearning on this wise to the Church at Philippi:
And this is my prayer, that your love may overflow more and more with knowledge and full insight to help you to determine what is best, so that on the day of Christ you may be pure and blameless, having produced the harvest of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ for the glory and praise of God. (Philippians 1:9-11)
The phrase “what is best” comes through in some translations as “what matters”. Beloved, our impact going forward will rise and fall on our capacity to determine and then do “what matters”.
Speaking of things that matter, I invite you to continue your prayers for the tragic unnecessary, senseless and unwarranted losses in Israel especially the region known as Gaza. The impact is not just there but felt around the world. I hope and pray for a diplomatic solution and invite you to join me in being in touch with elected officials here in the United States to continue such efforts with earnestness. And while we hope, pray and work for and end to the hostilities in the Middle East and in Ukraine let’s acknowledge that the strife that has our attention is what comes through the news feeds. But in no way does it consider all of the ravages of war and violence across the globe that never make it to our inboxes or screens. As disciples of Jesus Christ, we are called to be peace makers everywhere and always; in our local settings and globally.
All war and violence have roots in avarice, greed, desire for domination and the refusal to see and embrace our common humanity with every other person without regard for nationality, first language, location, creed etc. What if the road to renewing the church led through this territory of things that matter. Let’s take up that work with fresh resolve and trust God for our future.
Yours in Christ Jesus,
Bishop Gregory V. Palmer