Friday August 2

Today was our first full day of the conference. In the morning we had Bishop Paulo Lockmann speak on evangelism. Bishop Paulo is the president of the World Methodist Council, which I hear makes him similar to the pope of Methodism. I had no idea we even had a leader proclaimed as such.

Paulo talked about some of his views on Methodism, which were really founded in Liberation theology. For him, Jesus' mission was to preach the good news for the liberation of the poor. So there is a heavy emphasis upon social justice to the poor. The Brazilian Methodist church is really exploding right now. He said there is a new church every 15 days right now. I was amazed by that statistic. Their strategy has been targeting youth and children. A church doesn't begin without first targeting the kids. I thought this was a great emphasis. Children and youth are literally the future. They will be the ones that help carry the torch. Also, if you get youth and children in church many times the parents will follow. 

He finished by talking about quantity and quality. He was taught that quality was better than quantity, however, he has learned that both are important. I agree. It seems so many times there is a cop out in the church that isn't growing or reaching out that "quality is better than quantity". That only leads to a stagnant church. It leads to contentment and comfort. Quantity and quality are both important. Yes, we need to do what we do well. If anything is worth doing, it is worth doing with excellence. So why not invite people to be a part of it? I loved this emphasis by Bishop Paulo.

The next lecture was by Edgar Legorda. Edgar is secretary on the UMC Global Board of Word Missions. Unfortunately, my ear piece kept messes up during Edgar's talk and so I didn't quite understand everything he was saying. He was giving information on the UMC's spread in Latin and South America. He said a couple of things I really appreciate though. 

One was "we are evangelized as we evangelize." As we pray each day, God evangelizes to us. This is such a great reminder of the importance of daily disciplines when living out faith. As you pour out love, it is so important to have love poured back into us. 

The other is that the mission we partake in is not our mission but it is God's mission. Thus we are following God's guidance for what to do and where to go. We are simply witnesses to what God is doing. We are telling about God at work not through manipulation, but with love, respect and relationship. The good news is that God is at work in people long before we do anything. We show up with the story of God already at work. God is before us, we are simply catching up to see what he's doing!