Greetings from Lake Junaluska and the 2013 Annual Conference of the Western North Carolina Conference. This is the time of year when delegates, including both clergy and laity, representing every church in our Western North Carolina Conference gather for worship, fellowship, Bible study, reporting, encouragement and required administrative needs.
The theme of this year’s Annual Conference is “To Serve the Present Age,” reflecting the focus on vital congregations to be actively engaged in missional outreach. Our focus text was from Micah 6:8
Do justice
Love kindness
Walk humbly with your God
Bishop Goodpaster challenged us to boldly go out beyond the walls of our churches to fulfill our mission of following Jesus, make disciples and transform the world. Several inspirational sermons were delivered including:
- Dr. Samuel H. Moore, Jr. – “Moving from an Empty Tomb Faith to a Resurrection Faith”
- Bishop Kenneth H. Carter, Jr. – “A Future with Hope” and “The Other Side of the River”
- Bishop Hope Morgan Ward, and Bishop Goodpaster – “Mission North Carolina”
- Bishop Peter D. Weaver – “Sign-ificant Ministry” (Click here to watch an interview and overview of his message.)
- Shannon Sherfey, M.D. – “Invited, Welcomed, Included, and Loved”
Dr. Elaine A. Heath led three Bible Studies focused on moving outside our conventional walls to be communities of Missional Wisdom. Dr. Heath encouraged the churches of Western NC to provide leadership in spiritual formation by engaging people in the community through outreach efforts. In a word, the message was to Go! In Matthew 28:19 Jesus didn’t call us to be comfortable, he told his disciples to go out and change the world.
Each year at the Annual Conference, the Daily Digest serves to provide a recap of the daily activities going on at Lake Junaluska. This Year the Daily Digest went from a printed edition on the first day (click on the following link to download a PDF edition of the Daily Digest):
…to a video edition re-cap each day for the rest of the week. Click on each of the following days to watch a short (10 min.) video of the daily highlights at Annual Conference:
Sunday, June 23 This video also includes an interview (4:30 minutes into the video) with Bishop Ken Carter who was serving as our District Superintendent last year. He has a powerful vision for the United Methodist Church.