Rev. Dr. Stephen Handy's Reflection on the Leadership Gathering

November 04, 2026

Rev. Dr. Stephen Handy

Lead Pastor at McKendree UMC and Associate to the District Superintendent.

Our gathering in Calgary centered on the new mission statement: The United Methodist Church forms disciples of Jesus Christ who, empowered by the Holy Spirit, Love Boldly, Serve Joyfully, and Lead Courageously in local communities and worldwide connections. In a sense, it was the Lord’s Gathering!

We convened at Knox Church, a congregation of the United Church of Canada (established as a Presbyterian church in 1883, it joined the church union in 1925). Our time together began Tuesday afternoon and concluded Saturday morning with worship. An estimated 300 people attended, clergy and laity from the United States and the Central Conferences around the world. Most promising were the 100 young adults among us. Because of visa issues, several of our African siblings could not attend in person, but they were able to join through an online cohort.

One of the joys of the Calgary gathering was reconnecting with old friends, meeting new siblings in Methodism, and discerning together what God is calling us to be and do in this season and beyond, because grace carries a responsibility!

Worship was diverse, engaging, joyful, and challenging. Each morning’s plenary featured several speakers. Afterward, we gathered in our assigned covenant groups of up to 20 diverse participants.

Highlights and questions from the plenary sessions:

• We are all stones on which Jesus desires to build the church.

• Refining discipleship will mean moving away from pathway language toward practices.

• Discipleship is the church’s shared, adaptive, often uncomfortable practice of building bridges across difference, where everyone is both a leader and a follower.

• Don’t confuse membership or attendance with discipleship.

• Our means of grace should be our curriculum.

• Will we instruct our children?

• What do we have that we didn’t receive from God?

• Holy friendship makes faithful discernment possible.

• Numbers don’t tell the story of transformation.

• Disciples have a set of ritual practices.

• The future is already here!

• Does the church understand what’s going on in people’s lives?

What we kept hearing, in both the plenaries and the cohorts, is that the church cannot be preoccupied with preservation (that is, with itself)!

Our covenant groups were spaces for prayer, listening, discernment, and holy conversation. Each person was assigned to one of five covenant cohorts: Discipleship, Leadership, Impact, Stewardship, and Accountability. Every group wrestled with the same overarching questions, and each cohort had three areas of focus. Discipleship, for example, included 1A – Innovative Forms of Discipleship, 1B – Empowering Younger Generations, and 1C – Amplifying Global Voices.

Our cohort conversations moved through three connected movements: Name It, Respond to It, and Imagine It.

Day One: Naming and Diagnosing Our Realities. Our first task was not to solve anything but to gain clarity. A Named Reality is a significant condition, change, challenge, opportunity, or tension shaping the life and mission of The United Methodist Church that requires our attention. It describes what is true now, and it may arise from cultural, technological, theological, demographic, economic, institutional, or ecclesial change. By the end of the day, we had named three realities.

Day Two: Moving from Named Reality to a Newly Living Practice. We revisited our three realities and engaged them more deeply and meaningfully. What have we missed? Whose voices have been absent? Where are theology, structure, and practice out of alignment? By the end of the day, each Named Reality had an emerging Newly Living Practice and a possible first step.

Day Three: Faithful Imagination. Here we pushed beyond incremental change. Faithful Imagination is the Spirit-led practice of envisioning possibilities beyond the church as it currently exists, while remaining rooted in the Gospel, our Wesleyan identity, and the needs and gifts of the communities we serve. It holds tradition and innovation together in tension. By the end of the day, each covenant group had identified and ranked three Newly Living Practice priorities, including the bold possibilities it believes deserve further experimentation.

My takeaways. First, the TWK is already doing some of this good work; our challenge is to stay focused on our discipleship priorities. Second, while The United Methodist Church in the United States is declining, the Central Conferences are growing. I asked God: What must we in the TWK do to learn from our siblings in the Central Conferences, and what would a two-week discipleship immersion experience look like? I was humbled and honored to represent the TWK Conference.

Finally, although no clear next steps emerged, I have faith that the Holy Spirit will disrupt how we as United Methodists in America form disciples of Jesus Christ, so that we may take part in revival and a renewed movement of God!