A Reserve Delegate from West Michigan shares her hope in the midst of pain and calls for commitment to prayer.
Rev. Kennetha Bigham-Tsai
Reserve Clergy Delegate, West Michigan Conference
Member of the Connectional Table
One of my favorite prayers is the Wesleyan Covenant Prayer. It is a prayer of surrender to the movement of the Holy Spirit. It is a prayer of trust that grounds me in the will and purpose of God. And it is a prayer that I prayed throughout General Conference 2016.
I am no longer my own, but yours.
Put me to what you will, rank me with whom you will.
Put me to doing, put me to suffering.
Let me be employed for you or laid aside for you,
Exalted for you or brought low for you.
Let me be full, let me be empty.
Let me have all things, let me have nothing.
I freely and heartily yield all things to your pleasure and disposal.
And now, O glorious and blessed God,
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,
You are mine, and I am yours…
And the covenant, which I have made on earth, let it be ratified in heaven. Amen
The Third Way was not discussed on the floor of the plenary. All legislation regarding homosexuality, including The Third Way, was tabled. However, our bishops, who have never before taken such an action as a council, have agreed to provide leadership around this matter.They will appoint a commission to address this matter holistically in light of our deep doctrinal and ideological divisions and in light of the structural issues that bedevil us.
I affirm the bishops’ decision.They committed themselves to unity, while recognizing that in some fundamental ways we are divided. And they committed themselves to finding a constructive way forward in the face of this reality.
Still, much of Thursday morning, I wept. Not because The Third Way was not considered, but because of the deep divisions and great brokenness that became evident in our General Conference. Our differences are doctrinal, but our divisions and brokenness are spiritual and relational. As a General Conference body, we have been too often riven by the exercise of raw political power and by an inability to meet each brother and sister with love. We have too often given rein to a spirit that is not the Spirit of God. For these reasons, the conversation that we had on the floor of plenary yesterday was painful.
So, I must explain while in the midst of my pain, I still have hope. The reason for my hope has nothing to do with what happened on the plenary floor. The reason for my hope has to do with the conversations that I had and the community that was built as we worked on The Third Way.
As we worked, I saw communities that are progressive, moderate and conservative come together in conversation and mutual support. I saw communities from the U.S. come together with communities in our Central Conferences. And I engaged in conversations across broad cultural difference, sometimes over meals or over coffee. Many of those conversations were with African delegates. And this is what I learned.
I learned and realized the degree to which we in the U.S. paint all delegates from Africa with the same brush. This plays into stereotypes and into the marginalization of voices. Africa is a vast continent comprised of thousands of language groups and ethnicities. Not all Africans are of the same mind on anything, including human sexuality.
For instance, one man spoke eloquently asking, “Which one of us is qualified to judge another person? We must find ways to include everybody.”
I engaged in deep theological dialogue with another African delegate about the sacrament of baptism, about inclusion, and about the need to allow people to practice ministry in ways that fit their cultural context. I had many other conversations with African delegates about inclusion, justice, cultural context, and the unity of our church.
I realized in these conversations the complexity of matters having to do with sexuality and marriage and family in cultural contexts very different than our own. And I realized the ways that we have marginalized moderate voices in Africa by silencing them with our assumptions.
These are the kinds of conversations we all need to have with one another. They are conversations that can help us to hear and grow and to see matters from other perspectives.
They are not conversations about winning and losing or manipulating a vote. They are not conversations about destroying the “enemy.” They are conversations that must happen in the context of the building of relationships and listening for the winds of the Spirit speaking through a sister or brother. I commit myself to these conversations. I hope that you can too.
I hope that you also can commit yourselves to prayer. I will, because how else are we to invite the Holy Spirit into our midst–into our decision making—into our Church.
So this morning, when the tears started, I knew that Kleenex were in the prayer room. And, that is where I went. There I found another person from West Michigan. We sat next to one another before an altar that was designed to evoke images of the Holy Spirit. Fabric, in reds and oranges, was draped across the table. Flickering lights lay upon the table. We sat in silence for some time. And at that altar, in the silence, peace came—the peace that surpasses understanding, the peace that the world cannot give or take away—the peace that comes from Christ, from the holy, from the Spirit of God.
Last Updated on December 15, 2023