NEW PHONE NUMBER 517-258-0038 | To care for UCC clergy and churches in Michigan.
NEW PHONE NUMBER 517-258-0038 | To care for UCC clergy and churches in Michigan.
Church News You Can Use
Nov 22, 2024
To any pastors or church members struggling to love each other in a politically diverse church, I want to tell you that this may be the most important ministry you ever do. God is still speaking and you never know who God will speak through next.
After the election, I hosted a reflection for our pastors and church members. There wasn’t much shock about the results—after all, we live in Michigan, where the country’s division is our local reality, embedded in our towns and within our churches. But there were a few pastors feeling surprised, scared, and rewriting their sermons for that Sunday.
My heart went out to them because they reminded me of myself, back in 2016, as a pastor who had recently moved to Dubuque, Iowa, from Illinois and was also truly shocked at those 2016 election results. Little did I know that, in the weeks that followed, I would discover my new Iowa congregation was much more politically diverse than I’d imagined. My carefully planned 2016 post-election sermon, as well as my long-scheduled, pastorally sensitive “drop-in” hours the day after the election, were all based on the idea that I would be comforting Republicans—not the other way around!
I had nothing to give at that post-election drop-in other than some soggy donuts (I’d probably been crying over them in the car) and the deeper struggle within myself: if I could have been so wrong about predicting the election results in Iowa and about understanding the deeply held views of my church members, was I equally wrong about my call from God to serve there? I think I basically told them all that in my sermon that week, which may have been way too much information for some church members who told me “We really didn’t want to hear who you voted for, Pastor!” There were a few lonely moments that winter of 2016 when I thought about packing my bags, but I’m so glad I didn’t. That purple congregation in the swing state of Iowa ended up being my sweetheart church. Pastors, you know what I’m talking about.
Eight years later, I’m now living in my second swing state and I am so grateful to be your Michigan Conference Minister, a pastor to pastors, responsible for the care of our congregations. I came here with my eyes open, thanks to a plain-spoken search committee who helped me to understand that despite a national news cycle full of unavoidable stories about Michigan militias and pandemic pandemonium, this complicated and diverse swing state is a very special place to be.
So after this recent election, I don’t feel shocked and therefore perhaps not as much pain or disappointment as others do in the United Church of Christ family. I am blessed to be here for such a time as this.
Nov 05, 2024
Nov 05, 2024
November 2024 Monthly Newsletter for the Michigan Conference UCC
This past weekend at our wonderful and well-attended Michigan Conference Annual Meeting, the General Minister and President of our denomination, Rev. Dr. Karen Georgia Thompson, shared her aspiration for the United Church of Christ to continue to celebrate being a “big tent” with room for a variety of opinions, theological and political. Little did she know that our diversity here in the Michigan Conference extends to some very unusual costumes, which were on hilarious display the night before, as we laughed our way through Halloween, worshipped our way into All Saints Day and now find ourselves here on Election Day.
Annual Meeting Highlights and an invitation to Election Reflection Leadership Lunch.
Oct 01, 2024
October 2024 Monthly Newsletter for the Michigan Conference UCC
More Annual Meeting Details (Online Registration ends 10.14.24)
and ‘spooktacular’ Fall Events and Resources (including Advent prep…)
Share the link with your local churches and leaders
and join us for a fantastic Fall in the Michigan Conference 
I am writing to you from a high speed train in Germany after visiting the Michigan Conference’s partner church in Northern Pomerania, because in my first year in this job, I promised someone I would do it. I remember hearing about how our Michigan church members poured decades into a partnership, with musical and youth exchanges, but like so many things in life, it had languished in recent years. They were tired but they didn’t want the program to die and by the end of our conversation, I didn’t either.
Besides, I also knew I could use the education. You see, in my thirty years of parish ministry, all four of the historic churches I have served were born of the Congregational tradition, which is only one of the five streams that make up our denomination (Congregational, Christian, Afro-Christian and the two German streams Evangelical and Reform.) So I know the stream that came from the pilgrims in England, but as I visit our UCC churches in Michigan, about half have their historic roots in Germany, with names like “Salem,” “Bethlehem,” and “Saint Paul’s,” started by farmers who may have first worshipped in a humble cabin. Their beautiful larger sanctuaries were built later by the next generation of woodworkers and bricklayers, extended families who came here to make a new life. Many of our churches held German language worship services until World War II made that untenable. The suspicion and prejudice they received as German immigrants, even those who had been here for generations, caused many to switch to English only, and to place an American flag in the sanctuary as a sign of their loyalty to the place that was now their homeland. These are the stories I have learned in my visits in Michigan, and they made me long to learn the story behind that story in the land in which it began.
Sep 03, 2024
Fall into important updates and events with the September Monthly Newsletter
Registration is now open for the 2024 Annual Meeting https://michucc.breezechms.com/form/AnnualMeeting2024
and here is a video invitation featuring members of the Planning Team
BOD is looking for folks interested in representing the Michigan Conference
AND Vitality Day is THIS Saturday!!
At the risk of stating the obvious, the United Church of Christ is a Christian denomination.
We have always been followers of the way of Jesus with a deep passion for bringing the Bible to the people, willing to stand up against the excesses of our own extended church family, but with humility because you never know who God will speak through next. Our ecumenical passion was bigger than the rest of Christianity’s. We are always reaching out to other Christians, including those who dismiss us. We are rebellious reformers, but also the first to call the warring factions together, trusting in the promise “that they may all be one.”
Ecumenically, we stand in the Reformed tradition that was not very traditional when it started. Some of our forebears were willing to be burnt at the stake so that people could read the Bible for themselves in their own language. The reformers didn’t do it to draw attention to an educational equity issue, or a justice issue, or even a class revolution, although all those things can spring forth when people try to follow Christ because the Holy Spirit is never asleep. But let’s be clear: the motivation of those early reformers, and to the current reformers who gather under the UCC tent to worship something other than themselves, was not to boost a political party, or to be first among ecclesiastical franchisees to produce the next spiritual happy meal, or even to create a list of “historic firsts” for a marketing campaign that I imagine our forebears would hate. They risked their lives and their relationships with the institutional church, not to create a new list of merit badges for secular forces to run through the church for some higher good. No, they did it all so that future generations could hear and read the gospel of Jesus Christ as they had. They were willing to bet it all on the idea that God was still speaking. And they didn’t make that up as a tagline, they found it in their worship and practice as Christians.
Aug 06, 2024
Are you and members from your local church coming to Vitality Day?
Saturday September 7, 2024 from 10am-3:00pm
Participate onsite (lunch included) or online through Zoom with livestream and chat commenting. Cost of registration includes a copy of the book Gone for Good.
Gone for Good will be the Book of the Month discussed on November 13, 2024 via Zoom
Want to know more about what’s happening this fall in the Michigan Conference UCC?
Jul 02, 2024
Call to Annual Meeting and more…
You can book and reserve lodging at Crystal Mountain.
• Call the Reservations Department at 1-855-520-2974 and reference group number 46L8YR
• Book online using this link Book Online Here
The group number and the dates of the event will automatically populate.
Arrival and departure dates may be altered as needed
“Save the Environment!”
I saw the slogan everywhere growing up, on tee shirts and bumper stickers but it was the posters of exotic animals from far away that captured my childhood imagination. They were my first hint that the world was huge and I had only seen a small patch of it.
I lost myself in the posters of parrots in paradise, monkeys in the rainforest, polar bears staring at stars while lounging on glaciers, and of course the bamboo-nibbling panda couples on that special date night in the wilderness. All of them seemed to be beckoning me to jump on the hang glider of eco-justice and come rescue them. Later, I was somewhat disappointed to learn that none of these animals were looking for me to rescue them by bringing them home as pets. Apparently, these rare creatures wanted me to save them by saving their environment, and then by leaving them alone. As I matured, that mission of preserving some species’ habitat inspired me. But in the interests of honesty, I’d also like to briefly thank Jesus for inventing stuffed animals, which got me through a potentially rudderless time.
Today, I look back on all those early imprinting visuals featuring animals that I would never see in my own block or backyard, and I now believe that I subconsciously internalized the message that the environment was somewhere else, far away, in a special spot much prettier than my boring neighborhood or block, and therefore much more deserving of preserving.
But there comes a time to put aside childish things, including the idea that the environment we should be saving is somewhere else, out on an iceberg our grandchildren may never see unless we get our Alaskan cruise tickets early.
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