(This was written for the July 2020 newsletter for Greenville First UMC)
Good morning, Church! God bless you. I say good morning anytime in memory of my late father-in-law who said it’s not a time of day, it’s a state of mind.
Beverly and I have successfully moved into the parsonage. Thank you, Leadership Board, and Wendy Bates, John Raven, Jeff and Jennifer Loding, for your work on preparing the house for its next occupants.
I am grateful for Pastor Don and Shelly who have oriented us for a good beginning here. And I praise God for Pastor Don’s 38 years of pastoral ministry.
As your incoming pastor, I want to listen, learn, and love.
- Listen to you for God’s voice in the stories of your lives and the life of the congregation.
- Learn from you about what it means to be faithful here and how decisions are made and guidance is sought and how peace and justice are pursued and practiced.
- Love you and our neighbors as an expression of our love for God.
I listen, learn, and love from perspectives of grace, hospitality, and peace.
Grace is the best way I experience God. In grace, God comforts, confronts, and confounds me with unmerited love that will not let me go. I know grace most directly in Beverly, my wife, and our three adult daughters, two sons-in-law, three grandchildren, family, and friends. I like Anne Lamott’s desire to be with her Sunday School kids to “assure them that we can trust God no matter how things look and how long things take…(and) that grace bats last.”
I value hospitality because my life has been shaped in significant ways by moving. I was a new student in a new school in 4th grade, 5th grade, 7th grade, and 9th grade following the educational career of my dad who started as a remedial English teacher in Elkhart, Indiana, and finished as superintendent of the River Valley School District in southwest Michigan. It was through the hospitality of Three Oaks United Methodist Church that I formed an initial call to ministry. The late Henri Nouwen wrote that “Hospitality is not to change people, but to offer them space where change can take place” (Reaching Out, 71).
My search and desire for peace are grounded in the social consciousness of my faith and my name. My faith gained a social consciousness through the Wesley Foundation at Central Michigan University and my pastor, Rev. Tom Jones. He was a prophet in a true sense and taught me the Gospel’s disruption and irritation and protest of unjust ways that cannot be denied. The Social Principles of The United Methodist Church have been a guide and companion in ministry for me (proposed new version here: https://www.umcjustice.org/documents/124). A deeper affirmation of peace is in the meaning of my name, Jeffrey, which means “God’s peace.”
So, we are on our way together. I am excited to listen, learn, and love with you as we witness and cooperate with all the Spirit of God is doing in our midst.