The United Methodist Committee on Relief (UMCOR) has supported NC Conference Disaster Ministries’ disaster relief and recovery efforts in eastern North Carolina. Read UMCOR’s article on how they help and support conferences, like the NC Conference, in disaster preparation.
Making the Most of MissionInsite
The Center for Leadership Excellence invites you to a webinar with Peter Wernett on MissionInsite and how to use this program to learn more about your neighbors and how to reach them.
The MissionInsite resource is free for NCCUMC congregations. Does your congregation use it?
This powerful data mining tool assists a congregation to create strategic missional priorities because it provides unique behavioral insights of your members and the neighborhoods you serve. This additional knowledge can increase outreach effectiveness and inform missional engagement.
We’ll spend time with MissionInsite’s founder and understand opportunities you may be overlooking to further awareness and a deeper connection for ministry with your neighbors.
Making the Most of MissionInsite
Presented by the Center for Leadership Excellence
with Peter Wernett
August 31, 12pm-1pm (Eastern Time Zone)
Tropical Storm Fred
Tropical Storm Fred caused heavy rains and flooding in western North Carolina. NC Conference Disaster Ministries connected with the Western NC Conference of The UMC following the storm. The Western NC Conference is assessing the damage and will contact us if NC Conference Early Response Teams or supplies are needed.
Please continue to keep all who were affected by the storm in our prayers.
Shepherding Your Congregations Faithfully and Wisely
Dear United Methodist friends,
Beloved, I wish above all things that you may prosper and be in good health, even as your soul prospers. – III John 2
As the pandemic continues in challenging new ways, we renew our commitment to love God and our neighbor in every way possible. Here in North Carolina, intensive care units are filled to capacity, overwhelmingly with unvaccinated patients. We are called to pray and to promote well-being for all people. Therefore, we urge persons to order their lives and the lives of their churches with caution, confident in the guidance of the scientific and medical community, gifted by God with wisdom, experience, and expertise.
Your guidance as a leader is essential as your church family plans for ministry in the midst of this reality. We urge you to welcome in face-to-face worship all who are vaccinated and to extend your ministry online to those who cannot or choose not to be vaccinated. Additionally, we urge full masking of all participating in face-to-face gatherings. We urge these measures in the confidence of our calling to love our neighbors and to help them prosper in spirit and in health.
I hope that you will convene your local church COVID task force anew. As you pray and plan together, may you shepherd your congregation faithfully and wisely in this challenging time. The resources are provided for your use, with frequent review and updating, on the conference website.
With prayers for the prospering of your spirit and your health,
Bishop Hope Morgan Ward
connections: Even a Sparrow Finds a Home
In a time of great sadness and despair, Bishop Ward reminds us of Psalm 84 and that we are held in God’s comforting strong arms.
Grace and peace to you in the name of Jesus Christ.
“How lovely is your dwelling place, O Lord of hosts. Even a sparrow finds a home, the swallow a place to lay her young. They go from strength to strength.” I find a beautiful symmetry in the appointing of Psalm 84 this next Sunday. Nine years ago, as we began ministry together in this season, it was Psalm 84 that moved us to embrace the image of strength, God’s strength in us, the strength of our shared ministry, and we prayed often that we would be moved from strength to greater strength in service with Christ in the world.
In these times, our hearts are heavy as we see the fall of Kabul. We pray for all in our state for whom Afghanistan is not a faraway place on a map. It’s a very real place to which our family is connected through military service.
We pray for our friends in Haiti*. We are bound closely to the nation of Haiti having lost Sam Dixon, our beloved friend, in the earthquake of 2010.
And we continue to pray for all who are ill with COVID, for all who are in danger, and for our leaders and medical community. I hope you will stay alert to the Conference website as we post very soon, new guidance.
In all of our life, as we return to familiar scripture passages, they speak to us in the current moment. I find Psalm 84 speaking to us this week, this day, as we pray for these and other needs in our world. God is longing to gather the whole world into God’s comforting, strong arms. Even a sparrow finds a home, the swallow a place to lay her young. May it be so and may it be so through the faithful ministry of The United Methodist Church in every place.
*Give today for Haiti Earthquake Response
Get Your Watermelons!
Watermelons from down east farmers will be available at MERCI on Thursday, August 19, 2021 from 10:30 a.m. – 4:00 p.m. These are supplied by the Society of St. Andrew and the NC Conference Mission Team. There are about 44,000 lbs. of melons and they will be in bins. There is no limit and reservations are not necessary, but if you want to reserve a bin, please contact Rev. Bill Haddock, 910-262-3831. MERCI is located at 674 Community Drive, Goldsboro, NC 27530