Wrightsboro United Methodist Church shares how they express God’s love through their food pantry ministry.
Stories
An Encouragement For October
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 monthâs Encouragement from Amanda Rigby, Pastor of Christian Education and Spiritual Formation at Edenton Street UMC and Executive Director of The Well Mental and Spiritual Care. You can reach out to Amanda at arigby@nccumc.org or follow The Well @thewellraleigh on Instagram.
Anyone can sign up to receive Encouragement emails here.
The Companion, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything and will remind you of everything I told you. Peace I leave with you. My peace I give you. I give to you not as the world gives. Donât be troubled or afraid.” (John 14:26-27, CEB)
 Overwhelmed.
Everyone I encounter these days is overwhelmed â by schedules and events and commitments. By expectations and responsibilities and the demands of ministry. By relationships and parenting and caregiving for aging parents. Overwhelm is the thread running through the lives of family and friends, church members, colleagues, and even strangers I run into out and about in the city.
Everyone is overwhelmed, and I feel it. In the quiet moments, in between the events and the commitments and the demands, the crushing weight of all that we are collectively bearing settles in. I wonder if you feel it, too.
If only the reasons behind our overwhelm were simple, it might be easier to stumble our way into some peaceful relief. But there is so much contributing to this experience â loss and grief, ongoing COVID realities, so much violence, human rights issues, economic uncertainties⌠and that list doesnât even begin to cover all that weighs us down in our daily lives.
In the words of Barbara Brown Taylor, the thing that is saving my life right now in the midst of all of that is actually the Holy Spirit. The last few years of my life have been spent leaning into the things of the Spirit through an experience called spiritual direction.
Spiritual direction is a discipline that most often takes the form of a monthly, hour-long meeting between a trained director and a seeker. The work of that time is looking together for the ways God is moving and working in and around the seeker. âDirectorsâ donât actually direct; instead, we are trained to be companions on the journey of spirituality for those who are seeking greater spiritual depth.
What Iâm learning through spiritual direction is how to encounter the peace that Christ offers to us⌠how to not only glimpse it but also cling to it and share it. This is a peace I have yet to find anywhere else. It is a peace given not as the world gives.
Whether you meet with a spiritual director, or find someone who can be a âsoul friendâ for you, I hope you will join me in searching for disciplines that invite you to lean into the presence of the Spirit. It just might be the thing that moves you from overwhelm to overwhelming peace.
In partnership,
Center for Leadership Excellence and the Commission on the Status and Role of Women
An Encouragement for September
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 monthâs Encouragement from Martha K. McLean, Executive Pastor at First UMC in Cary. Feel free to forward this Encouragement to a friend. Anyone can sign up to receive these monthly emails here.
The steadfast love of the Lord endures forever; the Lord’s faithfulness to all generations. (adapted from Psalm 100 v. 5)
Throughout the witness of scripture, the steadfast covenant love of the Lord is with us. Even in the lowest of valleys and the darkest of days the love of the Lord endures. It leans forward, it stretches out, it carries us forth into the future. Â
This love is steadfast in character, not fleeting. This love is faithful, not conditional or coercive or corruptible. This love is one that gives fully and completely of self for the good of the other. This love gathers us up, offering grace upon grace, not limited by time and space or circumstances, but rather, is able to overcome all that seeks to overwhelm us. This steadfast covenant love is one that unites us, guiding us into God’s way of life and how we live together as a people. It is full of blessing and the goodness that God intends for us and for all of creation.
As we all experience seasons of challenge and change, ups and downs, ebbs and flows, sorrows and joy, may we cling to the steadfast love of the Lord which endures forever, the Lord’s faithfulness to all generations. Amen and Alleluia!Â
In partnership,
Center for Leadership Excellence and the Commission on the Status and Role of Women
Lighthouse Congregations: Wesley Memorial UMC (Wilmington)
“We’re a beacon of light, we shine Christ’s light, and we welcome people and say, ‘It’s safe here.'”
Members of Wesley Memorial UMC in Wilmington share what it means to them for their church to be a Lighthouse Congregation.
An Encouragement For August
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 monthâs Encouragement from Tobi Nguyen, Pastor of Trinity UMC in Durham. Anyone can sign up to receive these monthly emails here.
Romans 8:14-15, NRSV
For all who are led by the Spirit of God are children of God. 15 For you did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you received a spirit of adoption.
I have two siblings, both are brothers. Mark is 16 months younger than me. We are a year apart in school. My baby brother, Drew, is 14 years younger than me. Our family adopted Drew when Mark and I were in middle school. Drew was 11 days old, and my parents flew to Lima, Peru, for the adoption process.
When Drew was three years old, he noticed the differences between the four of us who were blue-eyed and himself. That was the day I first heard my mom talk about adoption to Drew.
Now in my experience, adoption was a complicated process. My family spent years saving money, being interviewed, inquiries, doing paperwork, and research. In my view, adoption was so complicated and, at times, heart-wrenching.
Back to the conversation in the mini-van as we left a preschool playground. Three-year-old Drew asked, âMama, why is my skin brown, but Tobiâs skin matches yours?â
My mom turned around from the passengerâs seat to lock eyes with her precious kid, her face filled with love. Youâve seen that before, when the gaze is locked-in, but the face softens with all the adoration in the world.
And she said these two sentences to Drew. âTobi and Mark were born from my tummy. You were born from my heart.â
All of a sudden, nothing was more true about adoption than this. Nothing is more true about who Drew is and how we are family together.
My family has been shaped by adoption. My life is shaped by adoption.
Adoption is complicated but at its simplest, clergy and lay friendsâyou were born from Godâs heart. And nothing is more true.
You are born of Godâs heart. That is not a free pass to escape suffering. What it does mean is that we have the Spiritâwe are inspired to work in the present for things to get better in the presentâto confront systems of power and injustice. We are not satisfied with the present, but live toward a future promised by God. That future in which we hope for, work for, and participate in is life abundant.
How do you experience hope? Who reminds you of this hope?
In partnership,
Center for Leadership Excellence and the Commission on the Status and Role of Women
Orientation and Covenant Renewal DayÂ
New Faith Communities hosted Orientation and Covenant Renewal Day with current church planters at the NC Conference building on August 2. The planters were able to learn more about the NC Conference offices and ministry programs.Â
