I am excited to welcome Alexandra Storck to the staff at Faith as our College Age Ministry Intern. Alex recently volunteered as an adult leader on the youth spring break mission team. She was partnered with our Youth Director, Mark Fowler, and he was very impressed with her leadership on the trip. Alex was in my youth group at Living Water and was a valuable leader in our congregation. She is currently in graduate school full time and will only be with us in a very part time role for the summer. Our Young Adult Director, DeRon Gabriel, was recruited to work for Project Transformation as the si ..read more

It’s a little crazy around the office these days. Ladies are making clouds, yes I said clouds, in the workroom. Mark is building worship backgrounds for youth camp in June. VBS recruitment is in full swing and the worship team finished their long term planning for the rest of the year. Seungrok and I are trying to figure out how to get all our work done and spend next week at annual conference. The pace of life is changing with school ending and summer travel season beginning. It’s nice. My grandson Henry is sleeping until 9 am each day instead of being at my house at 7:30 am. I miss him but I ..read more

This Sunday is our celebration of the birth of the church. Not Faith UMC but THE church. It falls on the 50th day after the resurrection. Pentecost is based on the scripture from Acts 2n where the Holy Spirit descends on all the people “like tongues of fire.” It may even evoke a reminder for you of the Holy Spirit descending on Jesus and God’s voice claiming him as beloved. It is a tradition in churches to wear Red on this special Sunday. I have changed the paraments in the sanctuary to red as well. We have special elements planned for worship and our Bell Choir will be playing. On that first ..read more

Last Friday completed the work of the 2020 General Conference. Yes, that date is correct. This conference had been postponed due to the pandemic. It was a historical conference in other ways as well. But many of the things that were voted on must now go before every annual conference for ratification. We have been told by Bishop Nunn that our annual conference is only three weeks away and we will have to wait a year before voting on these items as Oklahoma Annual Conference. The UMC communications made a great feel good video that you can watch here. Some significant things happened, that I wa ..read more

When my cousin and his wife moved to Tulsa, they met with the education department at Faith and described to us all the ways that they and their children had been received in churches. With two young boys who are the autism spectrum, they did not always act like typical children. The stories that they told us brought us to tears and we said simple “We can do better.” Christi then educated us on what churches were doing in some of the large cities. We flew in a woman from Dallas who led a training for us and helped us develop what is our Special Angels program here at Faith. It is important for ..read more

I have been in prayer for this gathering for weeks. Several of my friends, including our previous pastor Rev. Charla Gwartney will be gathering in North Carolina for the 2020 General Conference on the 23rd. This conference was postponed due to the CoVid pandemic. According to the book of discipline, we are required to have one every four years. The delegates elected expected to be done with this years ago but instead they are gathering next week. I don’t want to alarm you or cause undo stress because Faith is blessed to know very clearly who they are and what they are about. But there are seve ..read more

You may have seen in our newsletter that our Leadership Team is creating things called “Guiding Principles.” Under our new Simplified Accountable Structure the Leadership Team has three choices regarding every decision. 1) Make the decision and move on. 2) Make the decision and create a Guiding Principle to answer future decisions around this same topic. 3) Call for a Town Hall to receive input from the congregation before making their decision. We have had all three of these choices made in this first quarter of operating under this new structure. Previously, in order to understand the polici ..read more

Our new Easter series is one that was inspired by the work that I have done recently with my Disciple Bible Study. We are 27 weeks into the study of the four gospels. It has been an eye opening experience. “Initiating Grace” is based on the resurrection appearances of Jesus. But what is unusual is that we are focusing on people that he appeared to, whose relationship to him was broken. We begin with the couple on their walk to Emmaus who are discussing their disappointment with what happened in Jerusalem. Then we move to Peter who denied knowing Jesus three times as Jesus was being executed. T ..read more

My cousin and I were discussing trying to find time to fulfill taking our parents to say goodbye to their youngest brother who is nearing the end of his life here on earth. I told some of the staff that I was feeling “fragile” this week because the normal business and pressure of Holy Week was overlaid by my grief for my uncle knowing that my recent trip to see him would be my last. Eric works in sports and he equated this week to Super Bowl Sunday for me and I liked it. On top of that we had the lovely celebration of the life of one of our saints, Merideth Yoakum, on Wednesday. Yet, in the mi ..read more

The last 4o days of repentance and reflection have led us to Holy Week. This upcoming Palm Sunday we are excited to have the children singing in both services and (if the rain holds off!) the Easter Egg Hunt on Sunday afternoon at 3 pm. I still need volunteers to help me set up the Prayer Stations (for Monday and Tuesday) after the Easter Egg hunt on Sunday afternoon. I hope that you will take some time to go through the stations and deepen your understanding of the significance of Holy Week. They will be open from 3-7 on both days and you can reserve a time slot here. WE INVITE YOU to come on ..read more