Vision, mission to focus conference actions

All agencies to spend
next year considering
how focus affects them

Laity and clergy leaders clasped hands and sang the Doxology last week after adopting new vision and mission statements for the Southwest Texas Conference.
They then directed all conference agencies to spend the next 12 months reflecting “upon the new mission statement and its impact upon their organization and operation for the rest of the quadrennium.”
Both actions came June 4 in Corpus Christi during the 146th Southwest Texas Annual Conference session.
The new vision statement is “Offering Christ to All.”
The new mission statement says: “Radiating God’s love, the Southwest Texas Conference empowers ministries to make disciples of Jesus Christ.”
Both statements were proposed by the Council on Ministries after a 13-month study done in conjunction with the Congregational Growth Office and New Church Development Commission.
“This is not just another theme we’re adopting,” said Bill Ault, chair of the Council on Ministry. “It is a new future direction for The United Methodist Church in south and central Texas as we aggressively reach out to all segments of our population.”
The two statements are to focus all conference actions on a common goal and become the standard for judging every decision and activity, Ault said.
“My dear Methodist friends,” Ault told clergy and laity representatives of the region’s 348 United Methodist congregations, “in my opinion we are at a turning point in the life of Methodism in south and central Texas. I believe what we can do in the next few moments with a vote and commitment to this vision and mission will bear fruit for Christ for years to come.”
Because the two statements are to be so central in guiding conference actions, agencies need to spend the next year determining how the vision and mission will affect their work, said the Rev. Mickey McCandless, pastor of Bracken UMC, Garden Ridge.
“If we don’t take this opportunity to stop to reflect, we will continue doing what we’ve always done,” he said.
Conference members approved McCandless’ motion that conference agencies do no new programming over the next 12 months—beyond what is already in process—while they consider how their work empowers ministry. Each agency is to report its findings in writing to the June 1-4 annual conference session in 2005.
Bishop Joel N. Martinez said he thought the new vision statement “would move us further than we have dared to go.”
“It has the potential to unite our churches and ministries,” Martinez said in his State of the Church Address June 3. “It also has the power to expand our horizons of mission. It has the potential to focus our resources in the coming quadrennium.
“This word—’Offering Christ to All’—breathes with evangelical and missionary power. It honors the gospel mandate to go to all. It leaves no one out. It calls the church to walk and not to wait.”
The bishop said “Offering Christ to All” would:
> Become the standard by which all conference ministries are measured.
> Center energies on people rather than process or structure.
> Move United Methodists back to their identity as an evangelistic movement.
> Get church members ready for heaven.
Work on the new vision and mission statements began in May 2003, said the Rev. Bill Henderson, chair of the New Church Development Commission, in a June 4 report to the conference. The Congregational Growth Office and the New Church Development Commission invited 100 leaders from the Southwest Texas and Rio Grande conferences to Alamo Heights UMC, San Antonio, said Henderson, senior pastor of Northwest Hills UMC, Austin. There they saw an initial presentation on demographic trends in south Texas.
Between May and February, small groups from that 100 studied population information provided by Percept, a California-based consulting firm; compared current church locations to population growth centers; and did biblical reflections on what God was calling the Southwest Texas Conference to do, Henderson said.
A 20-member writing team developed the vision and mission statements, Henderson said. That group received input from the bishop’s cabinet, the Futures Committee, the Council on Ministries, the Council on Finance and Administration and other agencies. The team presented the proposed statements to the 100 leaders for feedback in February and the Council on Ministries in March.
Nell Martin, chair of the Futures Committee, said June 4 that the vision and mission statements were designed to:
> Keep Southwest Texas United Methodists from going in the wrong direction.
> Keep conference agencies from wasting resources on activities that aren’t mission-related.
> Keep United Methodists, who are overwhelmingly older and white, from becoming isolated from our ethnically diverse neighbors.