Rise Up, Beloved

Making Disciples of Jesus Christ for the Transformation of the World

It was a joy meeting many of you during Annual Conference 2025. I am thankful for each of you and for your faithful ministries. You welcomed me as your bishop and a servant leader among you. I want to give all my thanks and joy to the Lord.

The West Ohio Annual Conference and the East Ohio Annual Conference were sacred gatherings where we prayed for each other and worshipped together. We reported on business and ministry guidelines of the Conferences, approved the budgets for 2026, decided on future vision arrangements, and voted on the items supporting the Constitutional Amendments of the General Conference. Together, we experienced a beautiful communion of business, worship, prayer, social engagement and unity.

In my first year as your bishop, I have asked much from you, and I am deeply grateful for your efforts. While we have some staff serving the one Ohio Episcopal Area, we are still two separate annual conferences – East Ohio and West Ohio – and most of our staff are employees of one Conference or the other. Each Conference has its own unique histories, practices, procedures, systems, and cultures. This is not only all right, but also necessary.

The time for reviewing and designing a new future will come through the work of the Ohio Episcopal Area Task Team, which will soon expand to many teams each focused on specific areas. We claim it as a movement of prayer and innovations. Until then, depending on the work to be done and the events to be hosted, sometimes we will use the platforms and processes of one specific Conference, and sometimes we will use them from both Conferences.

I believe that the Christian community, the annual conference, is best when it creates a culture of unity where everyone cooperates and trusts from the bottom up and communicates fluently east, west, south, and north. I pray that the East Ohio and West Ohio Conferences will continue to learn from each other step-by-step, inviting each other and adding the best faith and friendship to each other, so that we can grow the Church and reverse the decline in number of churches and professing members.

The advice of Moses' father-in-law Jethro in Exodus 18 is the most appropriate spiritual guidance for our reality. It is to expand each other's territory, to divide the expertise of effective organizations and Orders, and to form a vibrant ministry team where more people dedicate themselves to the expansion of God's kin(g)dom. Through that discipleship, joy is reaped, and lives are transformed.

We see this in our local churches, where clergy and laity leaders are dividing responsibility among themselves and doing their best to spread the Gospel of Jesus to the world. In this urgent reality, more church members are committed to the Gospel and laypeople are making disciples as church volunteers and in their professional work setting rather than overburdening pastors.

The Church urgently needs to once again testify to the fundamental discipleship and the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and we need to learn from each other and gather strength for the responsibility of discipleship. To move us toward that reality, I have asked several directors and staff members in East and West Ohio to do work for both conferences. It will be challenging, but it is important work as we strive to reach new people for Christ.

Fresh Starts & New Beginnings, Discipleship, and Next Generation Ministries are expanding with visionary efforts from both East and West Ohio. Camps & Retreat Ministries will be enhanced, and Laity Ministries will be expanded. Our two Conferences will reaffirm the importance of Sunday School programs, regardless of the size of our local congregations, and will celebrate the positive impact the ministry can have on future generations. We will work together to expand small group ministries through the Word and prayer and raise up leaders.

It is a joy to learn through prayer that the Church’s position is maturing honestly through confession and repentance, and that we can become one in the same Great Commission despite our different theological positions and our thoughts and beliefs on many topics. Let us exclude no one as we live out our mission of The United Methodist Church to make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world. In doing so, may we, empowered by the Holy Spirit, love boldly, serve joyfully, and lead courageously.

In closing, I remind you of these words from my sermon during both Annual Conferences this month:

“Let us now experience again the fervent work of the Holy Spirit, who overcomes the power of darkness that binds us and rises to overcome the pain of separation and dis-unity. Let us proclaim to the world that Jesus is our life, our pride, our salvation, our everything, and call upon Jesus with all our might. Jesus, here!

I thank the Lord every day as I encounter stories of Ohio history, church tradition, and brilliant missions. I invite you to embrace the power and transformation of Jesus working in Ohio. Jesus calls us to rise again. Let us say in the name of Jesus that we are all beloved people. Let us declare that we are a beautiful people of God where no one can be bound, no one can be discriminated against, and no one can be rejected. We rise up with abundance in the face of scarcity; courage in the face of fear; generosity in the face of greed, and peace-living in the face of violence.”