The Global Methodist Church is holding its Convening General Conference in San Jose, Costa Rica. Thousands of people have gathered to celebrate the formation of this new denomination, and to deliberate on how it will be established. This is the fulfillment of many years of prayer and hard work.
We are sitting down in our studio to watch the conference together. As is the case with any gathering of people, it is difficult to understand what is happening if one does not know the history, theology, and personalities involved. We know some of these things and will be trying outline helpful things for an audience to watch with us.
This watch party is NOT an official ministry of the Global Methodist Church. The GMC has not extended permission to us to restream the proceedings. Rather, you need to find the official GMC live stream at https://www.sotheworldwillknow.org/live. You can watch them and watch us at the same time (most people have the bandwidth and processing power for this, nowadays, but we are sorry if you don’t). We are hoping to correspond with people on site in Costa Rica, to offer insights and analysis, and make it a rich viewing, praying, and thinking experience for all who join us.
This is an extension of the ministry of the Nowata Methodist Church. If you want to convey gratitude for this service and provide for a future platform on which we can offer quality content for the worldwide church, then you can either mail a check to PO Box 129, Nowata OK 74048, or you can give online at https://tithe.ly/give?c=2198808.
If you would like to be a part of special gatherings for supporters, then join my Locals community, go to plainspoken.locals.com and become a supporter! We will hopefully be doing special things there in the coming week.
If you would like to subscribe to my pastoral Substack, where I publish articles on topics pertaining to pastoral ministry and Methodism, you can go to jeffreyrickman.substack.com.
If you would like to subscribe to the PlainSpoken Podcast Substack, where I publish articles, video, and audio pertaining to Methodism and the culture war, you can go to plainspokenpod.substack.com.
If you need to grow in familiarity with and knowledge of the scriptures, I would urge you to sign up for my daily scripture reading at https://nowatamethodists.substack.com/.
God bless you, and God bless the Global Methodist Church!
I'm publishing this here first to convey my thanks to those of you who have supported my work. Thank you.
Episode 1 takes up marriage, divorce and remarriage. Going into Johannesburg, our Book of Doctrines and Discipline told the world who could marry and never once used the word "divorce." On the last morning of General Conference, in about fifty minutes of floor debate, that changed. I walk Petition 1020 through its whole life: the language we inherited, Jonathan Lee's petition, the committee's 35–1 vote, and Saturday on the floor. That meant Rich Hoffman's amendment, Matt O'Reilly's rewrite, a motion to send the whole thing away for six years, and a final vote of 329–41.
Then we open Matthew 19 and 1 Corinthians 7 and ask what the church said, and what it chose not to say. I land somewhere between grateful and uneasy, and I want to hear where you land. The free discussion guide sets the old and new texts side by side, gives both sides in the delegates' own words, and has ...
I don't know why the live stream didn't work today. Here is what I did:
Update: I know I said I would start back up this week. I could easily start the morning live stream back up, but I have been feeling like I need to do some wrap-up on General Conference. It just took me some time get clear on what I would feel good about doing. And I finally got some really good thoughts together after a lot of percolation. Early next week, I should be publishing some very decent work on explaining some of the more impactful developments in Johannesburg. For right now, I'm aiming at eleven episodes dealing with:
1. Marriage, Divorce and Remarriage: how the church put words about divorce into our Book of Doctrines and Discipline on the final morning
2. Sex and Gender Identity: the rewriting of ¶302.8
3. Protecting the Unborn and the Mother: our new language on abortion
4. The Racial Theology Resolution: Resolution 1466, adopted and then defeated on a revote
5. The Articles of Faith: a new doctrinal standard for the Global Methodist Church
6. Restrictive Rules and the ...
