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Today, we join a million plus Free Methodist friends around the world in celebrating 157 years of life and ministry together as a freedom movement in companionship with Jesus our Messiah.
We celebrate the freedoms achieved for human beings through the loving self-giving of Jesus to death and then through death to Life–freedom in the Spirit of Jesus to be truly all God intends for the human person in relationship with others; freedom from the sins and arrogance of racial pride and prejudice; freedom from conflicting loyalties that dilute our allegiance to Jesus’ kingdom first; freedom from the confusions and corruptions of self-centered living; freedom from the false and idolatrous ideologies that prevail in the world; freedom from the disempowerment of women and young people fueled by sin-shaped systems slanted away from them. Yes, freedom to reach full God-imaged potential, to live clean and focused lives for the love of the One whose first love will re-create the whole world. Freedom to enter into collaboration with other Jesus’ followers to wage campaigns of Holiness and Shalom that set captives of all kinds free.
We celebrate but also we commit and covenant together for the next decades, trusting our loving and liberating Lord to empower us to be clear and compelling witnesses to His accomplishments for the sake of all people everywhere.
Make it so, Loving Lord!