Some Highlights for the Month of February

[GUMC Guam United Methodist Church]

Dear Friends and Family:

 

We are leaving the Epiphany season pretty soon and move to Lent.  The joy of Christmas resulting in the mandated ministry to tell to the nations of Christ is going to turn to a somber mood. Lent is a season reminding us that the incarnation of God in Jesus Christ, is inextricably linked to Christ's crucifixion. Birth, and now the death of the Messiah looming large in theological horizons for those who observed the Christian calendar religiously.

 

For ordinary Christians, Jesus the hope and peace of the world is taken dialectically.  This means that we don't celebrate Christmas during December only.  We take note each day of the joy we experience when redemption and forgiveness which we associate with the birth of the Immanuel--the God with us. We have both joy in the redeption experienced and the responsibility attached to it as relate with our fellow human beings.  There is that "otherness" and at the same simultaneously responsible to both realities.

 

To accent and to further dramatize God's love for the world, we need to observe changing of theological seasons.  Summer is nice but the falling leaves during autumn give the people in the western countries to do other things like collecting things they left out in the yard, or remaining summer harvests to be gathered before the weather turn to really cold ones. And frost spoils.  And Fall gives them yellow, brown color of leaves and then trees die.

 

Lent is the equivalent of Fall.  We undergo some changes in what we observe at church. Come Ash Wednesday, we will be reminded that from dust we come, to dust ye shall return. This is not just biological science reality but an affirmation that we are not God.  We are human beings that have limitations.  But.  But, in God's wisdom and power, we are born into eternity in God's terms.

 

Lent is a season of preparation, penance. It is a forty-day devotional preparation for Easter traditionally based on Jesus' wilderness fast (Mark 1: 13).  This is a time to prepare for baptism which often takes place during Easter for a lot of Christians.  And a renewal of baptismal vows for those who are already practicing the faith.

 

Succinctly put, Lent season is a focus time, a devoted moment when we take our Christian vows more seriously.  While we read Christian sacred texts seriously, Lent is a time to allow us to believe that in these pages we call Bible (for us, Christians) we are the one being read.

And we have fallen short. We miss the mark. And so Lent is the best opportunity to attend study groups, go on a retreat, add some hours for private devotions.  And both by our body language and speech, we are dead serious to discovering what Lent might do for us.

 

Ministry Resources.  I brought with me some ministry goodies I thought might be helpful to us as we do and raise the quality of our ministry in our own backyard---within our family here at church.

 

    A. Five Practices of Fruitful Congregations by Bishop Robert Schnase.

               1. Radical Hospitality

               2. Passionate Worship

               3. Intentional Faith Development

               4. Risk-Taking Mission and Service

               5. Extravagant Generosity

          We have in both CDs and print media. Use this for small group

          sessions.

 

    B. Resource Directory

               The General Board of Discipleship has 100s of organizations,

                resource materials to fit youth and adult needs. Whether it is

                camping, retreats, volunteering, they have it. The 2009-10

                resource directory is published to help local churches get

                into equipping world-changing disciples.     

 

    C.  Books

               1. Swimsuits in the Arctic --Seven Simple Keys

                      to Growing Churches by Adam Hamilton

 

                   --Rev. Hamilton is a UMC pastor which has an active

                     5,000 members in the Kansas area.

                   --He is the speaker for the Britt Lecture this year.

              

               2.  Leadership in Wesleyan Spirit by Lovett H. Weems Jr.

                    --Dr. Weems, Jr. is president and professor of church

                      leadership at St. Paul School of Theology, Kansas

                      City, Missouri.

        

 

               3.  Christianity and the Social Crisis in the 21st Century

                            by Walter Rauschenbusch (edited by his

                            grandson, Paul Rauschenbush)

                    --Father of Social Gospel movement.  One hundred

                      years ago he wrote a book that has stirred ordinary

                      and the intellegentsia of the Christian faith in the western world.

                    --This centennial edition included comments of most well-known

                      theologians such as Rorty, West, Trible, Chittister. Forbes, Jr.

                      Campolo, and Wallis.

                    --Anybody wanting to read it and invite others for a discussion?

 

               4.  Christian Attitudes to War, Peace, and Revolution by John Howard

                             Yoder.

                    ---Some of you might remember is earlier work, The Politics of

                        Jesus.

                     --What do we say in age of violence and terrorism, and the search

                        for an elusive peace is more than ever relevant?  Is this book useful in our

                        Guam context?  Would someone volunteer to read and invite

                        others for over a cup of coffee conversation?

         

                 

Environmental Initiative.

       Jillian Somera, one of our people, is collecting recyclable telephone directory.

She will be here Sunday and ready to receive your 2009 (or earlier) ready-to throw-

away phone books. This is Jill's effort to reduce unproductive garbage by recycling them.

It will only be this Sunday. 

 

Ministerial presence. The Rev. Bonnie Davies (Goodings), Fr. Tony Gomowad, and Pastor San Juan are with us.  Let us welcome them make use of their presence in our midst.

Pastor Davies will come to visit Elyssa (the Goodings) as she prepares for the birthing of her second child. It is part of their family tradition that a pastor in family will help baptize the new addition. 

 

Good and Faithful Servants. If it is appropriate, we should congratulate each other, the whole household of the Guam United Methodist for ending 2009 on a positive note.  We paid all our bills, paid our apportionment 100% (money we remit outside Guam to make sure we are able to share in our worldwide mission and the administration of running a nine million church members), went the Second Mile by helping various causes and needs which were unbudgeted amounts, respond to crisis and world needs as they are presented to us.

 

Let us continue reaching out to others, practice radical hospitality, and share our resources as an expression of our faith formed by the need to love others.

 

Pastor Fred Agtarap
Guam United Methodist Church