In May of 2024, the United Methodist General Conference will meet to vote on keeping or removing the following statements from the Book of Discipline, the church by-laws.

• All persons are created in the Image of God and thereby are persons of sacred worth.
• The practice of homosexuality is incompatible with Christian teaching.
• Self-avowed, practicing homosexuals cannot be ordained to Word, Sacrament, and Order.

Due to Covid and the realities of being an international church with representatives from every part of the world, the General Conference has been delayed several times. Consequently, there are those United Methodist laypersons and pastors who have decided to leave the United Methodist Church and join the Global Methodist Church (created on May 1, 2022) or become independent congregations.
To date, in the Great Plains Annual Conference of the UMC (Kansas and Nebraska), 67 congregations (5.8% of all the congregations in the GPUMC) have decided to leave the UMC effective November 1, 2022.
Denominationally, it is estimated that about 15 to 20% of the churches in the UMC are anticipated to be leaving. 80% of the UMC’s 30,000 churches in the US – 24,000 churches – will remain in the UMC.
The Board of Directors of Chapel Hill United Methodist Church has decided not to make any decisions around these denominational issues before the General Conference meets in May of 2024. Once the General Conference meets and decides what is to be retained and what is to be removed from the Book of Discipline (By-laws), The Board of Directors will have two years to discern the future of Chapel Hill United Methodist Church.
Unfortunately, there is a lot of misinformation that is being shared by various groups which only serves the purpose of doing the work of the devil in the name of the Lord. If you want to learn more about the details, I would highly recommend you listen to the Rev. Adam Hamilton, Senior Pastor of the Church of Resurrection in Leawood. The website is: https://proudtobeumc.com/umcresources/
In order to stay focused on our all-church conversation around “The Good and Beautiful You,” my original plan to share a sermon and/or video, has been, with the Board’s approval, delayed until January.
With God’s help, we will be faithful to the mission entrusted to us, “To Welcome All People to Experience and Share the Extraordinary Grace and Love of Christ Jesus our Lord.”