June 8, 2023

Dear Hyde Park Family,

By the time you read today’s Midweek Message, I will be in Lakeland, Florida for the yearly gathering of the Florida Annual Conference, made up of clergy and lay delegates from every United Methodist congregation in the state. All four of our clergy team will be there, along with lay representatives from our church.

I appreciate your prayers for our work, as we organize, vision, and plan the work of the Conference over the upcoming year. Pray for our new bishop, Tom Berlin, who presides over the proceedings. And please pray for me and the Board of Ordained Ministry, which I chair, as we present ministerial candidates for approval at tonight’s clergy session at 6pm. I would appreciate prayers for clarity and courage as I make my presentation and answer questions, as we navigate the tensions that exist within the denomination at large.

Most of all, pray that these next several days be times of joy, connection, and hope for the future.

On March 3, 1785, John Wesley wrote a brief essay titled “Thoughts Upon Some Late Occurrences,” which included reflections on the first time he gathered clergy together for what would become an annual time of conferencing:

“In June 1744, I desired my brother and a few other clergymen to meet me in London, to consider how we should proceed to save our own souls and those who heard us. After some time, I invited the lay preachers that were in the house to meet with us. We conferred together for several days and were much comforted and strengthened thereby.”

Over time, Wesley realized that the long-term viability of the Methodist movement depended on all the preachers coming together for a time of holy conferencing, to conduct the important work of maintaining “doctrine, experience, right conduct, and discipline as essential to the permanency of Methodism.”

279 years later, United Methodist clergy and lay delegates still gather every year for those same purposes, along with celebrating ministries, worshipping together, establishing leadership teams, approving budgets, and deciding missional and strategic goals for the work of the church. The core purpose of the annual conference gathering, however, is still the same as it was for John Wesley and the first delegates: to be “much comforted and strengthened thereby.”

Thank you for the prayers!

Grace and Peace, 

June 1, 2023

Dear Hyde Park Family,

Among my leadership roles beyond the local church is that I serve as the chairperson of the Florida Conference Board of Ordained Ministry for the United Methodist Church. We evaluate and recommend persons to serve as clergy in our Conference. Our work culminates every year with our Annual Conference gathering in Lakeland, set for next Thursday through Saturday. I certainly appreciate your prayers for our work.

Last year, our Board invited consultants from the Forum for Theological Exploration to help us improve the way we do our work, including identifying implicit biases in our perceptions and processes, improving communication, and navigating through change. Those two consultants, Stephen Lewis and Dori Baker, presented insights based on their book “Another Way: Living and Leading Change on Purpose.”

Their wisdom was not only helpful to the Board of Ordained Ministry of the Conference; I think they are applicable to all of us, in whatever vocation, life stage, or walk of life we find ourselves in that requires courageous, adaptive leadership.

Here are seven of their most powerful insights. I hope you find them meaningful:

· Dialogue is an essential leadership practice and a core process for change.

· Leadership is a communal practice that builds the capacity of a team, community, or organization to envision and enact a future informed by the past and the diverse people around us.

· Strengthen your capacity to embrace mystery by thinking about, playing with, and adapting to uncertainty, because it, like death, is inevitable.

· Leadership is more about public listening than public speaking.

· The wisdom of our ancestors and descendants is always present and available to us, so remember to welcome them as we face the most difficult tasks of our lives.

· Learn from multiplicity. Most of us are more than any one thing simultaneously. Appreciate the complexity of other stories and perspectives.

· There is a future that mourns if you and I do not step into our purpose.

As people of Pentecost, let us open ourselves to the ongoing, innovative work of the Holy Spirit in and through us. May we each step into our purpose, and claim the leadership voice that God summons of us.

Happy Pentecost!

May 18, 2023

Dear Hyde Park Family,

This Sunday is the convergence of two observances, one civic and one liturgical. First, it is Graduation Sunday, in which we will honor the high school seniors in our worship services with a video and a prayer of blessing. It is also Ascension Sunday, in which Christians around the world remember Jesus’ final moments with the disciples before ascending into heaven.

It’s not often that graduation and ascension occur on the same Sunday, but there is some connection between commencement addresses typically heard at graduations and the speech that Jesus gave to the disciples.

Commencement speakers often seize the significance of the moment and challenge the listeners to rise to the occasion. They widen the graduates’ gaze beyond their own social circle, and summon them to be part of something greater than themselves.

Here are some of the more notable commencement speeches offered in recent history. Listen for those common elements:

From Vaclav Havel:

Whether our world is to be saved from everything that threatens it today depends above all on whether human beings come to their senses, whether they understand the degree of their responsibility and discover a new relationship to the very miracle of being. The world is in the hands of us all. (Harvard University, May, 1995)

From Elie Wiesel:

My good friends, we are all waiting. We are waiting, if not for the Messiah, as such, we are waiting for the messianic moment. And the messianic moment is what each and every one of us tries to build, meaning a certain area of humanity that links us to all those who are human and, therefore, desperately trying to fight despair as humanly as possible and–I hope–with some measure of success. (DePaul University, June 15, 1997)

From Bono:

This is the straight truth. The righteous truth. It’s not a theory; it’s a fact. The fact is that this generation — yours, my generation — we’re the first generation that can look at poverty and disease, look across the ocean to Africa and say with a straight face, we can be the first to end this stupid extreme poverty, where, in a world of plenty, a child can die for lack of food in its belly. (University of Pennsylvania, May 17, 2004)

Then there is this speech, offered 2,000 years ago, during a commencement ceremony on a mountain top. Assembled were students of Jesus’ traveling seminary, who had spent more than

three years learning, practicing, attempting, failing, and trying again. For this simple band of commoners, the world had changed. They were no longer fishermen and tax collectors, they were world-changers-in-the-making.

And their time had come. When Jesus stood before them, before he took off into the clouds, he gave his address:

This is what you have heard from me; for John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now. It is not for you to know the times or periods that the Father has set by his own authority. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth. (Acts 1:4-8)

Like all great commencement speeches, Jesus seized the moment. He told the disciples that there were challenges ahead, but that they were to carry the gospel of God’s love to the furthest reaches of the earth, beyond their small social circles. Along the way, they would not be alone, for the Spirit would come upon them. They would receive the Spirit’s power and comfort to achieve great things for the Kingdom, and participate in God’s ongoing project: the healing of the world and redemption of all creation.

Congratulations to all of our graduates, from preschool, high school, college, and beyond. More importantly, let us hear Christ’s commencement address for ourselves, calling us to a deeper commitment and a greater love.

See you Sunday!

May 11, 2023

Dear Hyde Park Family,

For this final installment of “Why the UMC?” I offer a few of the many reasons why I continue to be drawn to Wesleyan theology and practice, and why we can be excited to be part of the continuing United Methodist Church.

United Methodists have a beautifully nuanced understanding of God’s grace. John Wesley found a way to hold these contrary truths together: 1) There is nothing we need to do to earn salvation; 2) We need to accept Jesus as our Savior to be saved. Wesley navigated the tension between them through his notion of prevenient grace, in which our very ability to choose to accept Jesus is itself a gift from God, at work long before we realized it. That grace continues to work in us through a lifelong process of leading us to faith in Jesus (justifying grace) and then shaping us more into the image of Jesus (sanctifying grace).

United Methodists live in the center, in the way of love. We are a people of the via media, the way of the center. We take the best of two ideological opposites and forge a third way that allows us to be unified in the essentials of our faith while allowing latitude on lesser matters of interpretation. When we are at our healthiest and best as a church, we model the kind of non-binary, non-dualistic thinking that is a hallmark of the Wesleyan tradition.

United Methodists practice an open table in communion. I often hear from new members how much they appreciate how we welcome all people to receive communion, regardless of membership in this or any other church. We believe that the communion table belongs to Jesus, not to any one church, and Christ invites all who earnestly seek a relationship with him.

United Methodists are connectional and impact the world. From the small groups that meet in a local church to the missions and efforts that span the world, we are a connectional people. Our denominational structures ensure that our faithfulness on the local level is amplified on a global scale. We support hospitals, relief agencies, community service centers, schools, seminaries, and missionaries near and far. We are making a difference.

United Methodists understand shared governance and holy conferencing. We have a unique polity and structure in our denomination that reminds us that no one person ever has sole authority to make all the decisions on any level. The local church has shared governance between the clergy and laity, and among the various elected leadership committees. The denomination has no pope or president, but is guided by a gathering of delegates in holy conversation. The Annual Conference is given spiritual direction by the bishop, who presides over decision-making by clergy and lay representatives. I love that in the United Methodist Church, we discern God’s future together.

The United Methodist Church is itself a work in progress. God’s sanctifying grace has been at work in the people called Methodist all throughout our history. When we have gotten it wrong as a church, God has nudged us toward perfection in love. We overcame our structural separation over slavery in 1939. We began ordaining women to be clergy in 1956. We allowed divorced pastors to remain as clergy in the 1960’s and 1970’s. We are navigating new challenges over LGBTQ inclusion, and we will get there. God loves the church enough to meet us where we are, and loves it too much to leave it there.

I love serving a congregation that will be part of the continuing United Methodist Church. For nearly 125 years, we have been part of the remarkable work of the Holy Spirit here in Tampa Bay and throughout the world. It is a joy to make God’s love real together.

Grace and Peace

May 4, 2023

Dear Hyde Park Family,

The United Methodist Church rescued me from a crisis of faith. I was fresh out of high school, in my freshman year of college, when the tightly wound and insulated world of my fundamentalist faith began to unravel.

At first, it was a simple tug here and there, on various threads of the fabric of my faith. There was my biology class – required for my pre-med major – in which I studied Darwinism, evolution and the persuasive writings of people like Stephen Jay Gould. There was my Introduction to Religious Studies class, in which I read philosophers of religion like Schleiermacher, Tillich and William James. And there were encounters outside the classroom, with earnest persons of a different religious perspective – and some with no religion – whose thoughts were too compelling to casually dismiss.

One day in the library, I bumped into a fellow student named Frank, and the subject of biblical literalism came up. I insisted that Moses wrote the first five books of the Bible, which was the standard teaching of my religious upbringing.

“Hmm,” Frank said. “Even the part where he died?”

One by one, with each pull of a thread, my precisely woven fundamentalism started to come apart at the seams. I remember thinking, “If this one thing I believed isn’t true, then this other things must not be true, which means none of this is true.”

A SAFE PLACE FOR QUESTIONS

Fortunately, and by the grace of God, I had started attending a United Methodist Church just two years before going to college. It was Pasadena Community Church in St. Petersburg, served by the Rev. Dr. John Stroman as the senior pastor. During that first bewildering semester of college I paid Dr. Stroman a visit.

We were seated next to each other in a high school gymnasium, watching our church basketball recreational league play one of the other churches. I did not expect to sit next to him, let alone have a conversation with him about my crisis of faith. But this seemed as good a place and time as any to strike up a casual conversation about a deeply consequential matter.

“Dr. Stroman, I think I’m struggling with my faith. I’m having lots of questions in college that I don’t know how to answer.”

There in that gym, as our heads swiveled from side to side to watch the basketball game, he offered a response that was gracious and substantive. He assured me that the history of Christianity is filled with people who have asked hard questions about the faith, and that even entire Christian communities and eras of time have been marked by expanding the theology of the church. It was the kind of wider, larger perspective that brought me comfort that my struggles were neither unique nor terminal.

THE BEAUTY OF THE QUADRILATERAL

That would be the first of many conversations between me and Jack Stroman, along a journey that would bring me greater and deeper appreciation for Wesleyan theology. I came to realize that human intellect and reason was a vehicle – not a barrier – for understanding the Bible and Christian tradition. Feeling free to ask questions and use my mind enabled me to have an even greater sense of biblical authority.

He was the first person to introduce me to the concept of “liberation theology,” the subject of his doctoral dissertation. He explained views of Christianity from a Latin American context, and how people’s cultural perspective shapes their understanding of the faith. I began to see how unrealistic it was to expect all people around the world to view the Christian faith through Western, American eyes. Indeed, God so loved the world, and Jesus came to save us all. But how one understands that love and salvation is unavoidably shaped by one’s cultural conditioning, one’s experience.

This is all to say that what we commonly understand as the Wesleyan Quadrilateral – Scripture, Tradition, Reason and Experience – is not only a hallmark of United Methodist theology; it was also instrumental in rescuing me from my crisis of faith.

Over time, I became less anxious about asking hard questions, out of fear that my faith would unravel. Instead, just like muscles grow through exercise by tearing muscle fibers so they can regrow stronger, becoming a United Methodist enabled me to not only stay a Christian, but grow closer to Jesus in ways I could not before.

THE CONTINUING UMC

I may offer additional thoughts in next week’s Midweek Message, but for now, if you’d like to have more reasons why it is great to be part of the continuing United Methodist Church, you can watch my interview last week for a web series titled “Hope Springs Eternal: Positive Conversations about the United Methodist Church.”

You can also watch a video from our elected leadership gathering last February, in which I share reasons I am excited for us to be an ongoing part of the denomination, along with a presentation by our District Superintendent, Emily Hotho, related to church disafilliations happening in our Annual Conference.

Finally, you may choose to join me for a two-week book study at the end of this month on Bishop Ken Carter’s new book Unrelenting Grace, in which we will explore the beauty and richness of our United Methodist core values of grace, holiness and connection. To find out more and to sign up, click here. 

Grace and Peace,

April 27, 2023

Dear Hyde Park Family,

Last Monday, I filmed an interview with a clergy colleague who is hosting a series of conversations about the United Methodist Church, and a hopeful vision of its future. If you are interested in watching that interview, let me know and I will send you a link when it debuts next Monday.

Preparing for that interview prompted me to think of the many reasons why I became a United Methodist in the first place, and why I am excited to be part of the continuing United Methodist Church today, even as we navigate disagreements over LGBTQ inclusion and the departures of churches for whom this is a church-dividing issue.

PERSONAL AND SOCIAL HOLINESS

The interviewer asked me, “What do you love about the United Methodist Church?” I replied that among the many reasons was John Wesley’s emphasis on both personal and holiness. We care for both a person’s individual relationship with Jesus along with the social fabric that connects us all. This is not an either/or proposition for us. We do not skew toward individual salvation; nor do we exist solely for social service or advocacy. God’s redemption is for each of us separately, and all of us together.

At the elected leadership gathering last February, I shared that this emphasis on personal and social holiness is found in our denomination’s mission statement, to “make disciples of Jesus Christ (personal holiness) for the transformation of the world (social holiness).”

This also echoes the renewed vision of this church back in 2018, when our Vision Plan called us to grow “Deeper” (personal holiness, to make discipleship) and “Wider” (social holiness, to transform the world) as a means of becoming “United” in common witness.

Personal and social holiness are in no way contradictory, and in every way complementary. Here at Hyde Park United Methodist, we care about helping you grow in your love of God (worship, prayer, scripture reading) and your love of others (small groups, service, financial generosity, and invitation). We have programs and ministries to deepen your faith, along with work that addresses homelessness, education, and poverty, and a witness that addresses anti-racism and an inclusion of all people. We are not perfect in this work; no church is. But by God’s grace, in the words of Wesley, we are moving on to perfection together.

BOOK STUDY: UNRELENTING GRACE

In the next Midweek Message, I’ll offer more insights that I shared from that interview, with further reasons I am grateful to be part of the continuing United Methodist Church. I may have more to say in the weeks beyond that. For now, if you are interested in pondering more with me about the values and beauty of being United Methodist, join me for a two-session book study on Bishop Ken Carter’s book Unrelenting Grace at the end of this month. 

See you Sunday!

April 20, 2023

Dear Hyde Park Family,

Grace and Peace,

April 6, 2023

Dear Passion Week Pilgrims,

“Lenten Communion”

by Katharine Tynan (1861-1931)

Rest in a friend’s house, Dear, I pray:

The way is long to Good Friday,

And very chill and grey the way.

No crocus with its shining cup,

Nor the gold daffodil is up, –

Nothing is here save the snowdrop.

Sit down with me and taste good cheer:

Too soon, too soon, Thy Passion’s here;

The wind is keen and the skies drear.

Sit by my fire and break my bread.

Yea, from Thy dish may I be fed,

And under Thy feet my hair spread!

Lord, in the quiet, chill and sweet,

Let me pour water for Thy feet,

While the crowd goes by in the Street.

Why wouldst Thou dream of spear or sword,

Or of the ingrate rabble, Lord?

There is no sound save the song of a bird.

Let us sit down and talk at ease

About Thy Father’s business.

(What shouts were those borne on the breeze?)

Nay, Lord, it cannot be for Thee

They raise the tallest cross of the three

On yon dark Mount of Calvary!

So soon, so soon, the hour’s flown!

The glory’s dying: Thou art gone

Out on Thy lonely way, alone.

On behalf of the staff and lay leadership of Hyde Park United Methodist Church, I wish you and yours a blessed Holy Week and a joyous Easter. For the full schedule of services on Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and Easter Sunday, and to serve as a greeter to welcome guests to worship, click here.

Grace and Peace,

Magrey

March 30, 2023

Dear Lenten Pilgrims,

The events of these past days can be marked by three powerful and timely prayers, which speak to needs of our world and our hope in God. I invite you to consider them prayerfully.

PRAYER 1: “LORD, DELIVER US”

The first is by Rear Admiral Barry C. Black, the Chaplain of the United States Senate, in the wake of the horrific shooting at the Covenant Presbyterian School in Nashville, Tennessee. He offered this prayer at the start of the Senate’s session on Tuesday.

Eternal God, we stand in awe of you. Lord, when babies die at a church school, it is time for us to move beyond thoughts and prayers. Remind our lawmakers of the words of the British statesman Edmund Burke: “All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good people to do nothing.” Lord, deliver our senators from the paralysis of analysis that waits for the miraculous. Use them to battle the demonic forces that seek to engulf us. We pray, in your powerful name, Amen.

PRAYER 2: “JESUS, HELP THEM”

The second prayer is by a meteorologist named Matt Laubhan, broadcasting live last Friday night as a line of terrible tornadoes tore through Mississippi, including a small town called Amory. As he watched the ominous tornadoes pop up on his radar, he spoke directly to the residents of that town: “Amory, we need to be in our tornado safe space.” And then, looking distraught, he paused for a moment before simply saying:

“Dear Jesus, please help them. Amen.”

If you’d like to contribute to relief and recovery efforts through our United Methodist Committee on Relief, you can donate here. 

PRAYER 3: “HOSANNA!”

The final prayer was first uttered 2,000 years ago, but is as timely now as ever. On the very first Palm Sunday, whose triumphal entry by Jesus we will celebrate this Sunday, people lined the streets with palm fronds and through their cloaks on the ground. Channeling their fears, anxieties, and frustrations, they shouted a prayer as Jesus road by. It begins with the word “Hosanna,” an ancient Hebrew term which means, “We pray: Save us!”

“Hosanna! Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord – the King of Israel!” (John 12:13)

These three prayers, offered in dramatically different contexts and even separated by millennia, are all rooted in the same theological premise: We need the grace of God to confront the horrors and tragedies of our time, and we need the strength of God to respond with justice and mercy. May our thoughts and prayers result in courageous and compassionate action.

Grace and Peace,

Magrey

March 23, 2023

Dear Hyde Park Fmaily,

There are two sacred observances happening within the next ten days whose juxtaposition rarely gets much attention.

The first event is this Saturday, March 25, known as Annunciation Day. It is precisely nine months before Christmas Day, and it commemorates the visit by the angel Gabriel to a young Mary, the mother of Jesus. The second event is April 2, which is Palm Sunday and the start of Holy Week, whose path leads to the cross on Golgotha.

Even though the date of Palm Sunday moves around from year to year, these two events are always within proximity of each other. Considering them in tandem makes a profound statement about faithful obedience.

Chief among the many reasons we admire Mary was her willingness to say yes to God. Her fears and doubts would have made it understandable for her to choose the easier path of self-preservation. Instead, she chose to obey God, regardless of the cost and pain that was sure to follow.

Thirty-three years later – but only a matter of days in liturgical time – we find a similar scene in the Garden of Gethsemane. Here, the son of Mary wrestled with the very same kinds of questions that his mother faced when he was conceived. It was a choice between comfort or obedience, between self-preservation or self-sacrifice, between human will or God’s will.

By linking Annunciation Day and Holy Week, we can draw parallels between these bookends of the life of Jesus. He was born of a woman who chose to obey God, just as he chose to live obediently until the end of his life.

“SING ME THE SONG AGAIN, MAMA”

We might even imagine a very young Jesus, talking to his mother about the day the angel visited her, and learning from her about obedience:

“Mama, tell me the story again of how the angel visited you.”

“Well, dear, he caught me by surprise one day. He told me not to be afraid, and that God had chosen me to give birth to you.”

“Were you afraid?”

“I was at first, of course. Nothing like this had ever happened to me, and I didn’t know what others might think. But there was something about the presence of God in that angel that gave me great comfort. I said yes, and I’m so glad that I did.”

“Why were you glad, Mama?”

“Because then I could have you in my life, dear! But more than that, I knew deep down in my heart that God was going to do great things to change the world, and that God wanted to do them through me. To exalt the humble, fill the hungry, remember the lowly: it is a privilege to be used by God in such a powerful way. We must say yes, even when it is difficult to do so. Do you understand that, Jesus?”

“Yes, Mama. May I ask another question?”

“Of course, dear.”

“Can you sing me that song again? The one you sang when you said yes to the angel?”

I’d like to think that years later, when Jesus was in the Garden of Gethsemane, praying earnestly with a blood-soaked brow, the words and melody of his mother’s Magnificat entered his mind.

My soul magnifies the Lord,

my spirit rejoices in God, my Savior.

He looks on his servant in her lowliness;

henceforth all ages will call me blessed.

The Almighty works marvels for me.

Holy his name!

His mercy is from age to age,

on those who fear him.

He puts forth his arm in strength

and scatters the proud-hearted.

He casts the mighty from their thrones

and raises the lowly.

He fills the starving with good things,

sends the rich away empty.

He protects Israel, his servant,

remembering his mercy,

the mercy promised to our fathers,

to Abraham and his sons forever.

In those moments when life is most difficult, and the pain and trauma of life have us in their grip, we often have our sharpest and clearest memories of the lessons our parents taught us. Lessons about staying steadfast in our convictions and courageous in our actions. We learn from our ancestors how to claim our future. And I think Jesus learned a thing or two about obedience from the woman whose obedience brought him into earthly existence.

It would be good spiritual preparation during Lent for us to pause for a moment, before the pageantry of Palm Sunday and the passion of Holy Week, to remember Annunciation Day, and the obedience of Mary. May she call us to a deeper place of surrender to God, just as her example did for Jesus himself.

Grace and Peace,

Magrey

Image Credit:

Maryʼs Golden Annunciation

Carmelle Beaugelin | A Sanctified Art LLC | sanctifiedart.org