Introduction: Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” Welcome to Exploring Missions. Connecting mission needs with those equipped by God to meet those needs—across the world, or across town. And now, the host of Exploring Missions, Bert Harper.
Bert Harper: Missions—they're a part of the church's DNA. It really is. In the New Testament, you find churches when they started, they should be on mission for God there and around the world. The two best examples, and Nathan and I talk about this quite often, is the church at Antioch and the church at Philippi. They were missional from the beginning, and we want to be that as well. Well Nathan, we've got guests today that I'm really glad to have on because they haven't been "quote" a denomination long, but we wanted to hear from them about: the New Testament church is a missional church. So, I'm anxious to hear about what God is doing in that area in their lives.
Nathan Harper: Yeah, we are excited about that and eager to hear some of the inside story. And kind of something, you know, when something is beginning or maybe even re-beginning, I'm curious to learn how that structure plays out, how that is organized, and maybe from a mission agency kind of perspective within a new denomination, how does that work? How does that get organized or reorganized? And so that's what I'm curious to learn today.
Bert Harper: I am as well. And so, we have a guest today that's going to introduce the other guest, although we've been introduced beforehand. The person that I contacted for the work that Global Methodist Church is doing is Bryan Scott. He is the mission coordinator for the Global Methodist Church in Mississippi and West Tennessee—that's the area. And so Bryan, thank you for joining us on Exploring Missions, brother.
Bryan Scott: Well, thank you for the opportunity to share what God is doing through this new expression of the Wesleyan heritage that we have, the Methodist Church. And I'm also excited to have Wes Griffin with us today, who is the Kingdom Advancement Commission chairperson, because when you talk about a denomination, I'm a local church pastor and a missions coordinator of an annual conference, but he is on the denominational level of missions for our denomination.
Nathan Harper: So it's wonderful to have both of you guys with us today. We're eager to learn from you, hear from you, see what God is doing in your life, but also among the Global Methodists. And maybe a good place to start would be just a brief summary of kind of the last few years, how the Global Methodist Church has come about and what that looks like now with a mission emphasis as a part of that.
Bert Harper: Bryan, go ahead. You started this while we were talking about it.
Bryan Scott: Well, I served as a missionary in Honduras during the whole disaffiliation process, and my path to disaffiliation was much easier than the local pastors and these churches that had very difficult roadblocks put in front of them as they tried to move out of the United Methodist Church into the Global Methodist Church, with fees being put on them in order to keep their properties, hard struggles in trying to get the votes needed to disaffiliate. It was a high bar that was put out there—the percentage of people needed to vote yes to disaffiliate—and a less than 30—about a 30% of the church could vote no, and then 70% or so or less were forced to leave their properties, some of them generational churches. And so, it was very difficult for a lot of these places. I, on the other hand, serving in a foreign country, I just needed to call my district superintendent. And even that was not a real pleasant thing; they were pretty curt when I made the announcement. It's very difficult for a lot of people, a lot of my friends that walked through it with their congregations. They were pretty shell-shocked for a while afterwards. But now it's a beautiful thing to watch these churches release the old and walk into this new expression of God's grace through the Global Methodist Church. I think Wes would be better to give more detail on that, plus he has more experience in that.
Bert Harper: Wes, thank you for being with us again, and tell us a little bit about that journey.
Wes Griffin: So, it's an absolute privilege to be on this program today, and we thank you for the opportunity just to share from our perspective some of the things that God is doing. I believe we live in a particularly unique moment of God's outpouring of the Holy Spirit on the face of the earth, and for those of us kind of out of Methodist Wesleyan circles—particularly those that were, many of us, formally in United Methodist Church, ordained there as clergy—and I have spent four decades in international missions. And so, I'll just go back and say, five years ago, I was part of a group of leaders that eventually averaged about 70 people that were meeting and helping to envision what the future might look like for what was going to become the Global Methodist Church. And part of what we were looking at was just simply God's heart for the lost, God's heart for the world. We knew that two-thirds of the world had yet to believe in Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior, and we knew that God wanted to see all of those people reached. So at the heart of what became the Global Methodist Church was a great heart to fulfill the Great Commission to go and make disciples of Jesus Christ, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and then also for us as Methodist people, kind of a unique stamp would be to spread scriptural holiness—that holiness of heart and life that taps into both the purity and the power that God can give to a believer so that they can be an effective witness. So, I would simply say five years ago, a team of about 70 people began to meet. It was about two years ago that the Global Methodist Church held their first convening global General Conference, we call it. At that time, people were elected to various commissions. I was elected to serve on the what became named as the Kingdom Advancement Commission, and I've been privileged to chair that for the last two years. In our particular commission, there are five working areas. We wanted these to all work together and work synergistically, and here's the five areas: it's evangelism, church planting, missions—so we say missions mobilization—third; fourth, unreached people groups; and fifth, disaster response. So today, the way the Global Methodist Church is organized in terms of missions and church planting and evangelism is that there's this commission called Kingdom Advancement, and we help to just mobilize laity and annual conferences around the world to help fulfill the Great Commission. That may be a quick kind of an opening statement for you.
Bert Harper: Amen. Nathan, when I hear that—evangelism, church planting, mission mobilization, unreached people groups, disaster relief—sounds like things that Exploring Missions, we try to talk about, doesn't it?
Nathan Harper: Yeah, absolutely. It's a very fulsome, holistic picture of, well, what you're called, the Kingdom Advancement—how Jesus is advancing His kingdom all over the face of the earth among all peoples. And it's exciting to hear how that's kind of come about, how God has guided you guys and your teams and leaders in this. I do have a quick question regarding—well, really not regarding disaffiliation, but in the formation of the Kingdom Advancement Commission, how much did you guys lean on the global brothers and sisters, individuals maybe in Africa or other places in the world who took a good, strong leadership in the whole big picture of disaffiliation and looking for God to work in maybe, I don't know, it's hard for me to put it into words, but basically a new wineskin almost, if you want to call it that? Did you guys lean on your brothers from around the world as you're kind of thinking through and putting things together?
Wes Griffin: I would say it's more than just saying we leaned into. We were, you know, our name is Global, and so that commission and the leadership, what we called the transitional phase and then when we were fully established, was made of people from all over the world. So, there were representatives from North America—I'm a North American—but there were participants in the formation of this denomination from Africa, from Europe, from Asia, Middle East and North Africa, Latin America, the Caribbean. I mean today, the Global Methodist Church has over 50 annual conferences—that's kind of the way we are organized, and most of those are geographic, though some of those are more linguistic. But there's 50 areas around the world; there's over 7,500 churches all over the world. So, the Global Methodist Church literally launched large, and it has been, in a sense, a unique sprint seeing how God formed this denomination. In some ways, there's no precedents for it. And so, we had a phrase that we often used that was used across our church that "we're learning how to fly this plane as we build it". And so, everybody hit the ground running with great dedication, and this global team began forming a global denomination.
Bert Harper: When I hear these five working areas, I know, again, new church planting. Are you looking at a local church in any of those countries, and they look into their areas and see an area of people that need to be reached, and they are purposely looking in that area to start a Bible study that could lead into a small group, that could lead into a church? Has that started taking place yet? I know you have the five working areas, but I was wondering, since it's new, how this is progressing. You catch what I'm saying—church planting. And oh man, we got to get started, and I just ask, have y'all got started doing that?
Bryan Scott: I can speak to that because one thing that they have asked us to do is to—those that we annual conferences who have more people and more churches, and obviously more money, being North American, do partner with other international annual conferences. And our annual conference has partnered with both the Covenant Annual Conference and the Mega Manila Annual Conference, which are two—both in the Philippines. And I went for a visit over there back in March for about three weeks. And that's the thing talking about church planting—I laugh and tell people that they plant churches like we have potluck dinners over here in Mississippi. And they really—they really do. And they do exactly what you say: they start a Bible study in an area or neighborhood that doesn't have one, and they call—a lot of time, they call those mission areas. And they will begin to meet, and people begin to come, and once they have a certain number, they begin to call them a mission church. And once they become a mission church, then they start moving towards, as they grow, a charter to be called a Global Methodist Church. One of the greatest examples is my friend Jesse, who is a pastor in the Philippines—I had the blessing of preaching at two of his churches. He became a Global Methodist a little over a year ago, came out of the UMC. He's planted three churches in a year! I'm not talking about just a few people sitting under a shade tree; I'm talking about congregations that he has started. And beyond that, he has several other places that he has Bible studies with people with an eye towards starting a church in those areas as well. And that's one of the things we need from them. You know, like I say, North Americans, we have—we can assist with money and stuff like that, but we really need for them to come to Mississippi out of the Philippines and teach us how to plant churches because, especially our area in South Mississippi, there are so many places where we can plant churches and see the gospel be spread. I know Jesus is calling; we just have to—it's kind of hard telling some of these older congregations. I'm the pastor of a small congregation, and it's over 100 years old, but it's kind of to encourage them to get out of their seats and into the community. Really good people, it's just we got lulled into sleep, and it's time for us to wake up and re-invigorate and to catch that zeal of early Methodism.
Nathan Harper: You know, it sounds like with a new beginning, if you will, there are possibly new fields opening to you and your teams. But let me ask this though: in the transition of disaffiliation and becoming what God is calling you to become, are there any fields that have had to be left behind for any particular reason? And then maybe as you answer that, what are some of the new fields that are opening up to you in the area of missions?
Wes Griffin: I would say that no field is being left behind. We are simply—in fact, we're just praying for opportunities. We're looking for how God is leading this denomination. One of the things I can report to you is that in the first 17G months, there were over 500 new churches planted. So think about that—in 17 months, 500 new churches. Many of those were in Africa where the church is growing rapidly, but they were also, I would just support, all over the world. And what actually—as we have just sought, you know, when you're launching something, particularly it's a time of just freshly asking God, you know, "What is Your vision for this group of people, for this organization, this denomination?" And so as this team of people prayed, they believe the Lord was leading them to pray and work to see 3,400 new churches planted by 2033.
So, that's a very aggressive, sort of an intentional goal. We're trying to be careful, you know, how do you count churches, you know, is a micro church a church, or does it have to be a registered church? And we're recognizing that kind of a definition of where two or three are gathered, there is Christ, and a church is being formed when people are being intentional about being disciples, reaching people with the gospel, and making disciples. One of the philosophies that we're baking into the Global Methodist Church is a philosophy that churches plant churches. Not denominations, not regions, not states, not districts, but churches take the ownership of looking around their area of the world—wherever it is, whether it's America or Central Asia, wherever it might be—looking around and saying, "Where's the next place that people need to be reached with the gospel? Where's the next place that we need to plant a church?" And to that end, we want to be a Book of Acts-type movement, indigenously led, led from the ground up, led from local churches, and seeing churches planted everywhere.
Bert Harper: When I hear this, and Nathan and I have talked about this a lot, Bryan and Wes, and that is the indigenous people helping plant these churches, in place of someone from a different country coming in. Global Methodist Church, with it being in those areas as you said—Africa, Asia, America, Central America, everywhere—you guys are sitting on a situation where those people don't have to learn the language, they already know the language; they don't have to learn the culture, they're already there. Nathan, they're already trained and ready to go, whereas in many situations if it was only the United States sending these and planting churches that have to do the language, that have to learn the culture, they're sitting on the possibility of a great movement, aren't they?
Nathan Harper: Yeah, it sounds like it, which does lead to a question. So, let's just say, for example, a brother in the Philippines is planting churches and he knows Tagalog already and he's got the culture down—he's from the Philippines, so he's reaching other Filipino peoples and the different tribes and groups that are within in that country—what is the role of the Kingdom Advancement Commission to help to support him, to help him, to provide him with maybe resources? What is the role if he's already doing the work? What do you guys do with that?
Wes Griffin: That's a great question, and it really drives to how the Global Methodist Church envisioned a different way for a denomination to function than what most of us had experienced. Most of us had experienced top-down kind of structures. Well imagine, what would it look like to envision a more Book of Acts-type structure that is from the bottom up, that is from the local level up, where local areas are empowered when they need equipping, like training, or they need resources of a particular way, looking for partners that can help do that, but to recognize that the center of leadership is always at the local level.
So, that's how we are formed. You know, we're organized around our annual conferences, but we say this: the Global Methodist Church exists to serve the local church. And so, the local church is our seat of leadership. So when a pastor, someone is doing the work and it's beyond what they can do themselves—first of all, God has His people all over the world, and God has resources all over the world. Some people have more, some less, and we say, "Look, if you have a need, let it be known," and there are ways for you to share that so that resources can be available that can help. I'm just talking about people resources, relational resources, it could be financial resources, but primarily we're focusing on training and equipping, resourcing as needed, so that the gospel can spread.
So, that's—you say, what does the Kingdom Advancement Commission do? We serve through our structures—we have bishops, we have conference superintendents—and we serve at their request for what they need to help resource their local churches. Here's like a couple practical examples. We've held evangelism and church planting training events in different places around the world in the last 18 months, and over 1,000 people have attended those different training events. We created a specific seminar we call ENGAGE: Acts 1:8 Mission Mobilization Excellence. We've had over 1,900 leaders that have been trained in what we call ENGAGE—that's Acts 1:8, how to be faithful witnesses in your Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and the ends of the earth. And we've actually had that particular type of training—we've created actually, we're now in about 10 or 12 different languages very quickly, because those languages that we use in our movement. So that's just a couple practical-type things.
And a third thing just to mention, and Bryan's going to be able to really speak to this, part of our portfolio that Kingdom Advancement oversees is disaster response, and we have responded to over 60 disasters in the last 18 months where people encountered a crisis because of a flood, hurricane, earthquake, war, famine—many different possibilities. Bryan right now—he can take and tell you in just a minute—he's actually on the Gulf Coast because of the hurricane that's headed toward the United States. But it's exciting when we can minister to people—like we've ministered to over 125,000 people in 18 months who just found themselves in need of humanitarian aid. Those are exciting things where we can be the hands and feet of Jesus like that.
Bert Harper: Bryan, that was exciting to hear. We're looking at the hurricane hitting the Gulf Coast here in America, and you're down there ready to go. I thought I was going to tell you you needed to leave, but you went there on purpose, brother! Tell us about what that entails about you getting ready and being there for the disaster relief mission part of the Global Methodist Church.
Bryan Scott: Right. On the local church level, I have my own home to get ready for the storm, also I have the church that I serve, the facilities of the church to get it ready. And then, it's just a sit-and-wait thing. But I know that if we have damage to the church or damage in the community, that we will have disaster relief people coming. But the beauty of that, that is a very ecumenical thing, because you have the Southern Baptists bringing in feeding trucks, and even the United Methodists bringing in clean up, and then us joining in with that as well. And we have a coordinator in our state that's over disaster relief, and he's been sending information down here with our presiding elder in this area to keep them updated about the storm and what needs to be done.
So, it's just a, you know—you never take for granted that nothing's going to happen, but when it does, that we have a group behind us that is going to be here to help. And we've been part of that, you know, helping other areas in Mississippi with the ice storms and stuff back in the spring that we were part of helping with disaster relief for that as well. So it's not just hurricanes in Mississippi; it's all kinds of weather events, tornadoes, and those sorts of things.
But you mentioned earlier about trying to help those churches where they are planting. A part of our—I thought about having been partners with the Philippine churches, we also are trying to develop church-to-church partnerships with our local congregations with their local congregations. So that, yes, if a church is interested in church planting, that they could partner with a pastor like Jesse. Then there's other churches that do children's ministry, so if they're interested in children's ministry, that they can do that. We also partner with a group called OneChild, which comes into international places which have part of less financial ability, and create these where people can sponsor a child, and they move in and help that local church develop a ministry. But the beauty of it is that that is the local church's ministry. They know what they're going to do, what they want to do. OneChild just comes in and helps them to organize, and then they release that ministry to do it to be itself. And we are able to help fund that through international, by sending money to those programs toward the children. And so it can be a local church here working with the Global Methodist Church there—a Global Methodist person taking care of a Global Methodist child or a child in Global Methodist ministry. And so that's one way, and so church planting can come through that as well where we can help them as far as getting finances to them and help them do church planting and church building.
Bert Harper: One more thing as we're coming in at the end of this time: the two things that really drove churches to come together to form denominations—yes, it was doctrine, I understand that, but the main thing was mission; the other was educating the ministers. And we don't have a lot of time, but when you start, are you guys starting up new schools or new universities, or are there some that were in the United Methodist that say, "Hey no, we're more Wesleyan, we believe the scriptures," and they're supplying that need? How's that work?
Wes Griffin: Well, education is extremely important, whether it's for clergy or laity, and I would simply—the short answer is we have a number of initiatives to help provide assistance so that people can pursue educational opportunities. Kind of a Wesleyan tenet is we encourage people to pursue the highest level of education that is within their ability so that they can be both an educated and a spirit-filled worker in the Lord's kingdom. Now right now, there are many great all around the world universities and seminaries and training programs that already exist, so our priority has not been, "What do we need to start new?" as much as, "Where are there partners that we could partner with right now to help see our needs met?" One of the things that we did as a global denomination was allocated significant resources for the training of clergy, and that has been distributed, made available to our annual conferences around the world to apply for funding so that they can help get the training that their clergy need.
Bert Harper: Nathan, go ahead. We got about a minute and a half left. You want to close us out with a question or comment, go ahead, man.
Nathan Harper: Yeah, just simply, how—maybe if someone is listening to this and they want to learn more, that maybe they want to connect, and maybe they're right for mobilization—how would they connect with you, and maybe, what is maybe one or two prayers that we could be praying for you guys and the work God's doing through Kingdom Advancement of the Global Methodist Church?
Wes Griffin: Well, I would just encourage the listeners, any opportunity you have to connect with the Global Methodist Church, we're an alive and growing movement that is focused on making disciples and new faith communities being established. I was in a restaurant the other day, and the young lady waiting on us, it came natural to just ask, "Do you have a home church?" and she didn't, and we got to invite her to church. I would just encourage every listener here: look for those in your community that you can reach out to and invite to be part of a fellowship—your own church, whatever type of church it is, or connect with—if you're a listener and you don't have a home church, of course we'd love to see you visit a Global Methodist Church and connect with us.
Bert Harper: Our guest today has been Bryan Scott, he's the missions coordinator for the Global Methodist Church in Mississippi and West Tennessee—that's their area, their district. And then our other guest is Wes Griffin from Carrollton, Georgia, and he's chair of the Kingdom Advancement Commission there of the Global Methodist Church. Guys, thank you for being with us today, and we mean it, and we're excited about what God is doing through you guys. I had a lot of friends, and they're with you, and we're praying for them. And we're also praying for those of you who are listening today on Exploring Missions that you would find a local church, get involved, and find out what mission God wants you to be on as we serve Him. Thank you for listening to Exploring Missions here on the American Family Radio Network.
Introduction: Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” Welcome to Exploring Missions. Connecting mission needs with those equipped by God to meet those needs—across the world, or across town. And now, the host of Exploring Missions, Bert Harper.
Bert Harper: Missions—they're a part of the church's DNA. It really is. In the New Testament, you find churches when they started, they should be on mission for God there and around the world. The two best examples, and Nathan and I talk about this quite often, is the church at Antioch and the church at Philippi. They were missional from the beginning, and we want to be that as well. Well Nathan, we've got guests today that I'm really glad to have on because they haven't been "quote" a denomination long, but we wanted to hear from them about: the New Testament church is a missional church. So, I'm anxious to hear about what God is doing in that area in their lives.
Nathan Harper: Yeah, we are excited about that and eager to hear some of the inside story. And kind of something, you know, when something is beginning or maybe even re-beginning, I'm curious to learn how that structure plays out, how that is organized, and maybe from a mission agency kind of perspective within a new denomination, how does that work? How does that get organized or reorganized? And so that's what I'm curious to learn today.
Bert Harper: I am as well. And so, we have a guest today that's going to introduce the other guest, although we've been introduced beforehand. The person that I contacted for the work that Global Methodist Church is doing is Bryan Scott. He is the mission coordinator for the Global Methodist Church in Mississippi and West Tennessee—that's the area. And so Bryan, thank you for joining us on Exploring Missions, brother.
Bryan Scott: Well, thank you for the opportunity to share what God is doing through this new expression of the Wesleyan heritage that we have, the Methodist Church. And I'm also excited to have Wes Griffin with us today, who is the Kingdom Advancement Commission chairperson, because when you talk about a denomination, I'm a local church pastor and a missions coordinator of an annual conference, but he is on the denominational level of missions for our denomination.
Nathan Harper: So it's wonderful to have both of you guys with us today. We're eager to learn from you, hear from you, see what God is doing in your life, but also among the Global Methodists. And maybe a good place to start would be just a brief summary of kind of the last few years, how the Global Methodist Church has come about and what that looks like now with a mission emphasis as a part of that.
Bert Harper: Bryan, go ahead. You started this while we were talking about it.
Bryan Scott: Well, I served as a missionary in Honduras during the whole disaffiliation process, and my path to disaffiliation was much easier than the local pastors and these churches that had very difficult roadblocks put in front of them as they tried to move out of the United Methodist Church into the Global Methodist Church, with fees being put on them in order to keep their properties, hard struggles in trying to get the votes needed to disaffiliate. It was a high bar that was put out there—the percentage of people needed to vote yes to disaffiliate—and a less than 30—about a 30% of the church could vote no, and then 70% or so or less were forced to leave their properties, some of them generational churches. And so, it was very difficult for a lot of these places. I, on the other hand, serving in a foreign country, I just needed to call my district superintendent. And even that was not a real pleasant thing; they were pretty curt when I made the announcement. It's very difficult for a lot of people, a lot of my friends that walked through it with their congregations. They were pretty shell-shocked for a while afterwards. But now it's a beautiful thing to watch these churches release the old and walk into this new expression of God's grace through the Global Methodist Church. I think Wes would be better to give more detail on that, plus he has more experience in that.
Bert Harper: Wes, thank you for being with us again, and tell us a little bit about that journey.
Wes Griffin: So, it's an absolute privilege to be on this program today, and we thank you for the opportunity just to share from our perspective some of the things that God is doing. I believe we live in a particularly unique moment of God's outpouring of the Holy Spirit on the face of the earth, and for those of us kind of out of Methodist Wesleyan circles—particularly those that were, many of us, formally in United Methodist Church, ordained there as clergy—and I have spent four decades in international missions. And so, I'll just go back and say, five years ago, I was part of a group of leaders that eventually averaged about 70 people that were meeting and helping to envision what the future might look like for what was going to become the Global Methodist Church. And part of what we were looking at was just simply God's heart for the lost, God's heart for the world. We knew that two-thirds of the world had yet to believe in Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior, and we knew that God wanted to see all of those people reached. So at the heart of what became the Global Methodist Church was a great heart to fulfill the Great Commission to go and make disciples of Jesus Christ, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and then also for us as Methodist people, kind of a unique stamp would be to spread scriptural holiness—that holiness of heart and life that taps into both the purity and the power that God can give to a believer so that they can be an effective witness. So, I would simply say five years ago, a team of about 70 people began to meet. It was about two years ago that the Global Methodist Church held their first convening global General Conference, we call it. At that time, people were elected to various commissions. I was elected to serve on the what became named as the Kingdom Advancement Commission, and I've been privileged to chair that for the last two years. In our particular commission, there are five working areas. We wanted these to all work together and work synergistically, and here's the five areas: it's evangelism, church planting, missions—so we say missions mobilization—third; fourth, unreached people groups; and fifth, disaster response. So today, the way the Global Methodist Church is organized in terms of missions and church planting and evangelism is that there's this commission called Kingdom Advancement, and we help to just mobilize laity and annual conferences around the world to help fulfill the Great Commission. That may be a quick kind of an opening statement for you.
Bert Harper: Amen. Nathan, when I hear that—evangelism, church planting, mission mobilization, unreached people groups, disaster relief—sounds like things that Exploring Missions, we try to talk about, doesn't it?
Nathan Harper: Yeah, absolutely. It's a very fulsome, holistic picture of, well, what you're called, the Kingdom Advancement—how Jesus is advancing His kingdom all over the face of the earth among all peoples. And it's exciting to hear how that's kind of come about, how God has guided you guys and your teams and leaders in this. I do have a quick question regarding—well, really not regarding disaffiliation, but in the formation of the Kingdom Advancement Commission, how much did you guys lean on the global brothers and sisters, individuals maybe in Africa or other places in the world who took a good, strong leadership in the whole big picture of disaffiliation and looking for God to work in maybe, I don't know, it's hard for me to put it into words, but basically a new wineskin almost, if you want to call it that? Did you guys lean on your brothers from around the world as you're kind of thinking through and putting things together?
Wes Griffin: I would say it's more than just saying we leaned into. We were, you know, our name is Global, and so that commission and the leadership, what we called the transitional phase and then when we were fully established, was made of people from all over the world. So, there were representatives from North America—I'm a North American—but there were participants in the formation of this denomination from Africa, from Europe, from Asia, Middle East and North Africa, Latin America, the Caribbean. I mean today, the Global Methodist Church has over 50 annual conferences—that's kind of the way we are organized, and most of those are geographic, though some of those are more linguistic. But there's 50 areas around the world; there's over 7,500 churches all over the world. So, the Global Methodist Church literally launched large, and it has been, in a sense, a unique sprint seeing how God formed this denomination. In some ways, there's no precedents for it. And so, we had a phrase that we often used that was used across our church that "we're learning how to fly this plane as we build it". And so, everybody hit the ground running with great dedication, and this global team began forming a global denomination.
Bert Harper: When I hear these five working areas, I know, again, new church planting. Are you looking at a local church in any of those countries, and they look into their areas and see an area of people that need to be reached, and they are purposely looking in that area to start a Bible study that could lead into a small group, that could lead into a church? Has that started taking place yet? I know you have the five working areas, but I was wondering, since it's new, how this is progressing. You catch what I'm saying—church planting. And oh man, we got to get started, and I just ask, have y'all got started doing that?
Bryan Scott: I can speak to that because one thing that they have asked us to do is to—those that we annual conferences who have more people and more churches, and obviously more money, being North American, do partner with other international annual conferences. And our annual conference has partnered with both the Covenant Annual Conference and the Mega Manila Annual Conference, which are two—both in the Philippines. And I went for a visit over there back in March for about three weeks. And that's the thing talking about church planting—I laugh and tell people that they plant churches like we have potluck dinners over here in Mississippi. And they really—they really do. And they do exactly what you say: they start a Bible study in an area or neighborhood that doesn't have one, and they call—a lot of time, they call those mission areas. And they will begin to meet, and people begin to come, and once they have a certain number, they begin to call them a mission church. And once they become a mission church, then they start moving towards, as they grow, a charter to be called a Global Methodist Church. One of the greatest examples is my friend Jesse, who is a pastor in the Philippines—I had the blessing of preaching at two of his churches. He became a Global Methodist a little over a year ago, came out of the UMC. He's planted three churches in a year! I'm not talking about just a few people sitting under a shade tree; I'm talking about congregations that he has started. And beyond that, he has several other places that he has Bible studies with people with an eye towards starting a church in those areas as well. And that's one of the things we need from them. You know, like I say, North Americans, we have—we can assist with money and stuff like that, but we really need for them to come to Mississippi out of the Philippines and teach us how to plant churches because, especially our area in South Mississippi, there are so many places where we can plant churches and see the gospel be spread. I know Jesus is calling; we just have to—it's kind of hard telling some of these older congregations. I'm the pastor of a small congregation, and it's over 100 years old, but it's kind of to encourage them to get out of their seats and into the community. Really good people, it's just we got lulled into sleep, and it's time for us to wake up and re-invigorate and to catch that zeal of early Methodism.
Nathan Harper: You know, it sounds like with a new beginning, if you will, there are possibly new fields opening to you and your teams. But let me ask this though: in the transition of disaffiliation and becoming what God is calling you to become, are there any fields that have had to be left behind for any particular reason? And then maybe as you answer that, what are some of the new fields that are opening up to you in the area of missions?
Wes Griffin: I would say that no field is being left behind. We are simply—in fact, we're just praying for opportunities. We're looking for how God is leading this denomination. One of the things I can report to you is that in the first 17G months, there were over 500 new churches planted. So think about that—in 17 months, 500 new churches. Many of those were in Africa where the church is growing rapidly, but they were also, I would just support, all over the world. And what actually—as we have just sought, you know, when you're launching something, particularly it's a time of just freshly asking God, you know, "What is Your vision for this group of people, for this organization, this denomination?" And so as this team of people prayed, they believe the Lord was leading them to pray and work to see 3,400 new churches planted by 2033.
So, that's a very aggressive, sort of an intentional goal. We're trying to be careful, you know, how do you count churches, you know, is a micro church a church, or does it have to be a registered church? And we're recognizing that kind of a definition of where two or three are gathered, there is Christ, and a church is being formed when people are being intentional about being disciples, reaching people with the gospel, and making disciples. One of the philosophies that we're baking into the Global Methodist Church is a philosophy that churches plant churches. Not denominations, not regions, not states, not districts, but churches take the ownership of looking around their area of the world—wherever it is, whether it's America or Central Asia, wherever it might be—looking around and saying, "Where's the next place that people need to be reached with the gospel? Where's the next place that we need to plant a church?" And to that end, we want to be a Book of Acts-type movement, indigenously led, led from the ground up, led from local churches, and seeing churches planted everywhere.
Bert Harper: When I hear this, and Nathan and I have talked about this a lot, Bryan and Wes, and that is the indigenous people helping plant these churches, in place of someone from a different country coming in. Global Methodist Church, with it being in those areas as you said—Africa, Asia, America, Central America, everywhere—you guys are sitting on a situation where those people don't have to learn the language, they already know the language; they don't have to learn the culture, they're already there. Nathan, they're already trained and ready to go, whereas in many situations if it was only the United States sending these and planting churches that have to do the language, that have to learn the culture, they're sitting on the possibility of a great movement, aren't they?
Nathan Harper: Yeah, it sounds like it, which does lead to a question. So, let's just say, for example, a brother in the Philippines is planting churches and he knows Tagalog already and he's got the culture down—he's from the Philippines, so he's reaching other Filipino peoples and the different tribes and groups that are within in that country—what is the role of the Kingdom Advancement Commission to help to support him, to help him, to provide him with maybe resources? What is the role if he's already doing the work? What do you guys do with that?
Wes Griffin: That's a great question, and it really drives to how the Global Methodist Church envisioned a different way for a denomination to function than what most of us had experienced. Most of us had experienced top-down kind of structures. Well imagine, what would it look like to envision a more Book of Acts-type structure that is from the bottom up, that is from the local level up, where local areas are empowered when they need equipping, like training, or they need resources of a particular way, looking for partners that can help do that, but to recognize that the center of leadership is always at the local level.
So, that's how we are formed. You know, we're organized around our annual conferences, but we say this: the Global Methodist Church exists to serve the local church. And so, the local church is our seat of leadership. So when a pastor, someone is doing the work and it's beyond what they can do themselves—first of all, God has His people all over the world, and God has resources all over the world. Some people have more, some less, and we say, "Look, if you have a need, let it be known," and there are ways for you to share that so that resources can be available that can help. I'm just talking about people resources, relational resources, it could be financial resources, but primarily we're focusing on training and equipping, resourcing as needed, so that the gospel can spread.
So, that's—you say, what does the Kingdom Advancement Commission do? We serve through our structures—we have bishops, we have conference superintendents—and we serve at their request for what they need to help resource their local churches. Here's like a couple practical examples. We've held evangelism and church planting training events in different places around the world in the last 18 months, and over 1,000 people have attended those different training events. We created a specific seminar we call ENGAGE: Acts 1:8 Mission Mobilization Excellence. We've had over 1,900 leaders that have been trained in what we call ENGAGE—that's Acts 1:8, how to be faithful witnesses in your Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and the ends of the earth. And we've actually had that particular type of training—we've created actually, we're now in about 10 or 12 different languages very quickly, because those languages that we use in our movement. So that's just a couple practical-type things.
And a third thing just to mention, and Bryan's going to be able to really speak to this, part of our portfolio that Kingdom Advancement oversees is disaster response, and we have responded to over 60 disasters in the last 18 months where people encountered a crisis because of a flood, hurricane, earthquake, war, famine—many different possibilities. Bryan right now—he can take and tell you in just a minute—he's actually on the Gulf Coast because of the hurricane that's headed toward the United States. But it's exciting when we can minister to people—like we've ministered to over 125,000 people in 18 months who just found themselves in need of humanitarian aid. Those are exciting things where we can be the hands and feet of Jesus like that.
Bert Harper: Bryan, that was exciting to hear. We're looking at the hurricane hitting the Gulf Coast here in America, and you're down there ready to go. I thought I was going to tell you you needed to leave, but you went there on purpose, brother! Tell us about what that entails about you getting ready and being there for the disaster relief mission part of the Global Methodist Church.
Bryan Scott: Right. On the local church level, I have my own home to get ready for the storm, also I have the church that I serve, the facilities of the church to get it ready. And then, it's just a sit-and-wait thing. But I know that if we have damage to the church or damage in the community, that we will have disaster relief people coming. But the beauty of that, that is a very ecumenical thing, because you have the Southern Baptists bringing in feeding trucks, and even the United Methodists bringing in clean up, and then us joining in with that as well. And we have a coordinator in our state that's over disaster relief, and he's been sending information down here with our presiding elder in this area to keep them updated about the storm and what needs to be done.
So, it's just a, you know—you never take for granted that nothing's going to happen, but when it does, that we have a group behind us that is going to be here to help. And we've been part of that, you know, helping other areas in Mississippi with the ice storms and stuff back in the spring that we were part of helping with disaster relief for that as well. So it's not just hurricanes in Mississippi; it's all kinds of weather events, tornadoes, and those sorts of things.
But you mentioned earlier about trying to help those churches where they are planting. A part of our—I thought about having been partners with the Philippine churches, we also are trying to develop church-to-church partnerships with our local congregations with their local congregations. So that, yes, if a church is interested in church planting, that they could partner with a pastor like Jesse. Then there's other churches that do children's ministry, so if they're interested in children's ministry, that they can do that. We also partner with a group called OneChild, which comes into international places which have part of less financial ability, and create these where people can sponsor a child, and they move in and help that local church develop a ministry. But the beauty of it is that that is the local church's ministry. They know what they're going to do, what they want to do. OneChild just comes in and helps them to organize, and then they release that ministry to do it to be itself. And we are able to help fund that through international, by sending money to those programs toward the children. And so it can be a local church here working with the Global Methodist Church there—a Global Methodist person taking care of a Global Methodist child or a child in Global Methodist ministry. And so that's one way, and so church planting can come through that as well where we can help them as far as getting finances to them and help them do church planting and church building.
Bert Harper: One more thing as we're coming in at the end of this time: the two things that really drove churches to come together to form denominations—yes, it was doctrine, I understand that, but the main thing was mission; the other was educating the ministers. And we don't have a lot of time, but when you start, are you guys starting up new schools or new universities, or are there some that were in the United Methodist that say, "Hey no, we're more Wesleyan, we believe the scriptures," and they're supplying that need? How's that work?
Wes Griffin: Well, education is extremely important, whether it's for clergy or laity, and I would simply—the short answer is we have a number of initiatives to help provide assistance so that people can pursue educational opportunities. Kind of a Wesleyan tenet is we encourage people to pursue the highest level of education that is within their ability so that they can be both an educated and a spirit-filled worker in the Lord's kingdom. Now right now, there are many great all around the world universities and seminaries and training programs that already exist, so our priority has not been, "What do we need to start new?" as much as, "Where are there partners that we could partner with right now to help see our needs met?" One of the things that we did as a global denomination was allocated significant resources for the training of clergy, and that has been distributed, made available to our annual conferences around the world to apply for funding so that they can help get the training that their clergy need.
Bert Harper: Nathan, go ahead. We got about a minute and a half left. You want to close us out with a question or comment, go ahead, man.
Nathan Harper: Yeah, just simply, how—maybe if someone is listening to this and they want to learn more, that maybe they want to connect, and maybe they're right for mobilization—how would they connect with you, and maybe, what is maybe one or two prayers that we could be praying for you guys and the work God's doing through Kingdom Advancement of the Global Methodist Church?
Wes Griffin: Well, I would just encourage the listeners, any opportunity you have to connect with the Global Methodist Church, we're an alive and growing movement that is focused on making disciples and new faith communities being established. I was in a restaurant the other day, and the young lady waiting on us, it came natural to just ask, "Do you have a home church?" and she didn't, and we got to invite her to church. I would just encourage every listener here: look for those in your community that you can reach out to and invite to be part of a fellowship—your own church, whatever type of church it is, or connect with—if you're a listener and you don't have a home church, of course we'd love to see you visit a Global Methodist Church and connect with us.
Bert Harper: Our guest today has been Bryan Scott, he's the missions coordinator for the Global Methodist Church in Mississippi and West Tennessee—that's their area, their district. And then our other guest is Wes Griffin from Carrollton, Georgia, and he's chair of the Kingdom Advancement Commission there of the Global Methodist Church. Guys, thank you for being with us today, and we mean it, and we're excited about what God is doing through you guys. I had a lot of friends, and they're with you, and we're praying for them. And we're also praying for those of you who are listening today on Exploring Missions that you would find a local church, get involved, and find out what mission God wants you to be on as we serve Him. Thank you for listening to Exploring Missions here on the American Family Radio Network.
In this episode, Bert Harper engages with Brian Scott and Wes Griffin from the Global Methodist Church to discuss the significance of missions within the church's DNA. They explore the journey of the Global Methodist Church, its mission emphasis, and the importance of church planting and evangelism in fulfilling the Great Commission. Join us as we uncover how local churches are empowered to reach their communities and the exciting developments happening within this new denomination!
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