I just love this season! We are getting close to the most wonderful time of the year...the giving season...Thanksgiving and Christmas. It’s the time of the year that churches focus on three things...their annual Charge Conference (a UM Tradition), their annual giving campaign leading up to the next year, and their efforts to do something for someone in need (my absolutely favorite part)!
For those of you who aren’t United Methodists, the Annual Charge Conference is kind of like our church’s annual meeting. Our District Superintendent comes to the church, and we report to her or him how our year went. And then he or she and the pastor(me) try to challenge the church o grow in our ministries and in our reach out to the world!
One of my favorite parts of the Charge Conference, and this really brings out the “nerd” in me, is the address by our District Superintendent. I have done about 35 of these now, and I think I am honest in saying that I have almost always come out of that message with some insight that encourages me or challenges me throughout the whole year. District Superintendents have an enormous impact on me and the life of our church!
One, that I will never forget, was my first charge conference as a full-time pastor. I had burned the midnight oil to get everything put together for the charge conference (we love reports in the United Methodist church), and I was exhausted. And being that it was my first big conference, I was also incredibly nervous. I mean my mind was all over the place! But, as our DS got up to share, I felt a calm come over me, as our DS (his name was Hank) shared about a journey he had traveling to a neighboring church. It was late summer, and he had been called to this church because there was a conflict there that needed some guidance, and the church had called him there to help sort it out. The meeting had gone well but had gone long. So, at about 9 pm Hank headed back to Sioux Falls and home. But on his way a mosquito hit his windshield. He turned on his windshield wiper and pushed the “Wiper Fluid” button, but sure enough it was empty. The wiper blade proceeded to smear the mosquito all over the upper right corner of the windshield. And for some reason, that blotch up on the windshield just started to annoy Hank. Despite trying stay focused on the road, his mind just kept going towards the remains of that mosquito! Two minutes later Hank and his car were in the ditch.
Hank then shared that one of the hardest parts about ministry is that too many times we get sidetracked by the “bugs” in our lives. These bugs cause us to lose our focus, and often times we find ourselves in the ditch.
This week, as I ponder all that we’ve been through in the last couple of weeks, I find myself kind of entrenched in that ditch. My mind is so full of things that frankly I have no control over! I need something that will get me back on the road again. In the United Methodist Church that road has always been about three simple things (John Wesley’s 3 Simple Rules): Do no harm, stay in love with God, and do all the good you can. (Actually, the full quote for the last one is “Do all the good you can, by all the means you can, in all the ways you can, in all the places you can, at all the times you can, to all the people you can, as long as ever you can.”)
Time and time again, for me, the thing that has kept me “on the road” or helped me get back on the road as a follower of the Jesus way, has been the last of these 3 simple rules...Do all the good you can!
Today, for instance, I went to the store to just see what it would take to purchase one of our Thanksgiving Meal Bags for families in need. I was a little worried about this. Inflation has been a big buzz word this year, so I was more than a little worried about how much this might cost. I mean after all we are trying to provide for 53 families and 17 individuals this year. This could cost some money! But after I went shopping, I looked at the bill and it wasn’t bad! For two families the cost of all the groceries not including the turkey was $49.34, or about $25/ family! Add to that a $20 gift certificate for the turkey and for $45 I can give a needy family a turkey dinner! After my visit to the story, I called Cyndy up and she, too, was surprised. She suggested that tomorrow we take Emerson, our granddaughter, with us, and we have her help us fill 6 more bags!
Could it be that the church has a vital role in helping us stay on the road? Could it be that the answer to staying on the road, or getting out of the ditch, is learning to be more generous of our time, talents, and treasures?
It sure worked for me this morning!
This week, we are asking all of you to take a good look at your 2025 giving pledge for Bear Creek UMC. It’s a time for you to prayerfully consider just how much good you want to do in this world. It’s a time for you and yours to prayerfully consider just how generous you can be. I can say this, as you pastor, if you give to Bear Creek UMC, we will do all we can to use that money to do all the good we can, by all the means we can, in all the ways we can, in all the places we can, at all the times we can, to all the people we can, as long as ever we can!
Your pastor and friend, ready to fill out my 2025 giving pledge for Bear Creek UMC, Brook
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