Prayers For General Conference 2019

I am praying fiercely for our denomination as the special session of General Conference begins a week from today. 

What am I praying for?

I’m praying that the Holy Spirit guides us to a place none of us can imagine;

I’m praying that the church that helped me experience God’s love for me, that steeped me in our Wesleyan tradition of personal piety and social holiness, that I in turn devoted my life to in service, continues to wrap our children in that same love and nurture, so that they may grow up confident in this Love that will never let them go;

I’m praying that what we know to be true in every congregation throughout the Mountain Sky Conference—that our pews are filled with people who disagree with one another yet are united in mutual love and mission—will be the foundation for our denomination’s future;

I’m praying that we in the church will not judge people without knowing them, but instead will listen to their experiences of God’s love and their commitment to Christ;

I’m praying the church stops seeking to limit love in the lives of LGBTQ persons. Celibacy is a gift, not a penance, and it is God who reminds us that it “is not good for the Human One to be alone”;

I’m praying that in a world broken by divisions and hostilities, we as members of the Body of Christ can provide a healing witness to the world that diversity doesn’t have to lead to division and unity is not the same thing as uniformity;

Each of us are United Methodist because we have found something life-giving in our grace-filled theology. May we not seek to expel anyone or leave ourselves because there are people we don’t agree with, for our scriptures teach us that God keeps widening the circle of fellowship. Personally, my greatest growth as a follower of Christ came not from those who look and think like me, but from those whose experiences and beliefs were not like mine. I give thanks to God for United Methodism’s “big tent theology” that has offered me these relationships that have helped me grow. 

One of my favorite spiritual writers, Roman Catholic Carlo Carreto, wrote eloquently of how much he loved his church at the same time it angered and disappointed him. As he pondered leaving he concluded:

“Where would I go?

Would I establish another?

I would not be able to establish it without the same faults,

for they are the same faults I carry in me.

And if I did establish another,

it would be my Church,

not the Church of Christ.

And I am old enough to know

that I am no better than anyone else.”

I ask you and your congregation to pray in the coming days for our church, that we might be led by God’s Holy Spirit.