Ministry

I was reading an article by Donald Haynes this morning where he starts by quoting that famous aphorism "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."  I respectfully disagree with Haynes and Santayana.  I say this as a person who did a full concentration in history at Albright College. In one of my introductory classes at Albright on American history, the … [Read more...] about History Does Not Repeat Itself

Accountability is hard to argue against.  In theory, no one wants ineffective people in positions of power.  We want our teachers to teach well, we want our doctors to practice medicine well, and we want our pastors to minister well.  Very few people would argue that we want ineffective teachers, doctors, or pastors. My struggle with accountability is: what do we hold people … [Read more...] about Accountability

I have been trying to keep up with what is going on at General Conference through Twitter.  I have noticed that the words leadership and leader have started to appear.   While the words leader and leadership are still very small on Andrew Conard's Word Cloud for General Conference tweets, I imagine they will gain traction as the conference continues. Bishop Jones' tweet that … [Read more...] about Leadership?

As the 2012 United Methodist General Conference approaches, I have been trying to bite my tongue and not get too worked up about things that have not yet come to pass.  With the possibility of radical changes to the church structure and the end of guaranteed appointments there have been many things that have gotten my dander up. For as long as I have been in full time … [Read more...] about Young Clergy?

I have been trying to figure out ways of visually representing life in the church.  One idea I have been tinkering with is using formulas.  In many church meetings, we seem to struggle with not have a common language to talk about our ministry and the problems we are dealing with.  When looking at attendance or money, I often hear the question "what is our problem?"  From a … [Read more...] about Formulating Church