My dear Theophilus of Clayton,
Praise the Lord! I am pleased to continue sharing with you about the recent NC Annual Conference of the Global Methodist Church. Again, the conference theme was: “Holy Love: God Initiates, We Respond.” I celebrate because we are part of a Holy Spirit movement of being the hands, feet, and voice of Christ.
At Annual Conference, those on the platform continually reminded the gathering of how we as the people called Methodists in North Carolina have faithfully responded to God’s initiative. New ministries are beginning to be rolled out across the Conference with Certified Lay Ministers, Youth Retreats, and a gathering for Young Adults. The assistance of the Bishop’s Cabinet is being organized for effective, efficient, and fruitful support of the local church.
A heroic work is being undertaken in the mountains of western North Carolina. A ministry has been established to help the victims of Hurricane Helene and her flooding. Home repairs, tiny houses, and now the mission is preparing to build new homes. Generosity has poured in from across the connection – as of the meeting of Conference $1.5 million has been received and about have of that has already blessed our neighbors in need. We are settling into a long-term work of recovery, estimated to be a 10-year outreach. The leaders of this disaster relief ministry challenge the churches to seed $100 per month into this work. If half the churches of the Conference accepted this challenge, resources of $2.5 million will resource holy love in action.
The North Carolina Conference of the Global Methodist Church consist of 406 local churches from the mountains to the coast. Within this number, fifteen are new churches started in the last thirty months. We, Clayton Methodist, are one of the group. The pastors of these churches meet in a cohort for resources and encouragement. At Conference, we shared a meal together. Over saucy “Q” we heard representatives from Carolina Movement share about their ministry assisting new churches to become fruitful. Only about 25% of North Carolina’s population is connected to a local church. Reaching new people through New Church Development is a Missional Priority of the Global Methodist Church. There is a great mission field in front of us. The Lord is ready to bring an abundant harvest through you and me. To this end, a fun, spontaneous offering collected $4,001 for New Church starts.
On a larger scale, the Global Methodist denomination now counts over 5,000 churches worldwide. While we were in Conference, the news broke of four more conferences
joining our movement: Central Russia, East Russia and Central Asia, Northwest Russia and Belarus, and South Russia. Bishop Eduard Khegay has faithfully led these Methodist from their former expression and into our two-and-a-half-year-old denomination.
These conferences in other parts of the world need our assistance to get on their feet. For years, they have been treated as dependents without being encouraged to mature to a level of self-sufficiency. The connectional strategy of the Global Methodist Church is to partner conference to conference, district to district, church to church, and pastor to pastor. North Carolina’s first partner will be the Uganda Conference. I have been paired as a prayer partner with a pastor, who is also the Conference Treasurer. The Conference will be providing organizational funding for five years on a decreasing schedule. Local churches will begin hearing about projects they may choose to walk along of a Ugandan congregation. Our first project of providing Bible for our brothers and sisters in the East African country bore tremendous fruit. At Conference, 2,956 Bibles were collected. Clayton Methodist sent the 56 Bibles. Additionally, $32,611.32 was collected in the Friday offering (including those received by mail and online). More is expected to be received throughout the summer. Clayton Methodist gave $3,155 to the offering. These resources will be used to distribute the donated Bibles, provide for printing Bibles in the Lugandan language, and give Study Bibles to Ugandan pastors. Thank you for your faithful offering! The word of God is spreading.
As you may know, I am honored to serve as the Chair of the Conference Finance & Administration Team. I reported on the strong financial health of our Conference. We are currently administering a $2,035,000 budget for the current year. The Conference approved our 2026 budget of $2,290,000. We call these “resources” as God provides “every good and perfect gift” (James 1:17). We call the distribution of God’s resources “sowing,” as we are called to sow God’s gifts into mission and ministry, instead of hoarding them. In my report, I celebrated many of the fruitfulness I named above. Additionally, we sowed $125,000 into new church starts this year. I also reminded the Conference of the blessing we received from the connection in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene and that we should be generous as the new season of tropical storms has arrived.
Theophilus, this is my testimony of the 2025 North Carolina Conference of the Global Methodist Church. Be of good faith. Remember God Initiates, so how will you respond?
In Christ’s Service
Pastor Dan