Wednesday: A Recap (part 1)

(Note from George: the blog was a bit thin on the ground yesterday, due to me suddenly becoming ill with an extremely sore neck. My sincere thanks to everyone who looked after me, prayed, and helped gather information while I was unable to do any blogging myself.

And with that, here’s a round up of what happened here yesterday.)

Actually, let’s start with the last few things that happened on Tuesday – picking up from where we left off, which was the first of our three visions of where the Church ought to be in the year 2020.

Our second ‘visionary’ was the Revd. Hans Baxby, representing UMC Europe (Eurasia). Hans had three points, the main theme of which was that he wanted to see the Church less dependent on outside finances. Churches should be self-sustainable, using their offerings to fund basic running costs and only applying for connexional grants for special projects. Conferences should also be self-sustainable.

Hans pointed out that the Church in his part of Europe is relatively young (the Russian church, for example, is only 19 years old). He concluded by saying that “We will only be a spiritually sound church when we are a financially sound church.”

Then the Revd Dr Joshva Raja (from India) gave his vision for the future. Obviously a keen sportsman, Joshva told us that mission was a ‘do or die’ game in which you needed to get good numbers (just like in 20:20 cricket).

Then, football in hand, Joshva gave a few other pointers –not just to the assembled delegates but also the England team (who must have heard him, since they went on to qualify for the next round the following day). His pointers were:

• Have one mind. Be single-minded, but not identical.
• Put the Church in the context of others.
• When necessary, change your approach.

After we’d heard the visions and had some time to think over them, it was the turn of Revd. Stephen Poxon (Secretary of the MMS) to speak. He gave us a historic background to the role of mission work within Methodism, telling us the story of Nathaniel Gilbert – a slave owner who had converted to Christianity and been baptised, along with his slaves. The first recorded Methodist from outside Britain was an un-named black female slave, illustrating the point that Methodism had always provided a spiritual home for people society deemed ‘nameless’, and that Methodists should continue to do so. He concluded with a challenge to us to consider how to move on in the future, and whether the time was right to form a World Methodist Missionary Society.

With the talking over, it was time for everyone to assemble in front of the auditorium doors for a group photograph. Much hilarity ensued as the photographer conducted the huge task of getting everyone in shot.