Monthly Archives: March 2017

Inaugural Rural and Small Town Conference Encourages 300 Midwest Ministry Leaders

in News. Posted March 16, 2017
On March 11, 2017 a leadership conference for rural and small town churches called Grow! was held at Cornerstone Church in Litchfield, MN. Over 300 pastors and ministry leaders from across the Midwest attended the inaugural conference designed to provide church leaders information on how to minister effectively, encourage them to see their unique role in God's plan, and help them take the steps that can impact their world for all of eternity. Included is a Q & A with some Grow Conference participants engaged in rural ministry in the Midwest.
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Journey to Harmony: Rev. Dr. Charles L. Gill, Pilgrim Baptist Church

in Blog Series, News, Pastor's Column. Posted March 16, 2017
Rev. Dr. Charles Gill reflects on his experience on the Sankofa journey, and how this trip violated the sanctity of his safe space. He writes about the residue of pain, humiliation, and shame in the African American experience, that he found he cannot wash off. And how as the trip progressed, Rev. Gill found many of those emotions began to leak out from under the locked door of his soul. Read what Rev. Gill is doing and what he desires for next steps as a result of this trip. In February, 30 Twin Cities Pastors went on a Journey to Harmony, touring Civil Rights Sites in the South. A handful of these participants wrote up their reflections to share with the Body of Christ in Minnesota.
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Sankofa 2017: Journeying Back, Looking Forward

in News. Posted March 16, 2017
Nearly 50 years after Dr. King’s assassination, 30 Twin Cities pastors kept Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s dream alive through Sankofa: Journey to Harmony. Sankofa is a Ghanaian phrase that translates as “go back and get it.” Our Journey to Harmony encouraged participants to go back and face our country’s roots in order to move forward. Following our inaugural Sankofa: Journey to Harmony, we are inspired, filled with hope and continuing to look forward. It has become all too clear that it is the Gospel that reconciles people. So as we look ahead, we continue to dream of God’s multi-tribal Kingdom revealed in Revelation 7.
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A Prophetic Call to Welcome the Refugee

in News. Posted March 9, 2017
As we seek to understand how Christians are called to welcome the alien in our midst, be confident in our country’s screening process, knowing that refugees are subject to the highest level of security checks of anybody who travels to the United States. But also put your confidence in God’s calling on our lives to remember our ancestors who were once foreigners (found as the Hebrew word GER in the Old Testament), and to show hospitality to the stranger (hospitality is a Greek compound word of phileo and xenia, meaning love of stranger found in the New Testament). Included are links to resources from the March 2 Standing with Refugees event.
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