For nearly half a century the good folks from Mayfield UMC have been going to Camp Aldersgate near Carrollton, one of our three Conference camps.  The church fills up the camp, spending a week together swimming and hiking, lugging each other up that huge hill and eating together in the dining hall.  For a generation […]

I have a hunch that there are lots of churches in our Conference that have put off capital campaigns in the last four years or so.  With a struggling economy and plate income a challenge, it just did not seem like the right time to take on a major campaign. But those churches still have […]

In his Five Practices of Fruitful Congregations, Bishop Robert Schnase made the term “Extravagant Generosity” mainstream in the lexicons of many of our churches.  This summer Michael Reeves and Jennifer Tyler release Extravagant Generosity:  Heart of Giving.  I am grateful to have received an advance copy from Abingdon Press and I wanted to share my […]

If you want to rile up some United Methodists bring up either casino gambling or the use of Native Americans as mascots.  Today I’m doing both.  I hope you’ll look past these offenses to find the message behind my post. Saturday was Faith Day at Progressive Field.  So I packed four Sheetzes in the minivan and headed […]

Last week I heard a business guru give his tool to assess the success of small businesses given the difficult economy the last few years. “If you’re still open, you’re a success.”  But then he admonished them to get out of survival mode and plan for the future. I think that’s where we are with […]

It has become a key phrase in our society:  “You can’t be too safe.”  This notion when it comes to raising children prompted Lenore Skenazy to write Free Range Kids, a book and now a blog.  In it, she reminds us that kids need to go out and play and have fun.  If they end […]

Mastercard’s “Priceless” ad campaign is world-famous and fairly well satirized at this point.  In those ads you might expect to see Friendship identified as “Priceless.”  But a survey by the Gallup folks in 1998 puts a definite value on friendship, $118.  That is, that for every friend a church member has in his or her congregation, […]

Do you have The List? You should. The List isn’t the one that has all the stuff you need to pick up at the grocery store.  The List is your wish list.  Or rather, your church’s wish list. What would happen if the family of a deceased parishioner told you they wanted to buy something […]

Do you know Tom’s Shoes?  It’s a shoe company that was started about five years ago.   Yes, they’re sold at Nordstrom’s and yes, they’re overpriced.  But that’s where Tom’s and most designers separate. Tom’s One for One program gives away a pair of shoes for every pair that is sold.  But it’s not like a […]

As the news broke in Japan it wasn’t too long before I got thinking about UMCOR and its role in the relief effort of many of these disasters.  We are blessed to have Japan as the center of much of our United Methodist missionary work in Asia so we had “people on the ground” who […]