Please join General Minister and President, Rev. Terri Hord Owens for her Facebook live prayers at noon EDT each week. You can access her new page “Rev. Terri Hord Owens” here facebook.com/terrihordowens
Disciples.org gets a facelift
We’re sporting a new look on disciples.org this week. Designed with mobile and screen readers in mind, the site is easier to read with carefully calibrated contrast. And on the side you don’t see, improvements have been made to make the site run more smoothly. If you find a broken link, drop a note to [email protected] and make sure to include the page address where you found the problem.
Same time. Same format. New location.
General Minister and President Rev. Terri Hord Owens has updated her Facebook presence so she can accept more followers. Her Facebook live prayers will continue at noon EDT but will be accessed at her new page “Rev. Terri Hord Owens” (facebook.com/terrihordowens).
First Christian Church Bartlesville member, Gay Cooper and her store Sew Uptown! are offering anyone who sews the chance to help nurses, doctors, and other health care workers during the pandemic. When these front-line professionals come home to their families, they shouldn’t have to worry about bringing the virus with them on their clothes. These drawstring bags will allow them to change at work, put dirty clothes in the bag, and then throw the whole bundle into the wash at home – bag and all!
Gay is donating the fabric, providing instructions, etc. Just pick up packets at her store, sew, and return! Call Gay at 918-332-8956 for more information.
Thank you Gay and everyone who is serving the Bartlesville community with this special gift.
Greetings, Friends and Followers of Christ,
The Regional Staff and the Regional Board hopes and prays you are well in this extraordinary time of “staying at home.” We also hope that you are continuing to worship online with your congregation and taking the opportunity to worship with Disciples around the Region as well. Just as important, we hope you are continuing to practice your faith by giving to your local congregation. We are also asking that you practice your faith by giving to the Region’s 2020 Spring Annual Fund.
This Annual Fund letter is a little longer than usual because we want you to know what is happening at the Regional Church in this unique time in the world and in the life of the church. Beginning in March, heart-rending decisions were made to cancel Regional events including Caminante Mission Trip, International Affairs Seminar, the Men’s Retreat, the Women’s Retreat, and Regional Assembly/Leadership Training School, and we transitioned many meetings to Zoom.
The Regional Staff has been working remotely since March 12, 2020. We continue to answer the phones, check the mail, and make deposits. We continue to do search and call for congregations seeking a minister. We offer tech support to our clergy and congregations who have never done a live-stream service. And we continue to assist those who still need to transition to electronic giving. We are beginning to offer resources for clergy and congregations to ponder if and when it might be “safe and responsible” to gather for worship.
The whole paradigm of ministry shifted in March. Clergy could no longer gather their flocks in the sanctuary for worship, visit the shut-ins, or make hospital calls. For all, transitioning to live-streaming has been challenging and life-giving in a different way. Since March 15th, your regional ministers have each visited 4-6 worship services each Sunday to discover amazing words, visuals, and music. We are very proud of every one of our clergy and the support they have received from congregations.
Michael has attended many Zoom calls concerning summer Camp & Conference ministry. Some of these calls have been with youth leaders across our Regions. Others have been with our Commission on Children, Youth & Young Adults. Recently, Michael led camp counselor training with 30+ folks on Zoom. A “safe and responsible” decision about summer camp will be announced on May 2, 2020.
I have attended many Zoom calls with the College of Regional Ministers and our General Minister & President concerning the financial resources which have been made available to congregations through Disciples Church Extension Fund, National Benevolent Association, Week of Compassion, and Pension Fund. All Covid-19 resources can now be found at here or at disciples.org.
Michael and I have hosted for several weeks now a Thursday clergy prayer time on Zoom. And, we have created a private Oklahoma Disciples Clergy Facebook page for conversation and prayer.
Recently we created a booklet originally designed to be available at Regional Assembly. We think it is important that you know how your gifts provided for the ministries of the Regional Church that happened in 2019. We hope you enjoy reading about the wider church! See the booklet below this article.
In this time, we celebrate the whole church coming together as one to live into our Covenant of Faith. THANK YOU for your generous gifts, small or large, which allow us to continue to work, to communicate effectively and efficiently, and to serve the Region and the whole church. We are grateful.
We are asking that you continue to support the Regional Church by prayerfully considering a gift to the Regional Church either by mailing a check to the Regional office or by giving online here. Every gift matters. Every congregation matters. Every person matters.
We will have a Regional Assembly in the fall, most likely as a virtual experience. Until then, may God’s blessing of protection, care, and love continue to be upon each of you and your family.
Peace & God’s Grace,
Pamela G. Holt
May 12, 2020
Dear Friends of Caminante,
We always thank you for your support of the Oklahoma Region’s ministry to Caminante in the Dominican Republic, both with your prayers and your contributions. We also want to let you know how this ministry has been changing because of the world-wide coronavirus pandemic.
For obvious reasons, the Region cancelled both the Spring Break and July 2020 mission trips to Caminante. However, this mission needs the financial support of the Oklahoma Region more than ever. The remainder of this letter will outline Caminante’s current situation, Oklahoma’s continued financial support, future mission trips, and matching gifts.
Caminante’s Current Situation
The Oklahoma Region joined with Global Ministries in walking alongside Caminante in the Dominican Republic more than ten years ago through People-to-People Pilgrimages and through annual, ongoing financial support. Through the Global Ministries People-to-People Pilgrimage program, Caminante graciously has hosted individuals from the Oklahoma Region in order to help gain a better understanding of the current realities faced by families in Boca Chica. Caminante has created ways for participants to learn how Caminante is working to protect the rights of children and the displaced, and providing a space for creativity and learning. Through reflections from adults of all ages who have gone on a pilgrimage to the Dominican Republic, it is clear Caminante has had a positive influence on the understanding of God’s global mission for church leaders and members from the Oklahoma region.
As the COVID-19 pandemic has affected the entire globe, the effects in the Dominican Republic, as in other places, will be lasting and even more challenging. Amid this unprecedented time, the work of Caminante will be more relevant and more critical for their community. The support from the Oklahoma Region for sisters and brothers in Christ at Caminante in the Dominican Republic will be a symbolic and tangible gesture of continued solidarity and partnership with Caminante in this new reality.
Oklahoma Region’s Financial Support of Caminante
Since 2008, the Oklahoma Region has provided $7,200 annual support to Caminante. In 2019, this annual support was increased to $9,000 to help meet Sister Denisse’s #1 priority.
In 2020, The Oklahoma Region will send $9,000 to Caminante to continue our support in the ministry and partnership we share.
We are only able to do this by your continued support, alongside the Region, the Commission on Faith & Action, Central Christian Church in Enid, and the Oklahoma Disciples Foundation grant.
Future Mission Trips
We celebrate that 2019 mission trips to Caminante continues to engage the lives of the participants as they hear God’s call to serve: two trip participants made the decision to go into overseas missionary work; one participant became a youth minister and is an active fundraiser for Caminante; one participant became an active fundraiser for Caminante; a retired ordained minister is exploring more calls to active ministry.
While mission trips are engaging and life-changing, due to the world health crisis, we do not know when we will be able to travel again. Thus, we will need to reimagine our ministry and mission partnership with Caminante in this new reality.
Matching Gifts
As the Oklahoma Region continues its support of Caminante in 2020 and 2021, we need your help. We are asking you for a monetary gift to continue to support this mission to help the children of Caminante. We are excited to let you know that your contribution will be matched by a generous donor who has offered to match all gifts, up to a total of $2,000. This is a wonderful opportunity to give!
Thank you for your support of the Oklahoma Region’s mission to Caminante. Please send your contribution to Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) in Oklahoma, 301 NW 36th Street, Oklahoma City, OK 73118 or electronically at okdisciples.org. Either way, please make the designation “Caminante.”
In addition to your donation, please continue to keep Caminante in your prayers.
Additional Questions
If you have any questions about Caminante and how it is dealing with the coronavirus, you may contact Don Johnson at [email protected] or Madison Rubino at [email protected]. Madison (shown in picture above) visited Caminante on the 2019 Spring and Summer mission trips. Because she is fluent in Spanish and is passionate about this ministry, she has recently talked with Sister Denisse and other Caminante staff.
Peace & God’s Grace,
Rev. Don Johnson Rev. Tom Stanley Rev. Pamela G. Holt
Caminante Leader Moderator Regional Minister
Please read the letter from the College of Regional Ministers regarding re-opening congregations, published by disciples.org
A Letter to the Church on Being the Church in This Moment
Dear Disciples of Christ,
As your Regional Ministry colleagues, we have listened carefully and prayerfully to the questions you are asking about when and how to meet again in person as the Church. We are asking many of the same questions.
We miss being with you in the spaces where we worship God together, witness the baptisms of eager youth full of hope and share the Bread of Life and the Cup of Salvation. It has been months now since last we hugged or shook hands. It has been too long since we have seen you in person, and yet we continue to be inspired by your acts of service and leadership that we see on-line, and we continue to celebrate your ministry and share your story. It troubles our spirits to know that we cannot be physically present for funerals, visit at hospital bedsides or join in the celebrations of commissioning or ordination.
We are aware that this is an unprecedented time of challenge and uncertainty. Even medical experts are not ready to declare that they understand fully how this very contagious virus works, the range at which it can spread, or how to enhance prevention with a vaccine. It has already cost the lives of tens of thousands of our neighbors and more than a million confirmed cases have been reported in the U.S. and Canada.
The disease does not discriminate but we can take steps to protect the most vulnerable among us.
First and foremost, we write to encourage you to be patient and take your time, and not rush back into full in-person activities before we are confident it is safe to do so. We also write to ask that you join us in considering these questions when you discuss whether and how to be together again in sanctuaries, fellowship halls, classrooms, offices, and other special, sacred spaces. In addition to logistical questions about how to share communion, have appropriate social distancing, and disinfect the sanctuary, etc., consider these deeper, theological questions also:
Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. John 13:34 (NRSV) What will we do, who love one another as Jesus loved, when the medical community continues to call attention to the risks of in-person meetings?
We do not presume to have all the answers for you. Every congregation will prayerfully and carefully discern for itself how and when to reconnect onsite. What we can offer is to tell you how we Regional Ministers and the General Units of the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) are dealing with our own gatherings.
We will not make on-site visits for the time being. We believe that we have a responsibility to exercise an abundance of caution for the safety of all those we serve. We will reconsider that decision when there is more medical evidence that the pandemic has been effectively contained.
We Disciples are a people bound by nothing more or less than a covenant with God and one another. When we read together in worship the Preamble to the Design for the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), we conclude with this powerful reminder of the extent of our shared calling:We are carrying on our work online, many from spaces in our homes. We are meeting once a week by Zoom and we are connecting with pastors and lay leaders by phone, email, text, and social media. We are sharing some of the best information and creative resources being compiled. These are available on disciples.org, regional websites and social media outlets. Frankly, we would be devastated if the health of any one of us were compromised because another of us were, unknowingly, carriers of the virus. By God’s grace and your support, we have the means to keep in touch, do the work you have come to expect from us, and pray with you.
In the bonds of Christian faith
we yield ourselves to God
that we may serve the One whose kingdom has no end.
Blessing, glory, and honor be to God forever. Amen. (from the Preamble to the Design)
With you, we desire to bless, glorify, and honor God in this moment and always.
Affectionately yours in Christ,
Please read a message from General Minister and President, Terri Hord Owens published by disciples.org
I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another. — John 13:34-35 (NRSV)
Rev. Teresa “Terri” Hord Owens
General Minister and President
Dear Church:
We are in Eastertide, when we rejoice in the good news of the resurrection, and yet so much our journey still feels like the wilderness. I continue to pray for you as we walk through these days of distancing together.
This week, some state governments are beginning to lift stay-at-home orders and allow some businesses and industries to reopen their doors. These reopening conversations are understandably raising questions about how and when churches should resume in-person worship services. These are difficult decisions, but I want to encourage you, as difficult as it is, not to rush too quickly back. It is not yet time to gather for worship in person.
I know that it is heartbreaking not to be able to gather. We want nothing more than to hug our loved ones and squeeze the hands of our grieving friends. We want nothing more than to worship together and join our voices together in song. We want nothing more than to break bread together at our beloved communion tables.
But the phased reopening plans developed by public health experts call for several benchmarks to indicate safety such as 14 days of declining case counts, widespread testing, and contact tracing. We are not there yet.
The economic impact of this pandemic is devastating, to be sure, and many of the decisions to reopen business are in response. There is and will be much work to do as we care for our hurting neighbors.
Church, we don’t make decisions based on economics. We make decisions based on love. And here in this time, in the midst of this pandemic, the loving thing to do is not to gather for worship. Love, as we know from 1 Corinthians 13:4-5, is patient. Love does not insist on its own way.
It is not easy to love from a distance. It is not easy to overcome our own desire for being physically close to our church family. It is not easy to give up the familiar in favor of this new way of being.
It is likely we will never meet in quite the same way again. But we have a historic opportunity here. We have the chance to test new ways, learn creatively, imagine beyond old boundaries and grow in our understanding of the family of God.
Let me be clear: even as we have gathered in different ways, we are still the church. Even as we have worshiped on Facebook and YouTube from our living room couches, even as we have prayed over Zoom, we are the church, and God is at work in and through us. We will continue to be the church.
There are a number of resources available for helping congregations think through how and when to resume in-person worship services, and we have linked to several of them on our COVID-19 resource page. I found this guidance from the Wisconsin Council of Churches and this pastoral letter from Disciples pastor Brandon Gilvin particularly helpful.
In addition, this letter from the College of Regional Ministers offers wisdom and hope. Many regional ministers are also offering guidance based on realities in your local context. I urge you to listen to them and to be in conversation with one another as you make prayerful decisions with your church leadership.
I have been inspired by the creativity, innovation, and compassion from Disciples over the past two months. You are already imagining new ways of being church, and I have confidence that we will face the future together with courage and grace, strengthened always by the love of God.
Grateful to be serving with you,
Rev. Terri Hord Owens
General Minister and President
We have several updates to share with you as we continue to walk together while we apart.
Disciples Mission Fund Continues to Empower the Church
In this Easter season, even as we continue to walk through the wilderness of the COVID-19 pandemic, Disciples Mission Fund continues to empower the church. Because of DMF, in the past few weeks, we have been able to:
* Equip our churches with resources for online worship
* Offer grants to congregations and pastors in crisis
* Share the work of our financial ministries in helping congregations access aid
* Help congregations transition to electronic giving
* Provide weekly prayer opportunities with our General Minister and President
* Support our global mission co-workers as they serve around the world
This will likely be a challenging year for DMF, and yet, we all know that the work of the church is needed now more than ever.
You can help. Please encourage your congregation to continue its support of DMF. Consider making a gift yourself.
As we begin to imagine a new world on the other side of this crisis, there is no doubt that the church will stand strong as a witness to God’s presence and unending love. Thank you for being part of this work.
Prayers with the General Minister and President
Rev. Terri Hord Owens will continue to gather with Disciples in prayer on her Facebook page on Wednesdays at noon EDT throughout May as we move through this trying time. She will also continue to meet with pastors and chaplains for prayer via Zoom on Fridays at 1 pm EDT. Links are available in the Disciples Together e-letter for pastors. (Past issues are available in the Disciples News Service archive.)
Global Ministries reports on partners
In addition to the Facebook events with area executives, Global Ministries is collecting stories from mission co-workers and partners about how they are coping with the COVID-19 pandemic. You can follow along and include these folks on the front lines in your prayers. The area executives have also issued a document combining their perspectives on how COVID-19 is affecting their areas.
Stuck at home and wondering what is going on across the church?
The stay-at-home orders have many of us paying more attention to the news. You can stay connected with the church beyond your congregation by subscribing to the Disciples News Service, a weekly e-letter. The general interest publication brings news and information from across the U.S. and Canada ranging from great work congregations are doing to messages from general ministries and more. Subscribe today! You can find past issues posted on the Disciples News Service archive. You can also keep up via Facebook, Twitter and Instagram! General Facebook | Disciples Exchange for program ideas | Disciples Local Impact for ministries and their local programs | Twitter | Instagram
Your Census Form Counts
General Minister and President Terri Hord Owens encourages you to fill out your census form now. Census numbers have an impact on your community for 10 years. Funding allocations, road improvements, representation in legislatures, school planning and more depend on these numbers. Make sure you are counted and fill out your form.
The Wait Is Over!
The first installment of The Jesus Way curriculum is now available for download! The Jesus Way is a 24-week study which introduces the underlying principles of living life modeled after Jesus. Don’t worry if your group doesn’t meet weekly, you can easily adapt the material to monthly meetings. By purchasing and downloading your copy of The Jesus Way you purchase the right to copy the material for use in your congregation. There is no need for every participant in your group to purchase their own copy. If you would like to support the work of Disciples Men as we continue to develop new curriculum for men’s ministries, a designated donation to Disciples Home Missions is always appreciated!
About The Jesus Way
The Jesus Way equips men to live life in a way that reflects the principles and priorities Jesus himself lived by. Each man is uniquely gifted by God. God established life principles and priorities foundational to realizing our giftedness. Jesus shows us the way. This ministry takes men on that journey, the Jesus way.
This journey will enrich each man’s life and the lives of those around him. Each man will rediscover God’s unique purpose for his life and what active citizenship in the realm of God can mean for his life. In 2020, The Jesus Way will launch six new studies for men. One-day training opportunities will be offered throughout the US and Canada on how best to establish The Jesus Way ministry in congregations. These resources are designed to establish/enhance a congregation’s ministry to and with men.
Web-based resources will also be available to assist congregational and middle-judicatory leaders implement this ministry. The major developers of The Jesus Way are Greg Alexander and Alex Ruth, respectively the Director and Associate Director of Disciples Men. Disciples Men is a ministry of Disciples Home Missions and the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) in the US and Canada. These are important and exciting times in Men’s ministry! We pray you will join us as we journey on The Jesus Way.
Click HERE for more information.
Phillips Theological Seminary will be offering a Disciples of Christ History & Polity course, the week of August 3-7. (As of now, this class will be offered on campus. Should this need to transition online, you will be notified.) The course will be taught by Dr. Lisa Barnett and is open to auditors and those seeking academic credit. Phillips Seminary will be accepting applications through Friday, July 10.
Phillips has a simple online application process. Apply today! Click HERE
If you have any questions regarding enrollment please contact MaryAnn Morris, Dean of Students, Phillips Theological Seminary at 918-270-6464 or email [email protected].
Phillips is deeply committed to serving lay and clergy leaders who are passionate about following the way of Jesus and transforming our world.