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January 31, 2024

Joel Winchip, executive director of the Presbyterian Church Camp & Conference Association/Campfire Collective, led a workshop last week at the APCE Annual Event that relied on his and others’ decades of experience helping congregations, mid councils and other groups to plan and pull off meaningful retreats.

January 31, 2024

On a crisp winter day on December 29, 1986, Jewel McRae began her first day as a member of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) national staff, and, as the saying goes, the rest is history.

January 31, 2024

The Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)’s Office of Public Witness has again issued an Action Alert, asking Presbyterians to advocate for a ceasefire and an increase in humanitarian aid for Gaza.

January 31, 2024

An updated version of the PC(USA)’s Daily Prayer app is now available for Apple, Android and Amazon devices. The app has been downloaded more than 10,000 times since its debut in 2012. This is the first significant update to the app, and it comes in response to requests to have the new version match the latest (2018) version of the Book of Common Worship.

January 30, 2024

LOUISVILLE — The Rev. Dr. Jerry Cannon, Vice President for Ministry Innovation at the Board of Pensions, sent educators attending last week’s APCE Annual Event home well-fed with God’s word and Cannon’s own prodigious preaching talents. Using Nehemiah 8:10 as his preaching text, Cannon led with gymnast Katelyn Ohashi’s viral floor exercise, which earned her a perfect score from the judges. “The most important thing about her routine is the joy. She clearly loves what she is doing, and it shows. The joy on her face is contagious,” Cannon said. A subsequent NPR report discussed how her coach at UCLA, Valorie Kondos Field, helped Ohashi rekindle her love for the sport. “What do you do when you lose your joy, when you just don’t glow like you once did?” Cannon asked. “Who do you go to when your joy is gone?” One thing to keep in mind as a source, he said, came from educator Dr. Jonathan Jackson: “Christian education is that ministry that undergirds all ministries of the church.” Nehemiah knew “true joy and restoration could come only by the inner strength provided by the Lord,” Cannon said. “The shiny new wall would not restore the people. They needed inner strength to keep them moving.” We can reconnect to our joy through the alliterative process of remember, repent and restore, according to Cannon, who offered examples of each during his sermon. Morgan Neville’s film “20 Feet from Stardom” tells us the story of great backup singers including the great Darlene Love. “It’s a movie about people who recognized God had them right where they needed to be,” Cannon explained. “Who would Gladys Knight be without the Pips? You would not have KC if there was no Sunshine Band. Every now and then, you ought to give God thanks for the background folks who make you who you are.” “You need to realize that God has a way of bringing us to a point where we need to repent,” Cannon said, adding he wonders how an Old Testament prophet like Nehemiah can speak to APCE in 2024. “How was Katelyn Ohashi able to complete that championship performance? She was miserable and had lost her joy, and Coach Val helped her rekindle her love and joy. She said, ‘I had to earn her trust that I cared about her more as a human being than I did as a gymnast,’” Cannon said, adding that APCE members and friends “are more than Christian educators, more than pastors and youth directors. That may pay the bills, but what makes you who you are is your relationship with Almighty God.” Cannon, a native of Charlotte, North Carolina, recalled his Carolina Panthers playing in a close conference championship game a few years ago. He was watching the game on an upstairs television while his children watched on the downstairs TV. As Cannon chewed his fingernails down the stretch of the back-and-forth contest, he noticed his children were cheering and groaning at different times than he was. It turned out his cable television provider was providing an uneven signal throughout the house. “God told me, ‘Every now and then, it’s OK to open up your ear when someone else is having a celebration,” Cannon said. “The joy of the Lord is your strength. That’s it!” Check back with pcusa.org for further reporting on last week’s APCE Annual event.

January 30, 2024

A new publication from the Presbyterian Peacemaking Program showcases reflections by people of faith who’ve been involved in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)’s long history of peacemaking and reconciliation.

January 30, 2024

Dr. Jacqueline E. Lapsley, President, and the Board of Trustees at Union Presbyterian Seminary welcome the Rev. Dr. Lee Hinson-Hasty as the Seminary’s next Vice President for Advancement.

January 30, 2024

“Aurora has become a place where immigrants and refugees from all over the world are settling now,” said the Rev. Doug Friesema, pastor of Aurora First Presbyterian Church in Colorado, whose congregation has opened up its space to five other congregations that serve Spanish-speaking immigrants, refugees, individuals from the African diaspora and African Americans.

January 29, 2024

Three longtime educators were recognized for their many years of ministry in the field of Christian education Friday during the Association of Partners in Christian Education Annual Event held last week in St. Louis and online.

January 29, 2024

Historically, Presbyterians “are used to being on a bigger stage and having what we say mean something,” the Acting Stated Clerk of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), the Rev. Bronwen Boswell, said last week during “A Matter of Faith: A Presby Podcast.”

January 29, 2024

As Stephanie Fritz took the microphone last week to give the sold-out crowd at the APCE Networking and Resourcing Lunch a “fast and furious introduction” to the abundance of resources and initiatives offered by the PC(USA), Laura Sparks caught her breath.

January 27, 2024

Friday’s next-to-last worship service at the APCE Annual Event featured the Revs. Phil and Stephanie Doeschot and two members of Christ’s Church in St. Peters, Missouri, Carol Jones and Ellen Vellenga.

January 26, 2024

APCE Annual Event keynoter Mark Yaconelli concluded his final plenary Friday with a story you just knew came with a happy ending. It did indeed, but the master storyteller drew it out so well that you were afraid it might turn out unexpectedly. More on that later.

January 26, 2024

One Sunday, the Rev. Michelle Scott-Huffman had an epiphany. As the former pastor of Table of Grace, a non-traditional, radically inclusive faith community she planted in Jefferson City, Missouri, she knew that her leadership and preaching were central to worship. But one Sunday, the congregation showed her — and the Spirit told her — otherwise.

January 26, 2024

APCE keynoter Mark Yaconelli, whose most recent book holds up the importance of storytelling, told a few compelling stories himself during his plenary talk on Thursday.

January 26, 2024

There may be no place thirstier for life than the desert after a long period of no rain, the Rev. Melanie Marsh said during Thursday’s worship service at APCE’s Annual Event being held in St. Louis and online. Marsh used a National Geographic clip to demonstrate rain’s dramatic effect on the Anza-Borrego Desert State Park southeast of Los Angeles.

Agency encourages putting a hold on national meetings at Texas’ non-PC(USA) conference centers while Federal courts debate Texas Senate Bill 4

January 25, 2024

Rick Jones | Office of the General Assembly

LOUISVILLE

When Texas Governor Greg Abbott signed a bill into law last month giving the state permission to enforce certain aspects of federal immigration law, the Office of the General Assembly determined it was time to revisit how the church supports members with immigrant identities and ancestry. The agency has decided to follow existing General Assembly policy and encourage Presbyterian groups to refrain from holding any national meetings at non-PC(USA) convention spaces in Texas while Federal courts determine the bill’s legality.

First in-person meeting looked at General Assembly mandate and historic approaches to confessions

January 25, 2024

Fred Tangeman | Office of the General Assembly

Last month, members of the Special Committee to Write a New Confession held its first in-person meeting on the grounds of Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary in Texas.

The three-day gathering in mid-December saw the committee beginning a process that is expected to culminate in the presentation of a draft confession to the 227th General Assembly (2026), for possible inclusion in the Book of Confessions. At the 226th General Assembly this summer, committee leaders will report findings of their work to date.

January 25, 2024

Since the Covid pandemic began in early 2020, we’ve gone from lockdown to shutdown, Mark Yaconelli told those attending the APCE Annual Event Wednesday during the first of three keynotes he’s scheduled to deliver. He saw plenty of examples of shutdown during a 91-stop book tour he completed last year following publication of his “Between the Listening and the Telling: How Stories Can Save Us.”

January 25, 2024

ST. LOUIS — In the vast sea of vendors that populate the Marketplace & Bookstore at the Association of Partners in Christian Education 2024 Annual Event, there’s only one who literally makes a splash.