Africa University’s Good News

It is a joy to be a part of the United Methodist family because together we can do so much good.  Recently a team from the General Board of Higher Education and Ministry visited Africa University in Zimbabwe and one board member from our Episcopal Area, Mr. Demetrio Beach, was able to meet the students who received our scholarships. He presented them with Bibles (see photo below) and encouraged them to continue serving the Lord and improving the lives of people in their countries.

Here is one of the “thank you” letters from a student who received our scholarship money:

My name is Banza Mutunda Mimie.  I am female and the first born in a family of seven—four girls and three boys.  My father’s name is Kasongo Ndalamba Kate, and he is a pastor in the United Methodist Church in the North Katanga Annual Conference in Kamina, in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

I am a second-year student in the faculty of Health Sciences doing management studies at Africa University in Zimbabwe.  My objective at Africa University is to fulfill my dream, which I started in my country at the secondary level.  I have done nursing and would like to continue with the same idea, but majoring in management in order to become a manager in one of the medical organizations in my country (DRC). …(My country) has become vulnerable to diseases such as: HIV/AIDS, Malaria, Cholera, TB and others.  Due to these matters I was inspired to do my studies in the medical area in order to be a part of the development process that aids in the prevention of these diseases.

It is a great pleasure and an honor for me to write to you, my sponsor.  This letter is to inform you that you have made my dream alive in providing me with the scholarship.  Regarding my family possibility, I was hopeless to achieve my goals, but you have made it possible.  For this reason I and especially my family are really grateful for such unforgettable action that has inspired us.  Our prayer is to see God showing his blessing upon you and all your family.  Africa University is a blessing to me and the hope for the best future of my family and my country.” 

'Let It Go'

At this year’s Academy Awards the soundtrack single that took first place was “Let It Go,” from the Disney movie “Frozen.”  This is a defiant song of liberation as Queen Elsa no longer holds back her ice-making powers.  She sings of freedom as she builds a spectacular palace of ice with flicks of her wrists.

Some of the lyrics whisper words of resurrection to me: “The fears that once controlled me can’t get to me at all.”  And “I’ll rise like the break of dawn.”  

The main message of Easter is resurrection, not only resurrection from bodily death but from death to our souls.  It is quite possible to be brain dead and yet bodily alive due to medical science.  It is equally true that people can be dead spiritually and in need of resurrection through faith in Christ. 

Christ not only brings us life eternal in heaven but spiritual resurrection of our earthly souls and minds while we are here walking on the earth.  Paul writes to the church in Ephesus: “But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ. By grace you have been saved.” (2:4-5) Through faith we have the power to be free of sin and the bondage it holds on us.

Like the ice queen in the movie, prior to her liberating change of heart, we sometimes are bound by fear, by guilt, by doubts.  Even those who know the Lord fall back at times into an attitude of worry, having flashbacks to times when we have failed, looking around at friends and comparing ourselves, or casting a judgmental eye on the ministry of others or their theological beliefs.  All of that brings spiritual death, and we so easily allow it to entangle itself around our souls.

Let it go!  Let it go by once again claiming the freedom and deliverance that Christ offers us on a daily basis.  Let it go by giving up the need to “fix” others who disagree with us.  Let it go by living a life of thanksgiving and gratitude for the enormous cache of blessings that God has bestowed on us.   

This Easter as we sing “Christ the Lord Is Risen Today,” let us also sing “Let it Go!” And then let us go forth and live resurrected lives in Christ.

Choose Life

Easter is all about life!  I enjoy Easter the most when it falls later in the spring because the flowers and trees look so much more resurrected than when we have Easter in late March.  Easter is all about life and not just the rebirth of the nature around us but most importantly about the spiritual life that comes when people experience a resurrection in their soul through a relationship with Jesus Christ.

Spiritual resurrection is what the church is all about but sadly at times the church can become stagnant and more about preservation than about outreach and transformation.  When that happens it is on a path of death and uselessness. In a recent visit from the General Board of Global Ministries Rev. Patrick Friday addressed our mission conference with a compelling call to becoming a “movement” once again.  He showed a YouTube video clip (produced by ConnectnMission) entitled “The Movement” in which he described the resurrection decisions that John Wesley made that changed the world forever.  Wesley was a priest in the Church of England and for the Methodist movement to happen Wesley had to decide between:

• The status quo (institution) or the uncertainties of a movement
• The comfort of tradition or the adventure of experience
• The security of a building or the passion of the people
• The organization of the rich or a church of the poor
• The life of stability or the life of unending persecution

Wesley chose the latter because of his “heart-warming” spiritual encounter with God and the Methodist Movement was born.  Still today the choices are before us.  The one brings sure death to our beloved church the other brings life, growth, transformation.  Ask yourself how does your church stack up against the choices that John Wesley made.  Where can you make some changes? The call is every before us to choose life…now is the time. 

Women’s History Month: Jarena Lee, A Pioneer Among Preachers

In Jean Miller Schmidt’s beautifully written book, Grace Sufficient: A History of Women in American Methodism (1760-1939), we read many accounts of sturdy Methodist women preachers.  One such woman, a true pioneer, was Jarena Lee of the African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church.

She was born in 1783 in Cape May, NJ, the daughter of free but very poor parents.  Jarena became a Christian at age 21 under the ministry of none other than the Rev. Richard Allen, founding minister of Bethel AME Church in Philadelphia and later the first AME bishop.  She felt a call to preach at that time and spoke to Allen about it; but he explained that the rules of Methodism did not “call for women preachers.”  He did  allow her to hold prayer meetings and exhort after sermons were preached. 

      
Jarena married the Rev. Joseph Lee, the pastor of a black church in Snow Hill, N.J., and they had two children.  Within six years there were a number of deaths in the family, including her husband, and she moved back to Philadelphia, where she again attended Bethel AME Church. 

   
During one Sunday service she stood up and began preaching after the preacher in the pulpit lost his train of thought.  Rev. Allen heard her impromptu, unexpected sermon. He was so moved that he endorsed her as truly called to preach. Jarena Lee thus began her itinerant ministry, starting in local house- churches before finally taking to the road to preach in New York, Maryland and Ohio.

Sometimes Jarena traveled on foot and depended on the hospitality of those she visited.  She received no salary. At one point she was able to connect with a group of Wyandotte Indians in Buffalo, N.Y., and when she preached to them through a translator, they found faith in Jesus Christ. 

A Legacy of Service: In Celebration of Black History Month

The year was 1976 and I was attending the Inter-Varsity Urbana Missionary Conference with a group of young adults from my home Bible study group.  It was a time in my life when I was struggling with a call to ministry and trying to decide whether to leave the teaching profession and go to seminary. 

The conference was an amazing panacea of famous speakers such as Dr. Billy Graham and Dr. John Stott.  There was powerful music, numerous workshops and display tables with recruiters from mission organizations all over the world.  In between speakers up on the main stage at this huge coliseum there were mission advertisements that lasted for only a minute or two.  One caught my attention.  A large African American gentleman seemed to have a speech impediment.  He spoke passionately about deaf people in Africa. 

My Mother’s Eyes

When I was a singer in the Cherub Choir at Lansdowne Methodist Church in 1960 we sang an anthem on Mother’s Day that went something like this:  “My mother’s eyes are watchful eyes that never fail to see where she may find some happiness or gain some good for me.”  That was my mother, the one with the watchful eyes.  For Janie Mae MacLeod Olver family was everything and her vigilant eyes were always looking for ways to bless her family.  God was the only thing more important to Mom than her family.   

Mom graduated third in her high school class academically but she never wanted to go to college or have a career.  Her goal in life was to raise a family!  She married at the age of 19 and only worked outside of the home in order to earn money to help with bills and see that my sister and I went to college.  Her career as a school secretary was ideal for a mother with small children who attended the same school.  It was handy to have mother downstairs in the school office if you ran out of lunch money or got sick.  We would walk home together when there was an early dismissal because of snow.  The day I graduated from college she quit her job working as a school secretary.  Before she retired she coaxed the principal she worked for into putting in a good word for both of her daughters when they were applying for teaching positions in the Baltimore County Public School system.  We were both hired.   

Mom spent the next 10 years of her life taking care of her aging parents and Dad’s aging siblings and then came the grand-children.  Never was there a grandmother like my mother.  She spent many, many days watching the children and taking them on exciting trips and buying toys and clothes.  She was always looking with her blue eyes for things that they would enjoy reading and lavished on them countless interesting picture books.

Finding Hope on a Mission of Peace

I experienced a remarkable, dual cultural immersion during my recent visit to South Africa. I accompanied 18 United Methodist youth from nine regional conferences across our Northeastern Jurisdiction (NEJ). The goals of our Mission of Peace, lasting from December 28 to January 15, was to broaden our cultural awareness, build bonds of peace among diverse peoples and learn about the vital mission of the church in the world.  Truly our mission was about making disciples and seeking transformation.

Three of the impressive high school-age youth on this adventure were from our Eastern Pennsylvania Conference: Madeleine Devitis, Adrienne Newcomer and Mia Sanchez.  I was one of four adult chaperones, representing the NEJ College of Bishops.  And while this journey drew me more deeply into the well of my own Christian faith, it also gave me a double immersion—brief but meaningful-- into the culture of young people and the culture of South Africa.

The Power of Immersion

My experience with youth culture was inspiring.  Our young people are spirit-filled, curious, passionate about social justice, and immersed in social media.  They sang, prayed, preached, befriended and encouraged one another throughout the trip.  I also enjoyed watching them interact with the youth of South Africa.