The Center for Leadership Excellence, in partnership with COSROW, is pleased to lift up the voices of women in ministry encouraging fellow women in ministry. Please enjoy this month’s Encouragement from Jane Almon, pastor at Glendale Heights UMC and Union Grove UMC (Bahama). Anyone can sign up to receive Encouragement emails here.
After spending a couple of days as an observer during the second week of General Conference, I arrived back home to the high-pitched, high-decibel buzz of the cicadapocalypse. The emergence of the Brood XIX nymphs from their 13-year maturation period underground had begun, and the newly hatched adult cicadas were singing in the sun. I was struck by the parallel of this phenomenon to the historic events unfolding at General Conference. A number of groups within the UMC had been advocating for their various causes for years, waiting for their day in the sun. For some of these groups, most notably our LGBTQ siblings, their causes at last were affirmed, and they marked their emergence from the long wait with singing.
Read Psalm 40:1-3 (NRSV):
I waited patiently for the LORD;
Psalm 40:1-3 (NRSVue)
he inclined to me and heard my cry.
He drew me up from the desolate pit,
out of the miry bog,
and set my feet upon a rock,
making my steps secure.
He put a new song in my mouth,
a song of praise to our God.
Many will see and fear
and put their trust in the LORD.
Reflect: Regionalization was approved, ordained deacons were granted sacramental authority, and LGBTQ persons are no longer banned from ordination and appointment, but licensed local pastors are still waiting for expanded rights and FossilFree UMC is still waiting for the exclusion of oil and gas stocks from the Wespath portfolio. Are there others still waiting for justice and equity, for their day in the sun? If you’re someone who is still waiting, can you find hope in the words of the psalmist? Seeing that others have been drawn up from the pit to sing a new song, can you trust in the Lord that your day will come?
Take Action: The nymph exoskeleton that is left behind by the adult cicada nourishes the soil as it decomposes. If you’re one who has emerged from underground to sing in the sun, consider how your experience of advocating and waiting for your cause to be affirmed can be used to help someone else through a difficult time of waiting. And for pure enjoyment and further reflection, go to YouTube and listen to “Como La Cigarra” (Like The Cicada) sung by Mercedes Sosa, a renowned Argentine singer who was known as “the voice of the voiceless.”
In partnership,
Center for Leadership Excellence and the Commission on the Status and Role of Women