Words from our Bishop

In the Giving We Receive

It is no coincidence that the theme for this year’s annual conference is the same theme as the missional study for 2008: “Giving our hearts away.” All year long the United Methodist Church will study the history and culture of Native Americans, and when we gather on June 5th at Antlers for our 166th year as a conference, we will celebrate the gifts of our faith that we have given to the world.

Giving defines who we are. Out of our turbulent and difficult history Native Americans were somehow able to give the world a song of hope and promise which has been passed on from generation to generation, and those are the songs we will sing when we come together to remember and celebrate our past, present and future.

One of the sayings of the Apostle Paul which is contained in his second letter to the church at Corinth is the passage, “God loves a cheerful giver.” Or, as Eugene Peterson says in his modern translation, The Message, “God loves it when the giver delights in the giving.” When you closely examine why we give as a people, you will come to understand that our need to give is rooted in our kinship and relationship to God. We are God’s people, and we demonstrate it through every act of kindness and giving. The Greek word “philanthropy” literally means “loving people,” and that word truly identifies us and our closeness to God. Giving is a part of living for us, and it is the highest act of celebration and praise that we can offer to God.

In the Gospel of John it says “God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son.” It also says that God is “the giver of every perfect gift (James 1:17).” We are the children of a heavenly Father who has shown us that one of the very basic principles of creation is the need to give. Every living thing is endowed with this need for it is in the giving that we receive.

When Peter and John went to the temple to pray on that Sabbath day, a beggar asked for money. Peter’s reply to him was: “Silver and gold have I none, but in the name of Jesus, rise up and walk!”(Acts 3:6) The one thing that we possess that we can give to the world is the name that has brought us this far along the way. It is a name that has survived our stormy past, just as it will guide us into the future. It is the name above all names, so much so that at the very mention of the name “every knee shall bow… and every tongue shall confess (Philippians 2:10).” It is the name that was given to our ancestors and it is the name that we in turn give back to a hurting world: His name is Jesus!

Come celebrate his glorious name and his marvelous works at our annual conference as we thank God for another year of giving.

Bishop Hayes