Bishop Ward introduces and welcomes Leah Wiebe-Smith as the new director for the Center of Leadership Excellence.
Grace and peace to you in the name of Jesus Christ.
Here in the North Carolina Annual Conference, we focus using our mission statement to continually remind us that we want to help leaders be effective and congregations be healthy so that we might make disciples for Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world.
Bishop Ward: It’s a great joy to welcome you, Leah. Leah Wiebe-Smith is our new director for the Center of Leadership Excellence here in the North Carolina Annual Conference. Leah has been doing this work so wonderfully and so effectively through the Academy for Leadership Excellence and in conversations over the last year, and as announced at Annual Conference, we now begin to work together in this new way to continue this good work together.
Leah: Thank you Bishop Hope. I’m passionate about seeing the transformation of leaders, seeing laity become more engaged and seeing clergy become more equipped and renewed. After every Academy event, we ask for feedback to measure impact and one comment that stands out to me over time is from a clergy leadership fellow and that comment was that their outlook on ministry had changed, their relationships had improved, and their church was looking outside of the church walls for ministry. To me, leadership is about knowing oneself. It’s about transforming people and it’s about transforming congregations, so I hope we can continue to work towards that end as the Center for Leadership Excellence.
Bishop Ward: We’ll be praying and working together as we move forward. Thank you for all our life together.