40 Days of Prayer for United Methodist Campus Ministries

My friends Ashlee Alley and Creighton Alexander are excited about the fall. They are excited to know that as the colleges where they minister begin the fall semester there will be many who are praying for the students, faculty, and campus ministries at their institutions. They are encouraged to know that so many have expressed [...]

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Outliers, Institute, and The Kingdom

In his book Outliers: The Story of Success, Malcolm Gladwell begins with the tale of Roseto, Pennsylvania, a small, immigrant community nestled near the community of Bangor.  The story of Roseto falls into a familiar pattern–one repeated again and again in American history.  Gladwell chronicles how the earliest settlers of the community travelled from their native [...]

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The Wisdom of Crowds In Action :: 6 Questions for The United Methodist Church

Last week I was in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, and, having failed to schedule a blog post on the first action day for 6 Questions for The United Methodist Church, I thought that today I should direct some traffic to this initiative and encourage participation on the part of those who occasionally click through my blog. [...]

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40 Days of Prayer :: Book Now Available!

Pick up a copy of the 40 Days of Prayer guide here.  I’ve been writing about this for a while now, and I’ll include more details in a few days.  I’m at a conference now, and I don’t have much time to write.  Paperbacks are available for $16.50, or you can download the book for [...]

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UMC Young Leaders and the 40 Day Prayer Campaign :: An Update

Dear Friends: It has been a little over two weeks since an invitation was issued to young clergy and other young leaders within The United Methodist Church to participate in a 40 day prayer campaign for the denomination.  I can gladly say that over 40 people have committed to write prayers for the campaign, and [...]

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Back Home :: Pause, Work, Prayer, & Elbow Grease

This week Molly and I travelled to Fayetteville, Arkansas.  Molly took part in New Church Leadership Institute, a conference which is part of the Path1 Initiative of the United Methodist Church.  I took pictures, researched, wrote a portion of my thesis prospectus, spent time with my brother (a student at the University of Arkansas), got [...]

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Other Observations :: General Conference Part III

In the morning I had the opportunity to speak to a couple of African delegates about their perceptions regarding the human sexuality issue.  They too a conservative stance, and clearly could not understand the distance they observed between the first missionaries who taught them about Christianity and the current American church.  One man said, “These [...]

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Legislative Committees :: General Conference Part II

Well, following the opening plenary worship session I headed over to observe a committee.  I chose to join the General Board of Society 2, as one of their subcommittees would be responsible for the petitions related to human sexuality. Morning Subcommittee Meeting Following a welcome for the day and a few brief instructions about proceedings, [...]

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Opening Worship :: General Conference Part I

What a day.  What follows are my reflections–this will be part 1 of 3.  Today took a lot of energy–particularly the afternoon sessions observing the discussion of the General Board of Society.  I spent the day observing the subcommittee handling the petitions on human sexuality.  You can probably guess where this is going, particularly if [...]

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Today’s Visit :: UMC General Conference 2008 :: Ft. Worth

Today I’ll be headed to downtown Ft. Worth as an observer at General Conference ’08.  Believe it or not, I don’t tote a laptop computer, so my notes today will be handwritten, and I’ll be posting a written update here at the end of the day.  I would ask for continued prayer for UMC leaders [...]

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