For My Sis

This entry is for my sister who has been on me to write on my blog. After all, in her thinking a blog is meant to be updated from time to time. So this one is for you sis! ;-)

Actually the past 48 hours I have been attending the Bishop's retreat that my Annual Conference has every year for pastors like me to get some continuing education credit. I always dread coming to these things because of all the work it means I leave behind, but I am always glad I came once I am here.

This year's topic is on preaching and our presenter has been William Bobby McClain who is the Mary Elizabeth Joyce Professor of Preaching at Wesley Theological Seminary in Washington, D.C. I have enjoyed this conference because Professor McClain has taken us back to the basics of preaching – not unlike what Vince Lombardi did with the Green Bay Packers after a humiliating defeat by the Chicago Bears when Lombardi held up a football and said to the team, "Gentlemen, this is a football." It has been good to feel like a seminary student again in preaching class.

I have also enjoyed this conference because Professor McClain is from the Black Church tradition. In fact, he is the last elder actively serving in the United Methodist Church that was ordained through the Central Conference of the Methodist Church.

For those who aren't familiar with American Methodist history, in 1939 the Methodist Episcopal Church, the Methodist Episcopal Church South and the Protestant Methodist Church joined together to form the Methodist Church. As part of the agreement for merger, the Methodist Episcopal Church South inisted that black preachers and black congregations not be apart of white annual conferences. Therefore, the majority white denomination placed all the black congregations into one conference that encompassed most of the nation known as the Central Conference.

In 1968, when the Methodist Church and the Evangelical United Brethen merged to from today's United Methodist Church, the Central Conference was eliminated and the black churches were incorporated into the annual conference in which they were geographically located.

Anyway, being from the Black Church tradition, Professor McClain has introduced us to some great gospel hymns and spirituals. I am sad to admit how ignorant I have been about some of the music found within the United Methodist Hymnal. But after this retreat I have a new favorite hymn. It's number 522 in the UMH and it's titled, "Leave It There." Maybe sometime in the future I will write a hymn story, but for now you can find the words here.

And the singing has been awesome as well! Now I don't know what it's like when pastors from other denominations gather, but my experience has been that when pastors in the United Methodist Church gather, the singing is tremendous! I guess it's in our blood, because we Methodist love to sing.

And another great surprise at this retreat has been the number of pastors who brought musical instruments. We have violin/fiddle, guitar, piano, and banjo. In other words, we have had in impromptu bluegrass band. So the music and singing as well as the instruction have made this a great retreat.