{"id":4404,"date":"2025-08-10T17:47:18","date_gmt":"2025-08-10T17:47:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/fumcschenectady.org\/blog\/2025\/08\/10\/love-boldly-serve-joyfully-lead\/"},"modified":"2026-03-17T17:18:04","modified_gmt":"2026-03-17T21:18:04","slug":"love-boldly-serve-joyfully-lead","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fumcschenectady.org\/blog\/2025\/08\/10\/love-boldly-serve-joyfully-lead\/","title":{"rendered":"Love Boldly, Serve Joyfully, Lead Courageously"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cLove Boldly, Serve Joyfully, Lead Courageously\u201dbased on Isaiah 1:1, 10-20<\/h1>\n
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The radicalness of our ancient Jewish ancestors in faith was that they came to understand their God as a God who cared about how people treated each other. This was a faith revolution in its time and place in the world. Surrounding nations believed in gods and goddesses who were fundamentally self-serving and needed to be cajoled and bribed to care about people. Our ancestors in faith came to know and understand a God whose care about people is foundational, immutable, and unchanging.<\/p>\n

God\u2019s steadfast love endures forever. That\u2019s how they described God, that\u2019s the faith that has been handed down to us over many generations. We know and connect with God whose steadfast love endures forever, whose fundamental nature is love, who assesses how the people are doing by how they\u2019re caring for the vulnerable.<\/p>\n

According to the prophet Isaiah, the people were not doing well. They were engaging in the acts and rituals of prayer and worship, the things intended to help them connect with God and God\u2019s ways, but they did so without following the most basic facet of God\u2019s wishes: caring for the vulnerable.<\/p>\n

God accuses them of praying with the blood of the vulnerable on their hands.<\/p>\n

And then asks them to wash their hands and try again, \u201cWash yourselves; make yourselves clean; remove your evil deeds from before my eyes; cease to do evil;<\/p>\n

learn to do good; seek justice; rescue the oppressed; defend the orphan; plead for the widow.\u201d (Isaiah 1:16-17) This God whose nature is love, whose care is for people, is really quite radical. Not only does God care and love, God\u2019s care and love isn\u2019t centered on the king, it is centered on the vulnerable.<\/p>\n

I remain so grateful for those who listened well enough to God\u2019s voice to differentiate what they expected to hear from what God was actually saying! And all of those since then who have affirmed the importance of knowing a God of love.<\/p>\n

In 2008 The United Methodist Church updated it\u2019s mission statement. The original one, passed in 2000 was \u201cTo make disciples of Jesus Christ.\u201d In 2008 a second phrase was added, \u201cTo make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world.\u201d I\u2019ve been grateful for the addition, as I believe the point of connecting with Jesus and God is increasing the capacity to love the world into fullness.<\/p>\n

We all see, every day, examples of injustice and wrongness and extreme examples of the sorts of things God was mad about in Isaiah 1. The world is in need of serious transformation. Most recently The United Methodist Church\u2019s Council of Bishops added a vision statement to complement our mission statement. I admit to a healthy amount of skepticism about how much things like that matter, but it turns out I like it.<\/p>\n

T<\/b>he new vision states:<\/b> The United Methodist Church forms disciples of Jesus Christ, who empowered by the Holy Spirit, love boldly, serve joyfully, and lead courageously in local communities and worldwide connections.1<\/a> <\/b>Now, it is too wordy. But the k<\/b>eys<\/b> are \u201clove boldly, serve joyfully, and lead courageously,\u201d which is explained this way:<\/b><\/p>\n