As I type this, I'm in full-steam-ahead mode getting ready to travel to Lake Junaluska to engage in the time-honored Methodist tradition of Annual Conference. From Wednesday through Sunday, lay and clergy members of the Western North Carolina Annual Conference will gather by the lake for a time of worship and study, to hear and receive reports, to consider and vote on petitions and resolutions, to commission and ordain, to honor the retired and to remember the dead who have died in the Lord.
When the Conference officially convenes on Thursday morning for a service of Holy Communion, we will sing "And are we Yet Alive?", the traditional Charles Wesley hymn that opens every session of Annual Conference. It is a hymn that celebrates God's goodness and providential hand that has kept us as a people called Methodist since last we met, and has graciously brought us back together for the gift of conferencing.
John Wesley, the founder of the Methodist movement in 18th century England, believed very strongly in the concept of Christian Conferencing. He even described it as one of the "Means of Grace", an ordinary channel for God to pour out God's grace upon God's people.
When we gather at Annual Conference, we continue what Wesley started, remembering who God has called us to be, standing shoulder to shoulder singing the hymns of the Church, breaking bread together at the Lord's Table and in places like Granny's Kitchen, Maggie Valley Restaurant and Butts on the Creek, in conversations in rocking chairs, on porches, in front of Stuart Auditorium and by the lake, we will experience the gift of encouragement, sustenance and nurture, hearing anew the call and finding renewed strength to be sent forth in mission - all things that are inevitable and unmistakable in those gloriously mysterious moments when the Church, through the Spirit, is really and truly the Church.
The concept of Christian Conferencing, holds at its core, the belief that the Church is indeed the Body of Christ in the world, and that to gather together in Jesus' name, is to experience his fellowship among the gathering of believers and the communion of the saints.
For us clergy-types, its an opportunity to to reconnect with clergy colleagues, to see who's moving and who's staying, to inquire about life and ministry since last summer. For many of us, it's also time to get away with our families for a few days, giving us an air of relaxation and sabbath in the midst of it all. Lord willing, there will be a stop or two for ice cream at Jelly Belly's in Maggie Valley...
Christian Conferencing by the Lake at Junaluska, is a time to be renewed and refreshed, a time for worship and wonder, a time to remember the mystery and beauty of the calling we all share, lay and clergy, as Christian ministers, and a time for those of us who have been set apart for licensed and ordained ministry in the Church to be reminded of the purpose, gift and task of our vocation.
And I think Brother Wesley was right. I do think Christian Conferencing is a Means of Grace. And as I prepare and pack for another Annual Conference, I look forward to every song, sermon and sacrament, and every handshake, hug and heart, through which God will be pleased to pour out God's grace, all over again!
Grace and peace!
Pastor Randy
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