Wider Church Ministries -
Doing ministry for almost 200 years throughout the world

November 18, 2009 By Tyler Connoley, SWC representative to WCM During the first week in November, I had the privilege of representing the Southwest Conference at the UCC Wider Church Ministries (WCM) Board meeting. This board oversees many of our denominations global ministries and international partnerships. It is also responsible for disaster relief, sustainable development, and health and wholeness work in the United States, much of which falls under One Great Hour of Sharing (another of the responsibilities of WCM). Over the course of the next few years, as I serve on this board, I'll bring you news and information about the specific ministries of WCM, but in this first report I wanted to offer some of my general impressions.

The SWC received 3 Blue Globe Awards in the following categories: Top Per Capita Giving Second Highest Percentage of Participating Churches Most-Improved Per Capita Giving

As a child of missionaries, I've seen many different ways of doing ministry cross-culturally, and I have strong opinions about what's good and what's bad. Attending this board meeting made me more proud than ever of the UCC, because our theology of covenant and autonomy leads us to do ministry in exactly the way I think a denomination should. Most of our global ministries are done through partnerships with local people. The work is driven by local concerns in the context of local culture, and not by the North American church's priorities. Whenever we find ourselves working with a young or underdeveloped organization, where we must grudgingly take a more-paternalistic role, our goal is always for our partner to grow enough to be autonomous. Our commitment to covenant partnerships also means  we are more-likely to work ecumenically, and in concert with people of other faiths who have similar concerns -- our Common Global Ministries Board is itself a partnership with the Christian Church (Disciple of Christ). This is certainly the kind of reconciling ministry Jesus calls us to.

I was also impressed by the long-term attitude of the WCM Board. The corporation that is now Wider Church Ministries was founded almost two hundred years ago, in 1812, and the organization plans to be around at least that much longer. All the conversations we had included discussions about sustainability. Sustainable development, of course, but also sustainability for an organization that will be thriving long after all of us are dead. This is a group of people who truly believe God will continue to speak in the 21st and 22nd, and who plan that WCM will be around to heed God's call two hundred years from now.

Finally a bit of biblical theology: The scriptural theme for the week was Ephesians 2:13-22. In that beautiful passage about Christian unity, Paul says, "Christ came and proclaimed peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near." He goes on to talk about the household of God, with Christ as the chief cornerstone -- a house in which you and I are the very stones of the building. In this model, I see our covenantal relationships as the mortar that holds us together, and part of WCM's responsibility is to strengthen those relationships across the many geographical boundaries that separate us. And so, our brothers and sisters from places as far away as the Gulf Coast and Sichuan Province, Kabul and Harare, Germany and Indonesia can say to us, "Now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near."