Donald Ward is the pastor of FUMC in Colorado City, TX and is our second featured pastor in our fall 2019 Coffee with a Pastor series. This series is a project of our NWTX Strategic Plan Innovation Team and Small Church Task Force.
To watch previous episodes of Coffee With A Pastor, click the links below:
Mission Volunteers are individuals or couples (ages 18 and up), who seek long-term partnerships with communities around the world. Mission Volunteer opportunities are diverse and range from working with refugees, children and youth, serving as a teacher, pastor, camp director or health care professional. The length of service ranges from two months to more than two years.
El Vergel Agricultural School is seeking a gardener and groundskeeper for 6 months to a year who will maintain the garden, manage the garden club within the school and teach volunteers ecological practices.
McCurdry Ministries Community Center is seeking a summer camp assistant for three months or more to monitor classrooms, chaperone classroom field trips, and assist with any other program needs.
To find more information and apply for these placement openings contact the Mission Volunteer Office directly at mv@umcmission.org. For a complete list of placement sites requesting long-term volunteers visit our website at https://www.umcmission.org/serve-with-us/mission-volunteers.
Welcome to our fall 2019 Coffee with a Pastor series. This series is a project of our NWTX Strategic Plan Innovation Team and Small Church Task Force. This is a four episode mini series interviewing small church pastors from around the NWTX Conference. Each has a unique voice of experience in our local churches.
The first episode features Wendell Horn, current Director of Mission and Administration of the NWTX Conference Office but no stranger to small town, rural West Texas churches.
At our 2019 Annual Conference gathering, the NWTX Annual Conference committed focus on the orphan. Here is a glimpse of what was presented this past June.
This Sunday, October 20, 2019 is the kick off Sunday for the 2020 Vision.
Below are 7 Steps for Planning Orphan Sunday in your churches.
7 Steps for Planning Orphan Sunday:
1) Select any Sunday from October 20, 2019 to September 20, 2020 that works for your congregation and worship team to set apart as a special Sunday. (Note that November 10, 2019 is National Orphan Sunday, and April 26, 2020 is Blue Sunday)
2) Study Scripture about our vertical adoption as God's children through the work of Jesus Christ. (John 1:12-13, Galatians 4:4-5, Romans 8:15 are good places to start) Study Scripture about our horizontal adoption responsibility as God's people to the fatherless in our society. (Jeremiah 7:1-6, Psalm 82:3, James 1:27 are good places to start)
3) Prepare a Sermon about the grace we receive in vertical adoption and the work of mercy in horizontal adoption in the community (local), conference (ex: 2020 vision), church. (ex: Methodist children's Home) and around the world.
4) Ask an Orphan Advocate to give a 10 minute presentation during the worship service; if you have a family with adoption/foster kids, ask them to share about how faith played a part in their decision to adopt/foster - and if not, ask someone from a support agency in your community to give a presentation about the work of their organization. (ex: Local Adoption Agency, CASA Advocates, Child Welfare Board members, County Rainbow Room/ CPS workers, or anyone locally involved in Orphan care in your community).
5) Plan the Worship Service to include liturgy, hymns, praise songs, and/or special music which gives worship to God for adopting us!
6) Take up a Special Offering as your Finance Committee sees fit. (from a one-time rail offering, monthly communion offering, Christmas offering, or year-long offering)
7) Turn in the Offering by writing a check to the Northwest Texas Conference Office on or after September 20, 2020. (with "2020 Vision Offering" in the memo line, and indicate the gift on your EZRA report in January, 2021)
Below is a testimony from Kim and Rhonda on how vertical and horizontal adoption has impacted their lives.
Download the following graphics for Sunday service use and social media.
2020 Vision - Facebook Cover Banner
2020 Vision - Instagram Square
If you would like to use either of the videos above in your services or promotions and need more that the youtube links above, please email Jaime at montgomery@nwtxconf.org for the original video files.
NWTX Conference passed legislation to raise awareness of the orphan crisis and need for care in our region and around the world. Between October 20, 2019 and September 20, 2020, each congregation will observe at least one "Orphan Sunday" to celebrate the spiritual adoption of Christians into the family of God, and to spotlight adoption/foster/kinship families, agencies, and support agencies in its community.
Additionally, a special offering will be taken up over the course of those eleven months from all participating congregations, as the initial funding for an endowment with NWTX Conference. Beginning in 2021, the annual interest from this endowment will be awarded to selected applicants in need of financial assistance for foster/adoption costs, as overseen by the NWTX Conference.
Employees who make less than $35,568 are now eligible for overtime pay under a final rule issued today by the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL). The new rate will take effect Jan. 1, 2020.
To be exempt from overtime under the federal Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), employees must be paid a salary of at least the threshold amount and meet certain duties tests. If they are paid less or do not meet the tests, they must be paid 1 1/2 times their regular hourly rate for hours worked in excess of 40 in a workweek.
The new rule will raise the salary threshold to $684 a week ($35,568 annualized) from $455 a week ($23,660 annualized).
Reaction from church leaders in situations like this is mostly one of confusion and, perhaps, dismay, i.e. “Do we need to pay our youth director overtime when she takes our kids to camp for a week?”
The answer is, at least at this point, “Maybe.”
Ultimately, it will be up to each church or church entity to determine whether the Department of Labor (DOL) rules apply. But here is some basic information to help in making this decision.
The Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) establishes a minimum wage, overtime pay, record keeping, and youth employment standards . The DOL has the authority to define the rules of the FLSA through regulations.
In general, hourly-paid workers or employees who earn below a certain amount - non-exempt workers - are protected by the act and are to be paid overtime pay at a rate of one-and-one-half times regular pay after 40 hours of work in a work week.
Workers who are not protected – exempt employees – are those that earn more than the regulated threshold amount and are considered to be professional, administrative, or executive employees. Please investigate the definitions for these classifications before you assume that your administrative assistant is really an “administrative” worker.
Ministers are not covered under FLSA regulations. Of course, we must determine who is a minister. Under IRS rules youth directors, ministers of music, children’s ministry directors, unless licensed or ordained and under Episcopal appointment, are not considered to be “ministers.” Whether that same definition applies to the FLSA is uncertain.
Other church workers might be subject to the overtime rules if they meet the “enterprise coverage” or the “individual coverage” criteria.
Most churches will not meet the “enterprise coverage” test. To meet the enterprise coverage test a church (or other non-profit) must have over $500,000 of revenue other than from donations, contributions or grants. Therefore, unless a church has a daycare or school that is not separately incorporated, the church will not be subject to the overtime rules under the enterprise coverage test.
It is, however, under the “individual coverage” test that churches might find that some or all of their employees are covered under the FLSA.
To be covered under the “individual coverage” test, an employee must be engaged in interstate commerce. On the surface, it would seem that church employees are not engaged in interstate commerce, at least as the original drafters of the FLSA back in the 1930s would have defined interstate commerce.
Although it may seem a stretch, employees may be considered to be in interstate commerce if they regularly make phone calls to people located in other states, regularly handle records of interstate transactions, or regularly travel to other states for business purposes. Even regularly sending emails to persons in another state might be sufficient to make these employees covered employees under the individual coverage test.
Now it must be noted that our United Methodist legal counsel have indicated that the Department Labor is not looking to draw every entity that uses email or that has a website under the purview of the FLSA. If the activities of interstate commerce described above are infrequent, immaterial and trivial, the DOL is probably not going to be knocking at your church door.
However, it should be noted that if an entity is found to have violated the overtime rules, that employer will be required to pay any overtime pay owed plus a penalty of 100% of that pay.
It is unlikely that we will receive a blanket exemption from the DOL rules. However, as more information and guidance becomes available, we will pass that along as it is received. In the meantime, if you have any questions, please contact Dave Andersen, Chief Financial Officer and Conference Benefits Officer at Andersen@nwtxconf.org.
It can easily be said the United Methodist denomination, like our nation has experienced periods of great unity and periods of great division. African Americans have experienced the implications of both these divisions more than most, yet has remained hopeful for a future of unity in ways The United Methodist Church as a whole should quickly learn from.
This was evident at Trinity United Methodist Church in Snyder, Texas on Sunday, August 25th, where over 66+ individuals from Trinity UMC Snyder, Visionary Hollowell United Methodist Church in Midland, Mackey Chapel in Odessa, Mt. Vernon UMC in Lubbock, Trent UMC in Trent and others came together to worship together and celebrate the future of The Black Methodist for Church Renewal (BMCR), the organized Black caucus of The United Methodist Church.
Boasting an average of 80 years in ministry in the Northwest Texas and New Mexico Conferences, these black congregations have served in ministry faithfully in their neighborhoods in beautiful and profound ways, honoring God by their witness in the world.
Larry Rodgers, pastor of Trinity United Methodist spoke of the history of The Black Methodist for Church Renewal movement, tracing its heritage from the Central Jurisdiction to The United Methodist Church’s in the United States, while also speaking of the Methodist’s Church split due to the Civil War and its aftermath and the impact it had on the Black Methodist movement. Larry reminded us that though division occurred, and eventual uniting again, we have always been one. One in the Spirit, One in baptism, One in the Kingdom of God.
This sentiment was continued by Pastor Quinton Gibson, pastor of Mt. Vernon UMC in Lubbock, who called us to get R.E.A.L. We need to be Restored, seek Excellence, be Accountable to the Lord, and be Liberated, living in the freedom God has bought for us.
President of the Northwest Texas & New Mexico Conference’s BMCR Wendell Smith, Pastor of Visionary Hollowell in Midland, concluded the day by having all in attendance join hands together and understand that the future of these congregations and also the future of The United Methodist Church rests in the hands of those gathered together here. Supporting one another as we raise up leaders in these communities and congregations is done by working together and being willing to step into that leadership role.
Would you consider praying for the BMCR, their leaders and their spouses as they undertake this important work in our conference? Wendell Smith, President and his wife Lisa, Larry Rodgers, Vice President and his wife Lillie, Stephania Gilkey, Treasurer and her husband Gerald. For more information about how to be involved, feel free to contact the Conference Office!
