“Journey Missions”
General Superintendent
Max Edwards
October 29, 2024
Our four Journey meetings will be taking place in March and April of 2025. Between now and then, I will be writing each month about reviving an effective missions giving tradition.
I have set a goal of $45,000 in combined missions giving across our four Jouney locations next year.
Do I really believe this can happen? I do.
Because it has happened before in our combined District Conferences! (I shared some of this history on page 2 of the October Kerusso). And the simple fact is this - - I KNOW OUR PEOPLE HAVE INCREDIBLE GIV ING HEARTS.
How can we acccomplish this again? Our total Journey registrations last year were nearly 300. This did not include local church members who came in simply for the evening services.
So here is what I’m praying about, and asking you about:
1. I’m asking each person who will attend Journey next year to bring a personal offering. It doesn’t have to be a huge amount, but if each person or family would bring a gift of $20 - $30, that kickstart would easily crest $5,000.
2. Next, I’m asking every EMC Church to prepare a special JOURNEY MISSIONS offering . You could do this by presenting the need to your congregation and inviting them to give, bringing those designated offering(s) to your Journey meeting. Also, if your church has an active Missions Committee managing the church missions budget, you could ask them to consider what they can invest in this endeavor.
I’m going to ask that every EMC church prepare to give $500 or more in one of the four Journey meetings. I truly believe that many of our churches can go far beyond that, sending several thousand dollars.
And remember, 100% of these dollars will go directly into missions. Not 90% … not 95% - - 100%.