ATLANTA – Did you know that The United Methodist Church (UMC) empowers local leaders worldwide to deepen mission engagement through Global Ministries’ Nationals in Mission (NIM) program?

NIM grants enable Global Ministries’ mission partners to identify leadership roles they deem critical for the church to flourish and then employ skilled, local leaders to fill those roles. Because NIMs are native to the country where they serve, they bring a deep cultural and contextual understanding to the ways they build relationships, address needs, and implement and lead sustainable ministries.

Recognizing the vital role that NIMs play in deepening the impact of mission in today’s global context, Global Ministries awarded grants totaling nearly $1.25 million to the program in 2024.

“By investing in indigenous leaders through the Nationals in Mission program, The United Methodist Church honors the importance of agency for our mission partners worldwide to provide sustainable leadership for critical ministries,” said the Rev. Dee Stickley-Miner, executive director for mission engagement for Global Ministries.

Currently, more than 300 NIMs are serving around the world, working in various areas including education, health care, community development, pastoral leadership, evangelism and social justice. Many also partner with UMC conferences, ecumenical organizations, or Methodist-affiliated institutions to expand their reach.

A NIM grant opened an opportunity for a church worker to focus on human rights with partner organization Centro Ecuménico Popular para América Latina de Comunicación (CEPALC) in Colombia. And in Pakistan, a NIM grant enabled a student to return to his home country to answer a call to ministry: counseling survivors with the kind of trauma and terror his own family experienced in a deadly bombing.

You can support the NIM program through a gift to Advance #12122L.

Sara Logeman is the senior manager of content and marketing for Global Ministries.

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The Africa Mission Partners Consultation, held April 17-19, 2023, in Maputo, Mozambique, was the first in a series of events planned over the next year as Global Ministries engages in critical strategic conversations to discern how God is leading United Methodists in mission. In reflecting on the event, General Secretary Roland Fernandes noted his strong desire to work with mutual respect and accountability to approach mission and build interdependence in doing God’s work. He hoped that the gathering would help to guide future expressions of mission through The United Methodist Church. Eveline Chikwanah covered the consultation for UM News.

By Eveline Chikwanah
May 3, 2023 | MAPUTO, Mozambique (UM News)

More than 80 delegates and partners from Africa met with United Methodist Global Ministries staff to discuss the future of mission on the continent, as the denomination moves from being a missionary to a missional church.

The agency’s top executive, Roland Fernandes, said the April 17-19 Africa Mission Partners Consultation in Maputo was one of several conversations planned for this year that will focus on the agency’s programs. Six bishops from around Africa attended the consultation.

“The meetings will look at what we are doing (and) what should we be doing as we look at 2024 and beyond,” Fernandes said. “We can only do that by listening to and learning from our partners; we cannot do that on our own. The whole purpose is for us to be able to listen and engage our partners in Africa in the true spirit of mutuality.”

He said it is important for the agency and its partners “to treat each other as equal partners and see what both have to shift together to continue to define mission in the future.”

“We are already transforming to being missional if you look at the work we do with the health boards,” Fernandes said. “We don’t run the health boards; they are being empowered by Global Ministries. Even with the Yambasu Agriculture Initiative, it’s local programs which are being supported. The conferences have their own strategic plans and the meeting was to discuss how we can work together and support them.”

The Rev. Reggie W. Nel, dean of the Faculty of Theology at Stellenbosch University in South Africa, said while the missionary church was in charge of all programs, a missional church is “missio Dei” (the mission of God) and led by the Holy Spirit. He emphasized it is time to decolonize the church and get rid of the “mother church and daughter church” concept established by pioneer missionaries.

“A fundamental question is whether we as children of a colonial missionary ecclesiology are willing to open ourselves up to the deep work of God as the Holy Spirit, or are we stuck in a superficial and perhaps an elusive second-hand performance of our own agents in building God’s kingdom?” Nel asked.

“Missiologically I would argue that, in the first place, we must consciously accept that we all come from a place with a personal and social history (collectively as an organization or community) that needs to be acknowledged and affirmed and held in creative tension,” he said. “It is not the one (personal) or the other (social), or the one over the other.”

Nel said grieving was important during times of turmoil such as the COVID-19 pandemic and the Rwandan genocide. “There remains a place for bouncing back before bouncing forward.  I would also add in between these backward and forward bouncing movements, the notion of digging ‘deep’ to simply allow the depths of the grief to overwhelm us, to let us fall deep.

“This is also relevant in our quest for discerning an appropriate missional ecclesiology for our time — a time of the plague and therefore, disruption, trauma, loss. The moment was not only personal, individualistic; it was communal, social,” he said.

Bishop Daniel Wandabula of the East Africa Episcopal Area thanked Nel for analyzing the situation prevailing in Africa. “It’s not an easy task getting to understand where we are, how we got here and how we can get out of this situation.

“We must be a church that belongs to the Lord and does his will. We are part of the whole story of creation from beginning to end,” he said.

Bishop Mande Muyombo, who leads the North Katanga Area that encompasses parts of Congo and Tanazania, said the African church wanted to be decolonized and make its own decisions.  “(The late) Bishop Muzorewa (of Zimbabwe) said we have to preach the gospel that decolonizes the mind because for so long we have been going through a traumatic experience.

“The need for grief work is critical,” Muyombo said. “We have to make mental health of our leadership a priority. If we are going to influence our people, we need to be liberated in our own leadership style. I am so proud of my colleague bishops because, despite the challenges, churches are being built and a lot of work is being done.

“As Africans it is difficult to live outside of our own cultural values,” he said. “In the Congo, we will continue to be faithful to our cultural values as marriage is defined in our own cultural heritage.  But at the same time, we do not want to be used as proxies. Ubuntu requires us to recognize human dignity in every human being who has been created by God,” he said, alluding to the human sexuality debate within the denomination.

Other bishops attending the event were John Wesley Yohanna of Nigeria, Warner Brown Jr. of Sierra Leone, Daniel Lunge of Central Congo and Joaquina Nhanala of Mozambique.

Global Ministries is engaged in supporting missionaries, evangelism and church revitalization, global health, and humanitarian relief and recovery — and is running 17 programs. 

The Maputo meeting is not the first time Global Ministries has called a consultation of its partners throughout Africa, though it is the first in a few decades. It held consultations with African partners in 1961, 1974 and 1977. The 1960s and ’70s were a time of great challenge for the church and societies in Africa.

Fernandes noted that a write-up of the 1961 consultation said, “It was held in a time of uncertainty when it would seem that no sure future lay before the church.”

Chikwanah is a communicator of the Zimbabwe East Conference. 

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Agencies meet in formal consultation for first time in more than 20 years. 

By Susan Clark 
August 18, 2022 | Atlanta, GA 

The General Board of Global Ministries of The United Methodist Church (Global Ministries) and the Korean Methodist Church (KMC) mission board held a consultation at Global Ministries’ headquarters on Aug. 15-17, 2022, in Atlanta, Georgia. The two-day meeting, which included the presidents of the councils of bishops of both churches, represented the first time the two boards have met together in formal consultation since 2001. The consultation was called to discuss mutual partnership opportunities for mission throughout the world, building on the shared history and current realities facing both organizations.  

The consultation was composed of delegations from both agencies, resource people and guests from Global Ministries’ executive committee and staff. At the consultation’s opening banquet, Bishop Thomas Bickerton, president of the Council of Bishops of The United Methodist Church and the United Methodist Committee on Relief (UMCOR), noted the deep-seated commitment to mission that brought the delegations together and expressed his hope that the meeting would offer an opportunity to live into a shared gospel. “My prayer is that we will be guided by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit and the example of Jesus Christ himself who called us to be one in the spirit even as we work for the transformation of the world,” he said. Bishop Chul Lee, president of the Korean Methodist Church, shared his hopes for cooperation, noting that, though cultures and ways of thinking for both churches are different, the Korean Methodist Church and The United Methodist Church can act in harmony and unity, called by God.  

Bishop Hee Soo Jung, president of Global Ministries’ board of directors, expressed hope that The United Methodist Church and Korean Methodist Church might fulfill a shared mission to transform the world through a serving church and community. He expressed hope that “we will share wisdom today with the passion to spread this peace and joy to all parts of the world,” further noting that “we can be glad in the abundant peace of Jesus Christ” and “let gentleness show.”  

Throughout the two-day meeting, delegates heard a series of presentations, including an historical overview of mission cooperation between the KMC and UMC and reviews of several mission efforts in areas of Asia and Africa. They also discussed longstanding challenges and opportunities for peace and reunification efforts on the Korean Peninsula, work paused by the global pandemic but which remains foremost on the minds of many Koreans because of the ongoing and painful separation of families and rising military tensions in the region.   

Roland Fernandes, general secretary of Global Ministries and UMCOR, reinforced the long-standing practice of collaboration in mission at Global Ministries. “We form partnerships that foster our goals of mission, which historically and today include evangelism, that is, making disciples for Jesus Christ, church development, building up the household of faith, alleviating suffering, and seeking justice, freedom and peace,” he said.  “The overarching goal is faithful, joyful participation in the missio Dei – God’s mission.”  

Bishop Chung Suk Kim, chair of the KMC Board of Mission, acknowledged several common challenges facing world churches today – declining youth interest in the religious faith, polarization and resulting conflicts, and issues of peace. He acknowledged the long impact of The United Methodist Church in Korea and suggested that the KMC and UMC act as brothers and sisters in mission to build on their history of collaboration.  

As the consultation concluded, leaders from both entities offered their hope for the future, agreeing to continue their consultation and work together to deploy a concrete list of opportunities for cooperation. Both groups acknowledged the mutual respect for one another and love of God that facilitated prayerful and thoughtful conversations throughout the two-day meeting. 

The Korean Methodist Church Board of Mission establishes and implements mission policies in domestic, social and global mission areas, including church planting and growth; peace, reunification and humanitarian help for North Korea; global missionary policy, training and support; and mission relationships with other churches and denominations; among other responsibilities. 

The General Board of Global Ministries, which includes the United Methodist Committee on Relief, is the worldwide mission, relief and development agency of The United Methodist Church, working with partners and churches all over the word to equip and transform people and places for God’s mission. Global Ministries connects the church in mission through the sending of missionaries, evangelization and church revitalization, global health and humanitarian relief and recovery. 

Susan Clark is the chief communications officer for Global Ministries and UMCOR.

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When The United Methodist Church in Nigeria sought to develop a strategic plan that would be effective in the current political and socio-economic climate, a mission roundtable helped more than 50 stakeholders from Nigeria and the United States to cast the vision and coordinate resources. The resulting six-year plan gave the church a clear mission statement and goals to propel them into their next phase of mission.

Mission roundtables are gatherings that bring together people from a variety of roles and contexts within the church to live out mutuality in mission. Working together to find new ways forward, participants can range from bishops, church and agency leaders to pastors, lay people and community members. Global Ministries U.S. Regional Office on Multicultural Ministries, based in Atlanta, has developed a Mission Roundtable Program, which trains facilitators to guide a group in dialogue that crosses the boundaries of identity, theology and worldview. “Even though not everyone agrees, we are all coming together from various backgrounds to address needs,” explains Joy McLeod, a Mission Roundtable facilitator from Atlanta who has been involved in roundtables in the Philippines and Mozambique.

A mission roundtable can be formed to create a long-range plan for an episcopal area, such as Nigeria, or to overcome a conflict or barrier in a ministry. The facilitators work to create a safe space and ensure all parties are heard. They work to build bridges across boundaries within the group and cultivate a sense of common mission and purpose. “Roundtables are all about mutuality, respect and listening to one another. And as a facilitator, I am responsible for creating a space in which these things can happen,” explains Barbara Oppliger, a Mission Roundtable facilitator from Switzerland who has been involved in roundtables in South America.

Two Mission Roundtable facilitators help keep these two- to three-day gatherings on track and ensure that every voice is heard. “Participants partake in visioning together,” says Paul Kong, Asia regional representative for Global Ministries, who has attended two roundtables in the Philippines and has helped bring training to Asia to increase the pool of facilitators available in the region. He notes that at the heart of any mission roundtable is the question: “How do we continue and progress and build up the body of Christ?”

Kong has seen how the quadrennial plan forged during the mission roundtable held with the Davao Episcopal Area of the Philippines in early 2019 is now shaping nearly every part of the church’s work. The strong investment of people involved in all different aspects of the church has made this possible. “It’s not just one person’s vision. I think that’s the beauty of this,” reflects Kong.

Another result of the Davao Mission Roundtable was an effort to better coordinate and strengthen sustainable livelihood programs throughout the region. Later in 2019, the three Philippine episcopal areas will meet in Manila. They are inviting nongovernmental institutions, United Methodist agency personnel, local business owners in related fields and individuals who participate in this ministry from each episcopal area. They will survey existing programs, look at best practices and find new ways to work together to improve ministries that serve the poor throughout the country.

The Mission Roundtable Program is available to all levels of The United Methodist connection through Global Ministries’ regional offices. This resource gathers people with diverse thoughts and ideas and creates a sacred space to discover new ways of being the church in the world. Together.

Invitation-only facilitator trainings help continue and grow the program, with the next training taking place November 2019 in Atlanta, Georgia. A facilitators’ summit will immediately follow the training to further equip new and experienced facilitators. The summit is organized in partnership with the Mission Roundtable training team, Global Ministries’ U.S. Regional Office on Multicultural Ministries, the General Commission on Religion and Race and the Circle Process Program at Emory University’s Candler School of Theology.

Okabayashi is a freelance writer for Global Ministries.

If your church, conference or district is interested in hosting a mission roundtable or if you would like more information on the upcoming facilitators’ summit, contact info@umcmission.org.

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