Bishop Ward and Tim Russell discuss the License to Preach school. License to Preach school is for persons who will be serving an appointment in the North Carolina Conference for the first time.
(Bishop Ward)
Grace and peace to you in the name of Jesus Christ.The Methodist movement, from the very earliest times, has called forth, from among the people, leaders – people to proclaim, to teach, to guide, to shepherd. This week, License to Preach School convenes, and Tim Russell, our director of Ministerial services, is here to share a bit about licensing school. Who comes and what happens?
(Tim Russell)
Our licensing school will be held May 17-23, at the Methodist Building. We’ll have a variety of people come and teach courses and sections on ethics, on pastoral counseling, and on pastoral visitation, on sermon preparation and so we ask anybody who’s going to serve a first-time appointment in the North Carolina Conference to come to licensing school. That includes seminary graduates. It includes people who are coming in as second career and will be licensed at Annual Conference, for the first time as local pastors. It can include people from other denominations who are going to serve one of our Methodist churches. It can include people from other Annual Conferences, who are going to serve one of our churches in our Annual Conference, and so generally at licensing school, we’re still pulling that list together, but generally, there’s about 40 people who attend. It’s a week long, from Sunday afternoon to Saturday morning. We close with a worship service and with a time of commitment and dedication and a time of prayer for those who are being sent forth into service.(Bishop Ward)
We invite your prayers for those who are entering the ministry in this way, as they gather very soon, and we ask that you also continue to create a culture of call in your congregation; helping people sense God’s claim and call upon their lives, helping them respond, helping them know ways in which to step forth into the ministry of The United Methodist Church. May Christ be with you this day and always.