Seventh Session June 10, 2016 • Vol. 7


THE CHURCHES OF THE SUSQUEHANNA CONFERENCE, THE UNITED METHODIST CHURCH


Creating new places for new people


By Bethany Wood H


oly Spirit, you are welcome here. The people of the Susquehanna Annual Conference gathered to


PHOTO BY SANDII PEIFFER


Bishop Jeremiah Park urged the Annual Conference to expect that God can radically change our communities into spaces where the Good News is shared and our neighbors are loved.


worship, sing, pray, and holy conference with energetic, inviting song. “Joy of the Lord” echoed through the space created for the work and fellowship ahead. Led by members of the Young People’s Ministry Council, worship began with the announcement that God, as proclaimed in Isaiah 43, is dong a new thing. Possibilities exist for the church to be transformed into places of vitality; possibilities for walking a new path, a new journey, and a renewed purpose as we together to make new disciples for such a time as this. Do we say “yes” or “no” to God? What are our expectations? We have the expectation that God is always doing something new, creating new spaces for new people, raising up new leaders, new ideas, and new potential. We have the expectation that God can radically change our communities into spaces where the Good News is shared and our neighbors are loved.


Pastors Mindi Ferguson and Kristopher Sledge brought that home in the “Spoken


Word.” They each spoke in a litany of how God has taken their lives in an undetermined journey, wrapped in grace. What is ahead, we cannot presume to know. We do know that God is present and that God is working for good as we live into the promise of faith.


Bishop Jeremiah Park greeted the congregation,


delightedly recalling the


conversation with the Rev. Beth Jones four years ago signaling his appointment to the Susquehanna Conference. He thanked those gathered for their faithful witness in so many ways – in the increase of paying Shares of Ministry, enabling the conference to pay our General Church Shares of Ministry in full, in raising over $400,000 for the Bishop’s Initiative, in mission ventures, and second mile giving in local congregations. He recognized his wife, Lisa, as she was joyfully acknowledged by the Conference. As Bishop Park began his sermon, he


asked God’s people to pray, pray, pray. And pray. He spoke of creating new spaces for new people. Last year, the Conference engaged in a theme of vital


CONTINUED ON PAGE 3


Bishop’s statement after Delegation Report


A PHOTO BY SANDII PEIFFER


Rev. Lori Steffensen challenged the Annual Conference to stay in a deep relationship with God, so we can go and bear fruit for the gospel.


Remain in my love, bear much fruit


By Rev. Ryan Krauss “We are who we are because of what


they have done for us.” Rev. Lori J. Steffensen expressed heartfelt gratitude to the families of the pastors and laity who had gone on to glory. The Celebration of Death and Resurrection on Thursday evening paid tribute to the fruitful ministry in the lives of Susquehanna Conferences departed saints. Though “service to our beloved church at times took them away from you,” continued Steffensen, “we grieve in the expectation of future hope.” The Celebration


of Death and Resurrection is a yearly memorial


punctuated by the dedication of stoles and Bibles in honor of the deceased. Placed on or at the foot of a symbolic yoke, these gifts — 22 Bibles and 23 stoles — will bless the pastors of Sierra Leone, just as the saints themselves blessed many of us. This material legacy is only a fraction of the spiritual fruit committed by these men and women who represent over 790 years combined in


ministry. Through


such commitment, they sacrificed in their own efforts to “make new places for new


CONTINUED ON PAGE 3 A witness to making disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world


s you have just heard in the report from our delegates to General Conference, United Methodists across the connection are facing important issues where there seems to be no simple or easy answer.


For now, we are living in a time marked by anxiety and tension on both sides of the issue of human sexuality.


Our beloved church is at a critical juncture. The Council of Bishops took seriously the charge of the General Conference to begin a process of prayer and discussion that will help us to look to the future in regard to same-gender issues. A special commission assembled from around the world and across the theological spectrum will begin soon to envision how our church might remain united.


As this special commission works over the next two or three years, our annual conference has an opportunity to uphold their work through intentional prayer and our own opportunities for conversation, mutual listening, and discernment.


During the rest of the year, God willing, I, as your bishop, and the leadership of the Annual Conference will be involving persons of differing perspectives in order to look at ways to engage clergy and laity in a process of discernment that more closely resembles a Christ-like model of faith. We will depend on the leading of God’s Spirit to show us the ways we can engage in deep prayer and discussion. Our hope is that our engagement with one another will lead us all to a spirit of openness to God’s preferred future for our church.


Be assured that you, as members of the Susquehanna Annual Conference, will be kept apprised as the plans unfold.


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