The following is written primarily for the people of Mosaic Church, whom I am honored to serve. I post it here as an encouragement to others who may be looking for words to share with their congregation in the wake of recent developments within the United Methodist Church (UMC). If these words help, feel free to use them.
Friends,
I am grateful for your good spirit. That you are reading this tells me you care about our community. Some of you have been aware of the UMC crisis for a while, but for those just now learning about it, thank you for taking a few minutes now to get acclimated. After reading this, don’t hesitate to call me if you’re left with questions. And remember our prayer gathering on Sunday, January 12 at 6:00 p.m. in the worship space. After a time of prayer, I’ll be glad to talk with anyone who has questions.
The news we received last week (you can read about it here, here, or here) about a new agreement for a denominational separation along theological lines comes to me as a deep relief. Having worked as a small part of a much larger group for several years toward some kind of resolution, I realize just how much time, energy, prayer, and even compromise — poured out on all sides of our current divide — it took to get here. Without context, the headlines in the national media might seem harsh and this plan to separate may come as a surprise. But for many who have been on this journey for years, this represents a significant and hopeful step forward.
Most headlines last week led with the idea that the crux of the crisis is a disagreement over the status and role of LGBT persons in the leadership of the church. I want to emphasize that in my experience, the crisis in the UMC doesn’t rest on one issue. Others would agree. David French, writer for the blog “The French Press” shares accurately in his post entitled, “The Sad, Necessary Division of the United Methodist Church”:
The secular media will cast the divide primarily in the terms it understands—as focused on “LGBT issues”—but that’s incomplete. The true fracturing point between Mainline and Evangelical churches is over the authority and interpretation of scripture. The debate over LGBT issues is a consequence of the underlying dispute, not its primary cause…there is a strain of Protestant Christianity that views the Bible as valuable but not infallible or inerrant. Evangelical Christians, by contrast, strongly dissent from that view.
That seems an accurate statement to me. Our divide has been forming for years over multiple issues that are very real and very deep. They strike at the fundamentals of historical Christian orthodoxy. How we interpret scripture and relate to the person and work of Jesus Christ is at the headwaters of this crisis, but it is also important to note that our inability to hold one another accountable where we disagree only exacerbates the problem. With no one willing to do the hard work of walking out decisions made by our General Conference, the result is a kind of anarchy that is excruciating.
In this rapidly changing denominational culture, we have all now come to the conclusion that the only way forward that holds integrity is to bless and send each other out — to separate. Toward that end, a high-level conversation led to the agreement or protocol that made the news last week. For what it is worth, I am on the executive council of the Wesleyan Covenant Association — a group formed within the UMC three years ago to represent a traditional, Wesleyan theological position — and in that role have had some access to this process of hammering out an agreement. I am as pleased with the agreement that has been reached as one can be, given the inevitable compromises. There are still many miles to go before General Conference approves that agreement in May (and many more miles afterward to flesh it out) but many of us believe there is enough agreement around the table to support this plan. I hope it will pass.
The United Methodist Church is my tribe, and I’ll be sad to separate from it. But before I’m a United Methodist I am a follower of Jesus. I will preach the faith of our fathers — a faith that billions have lived and died for. I will not step back from that gospel. It is life to me. It is life to us. It is our hope and our peace. Rest assured that our take on Christianity is not the minority report — though in our corner of the world it may seem that way. The vast majority of the global Christian Church embraces the historical position of the Christian faith.
Please pray for our UMC. These are hard days for many people. I sense the anxiety among my clergy colleagues and can’t imagine the stress our bishops must be carrying. There are so many more questions than answers for how this will play out structurally, and they have great responsibilities on their shoulders. If we can manage this well, however, our effort will be historic. We are all praying for a better witness than what we’ve had.
Mosaic’s Vision Team has been talking about the crisis in the UMC for several years. We have had multiple church-wide informational meetings. I’ve so appreciated your honest sharing through those conversations. It ought to come as a blessed relief that with approval of this agreement, we will be able to keep our assets, including our building. Having worked so hard for so long to buy and build this building and develop ministries with this space in mind, that’s something you deserve and I’m pleased it is now a realistic outcome. We will continue to pray and seek Jesus while we walk out the process of this proposed separation. And as soon as we at Mosaic are able to separate from the current UMC and become part of a new Wesleyan movement, I hope and pray we will do so enthusiastically. Remember: we have nothing to do but to save souls. Let’s spend and be spent in that work.
I think I can speak for our Vision Team and staff team today in saying that we grieve the pain of so many in the UMC who really don’t want any kind of separation. We also hear the words of Jesus who said of divorce in general that Moses allowed it only because of the hardness of our hearts. “But this wasn’t so from the beginning,” he said. If you’ve ever been divorced, you understand that sometimes the thing we want least is also the only option left. And sometimes that thing represents hardness. So we grieve the public witness of irreconcilable differences, even while we grieve a Church that has abandoned the historic faith. And I grieve my own shortcomings and the things I don’t even know that I don’t know. It seems right to approach anything like this with deep humility, understanding the impact it can have on a lost and hurting world.
One last word: For some within our church, this turn of events may not be good news. If that’s you, I hope you’ll hear that in our “house” we will always let the Holy Spirit lead as we pursue truth. We will always let grace shape our conversations, and we will always remember that the Christian life is a journey, not a moment. Where there are disagreements, may we give each other room to walk this out. Not one of us came clean to the Christian experience, and not one of us is finished yet.
I am so honored to serve as your pastor, and in these days especially, your faith and commitment to the gospel inspire me. Let’s be about our “one thing” and trust God!
Until all worship,
Carolyn
P.S. — More than 1500 churches and well over 100,000 people are being represented by the WCA. Our church is among its members. If you’d like to join personally, you can do so here. You’ll also find more information there about what is to come.
