Celebrating Fruitfulness
My dad moved in 1946 to an Illinois farm with a few pear trees.
Two trees still stand. One bore no fruit last year, but the other yielded an abundance despite its estimated age: 150.
A Danvers, Mass., pear tree is particularly worth celebrating. The tree continues to bear fruit even though it was planted in the 1600s.
Our bishops have called us to “Celebrate Fruitfulness” (fmcusa.org/uniquelyfm): “We will increase the number of growing and fruitful Free Methodist churches by encouraging and aiding successful leaders and their ministries. We will tell the story of these ministries to the rest of the denomination.”
You’ll find several stories of fruitfulness in this issue. Let’s celebrate our churches’ fruit.
A Fruitful Life
After this magazine relaunched in 2011, LLM asked several FM pastors to serve as unpaid advisers. The advisory panel included Joanne Green-Colon, a co-pastor of Heart & Soul Community Church in Rochester, N.Y., and an adjunct instructor at Northeastern Seminary.
Green-Colon died Dec. 16, 2013, a week after giving birth to her second child. Please pray for her family and visit heartandsoulchurch.com and fmchr.ch/jgcfund to learn more about her fruitful service to Christ.
Downloadable PDF: LLM February 2014
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Features
- Table of Contents
- [Feature]: Called to Fruitfulness and Growth
- [Bishops]: Tasty Church
- [Foundation]: Fruit Matters
- [History]: Fruit Around the World
- [Action]: New Fruit in River City
- [News and Briefs]: Bishops Share Vision for the Church
- [World]: Freedom Sunday: A Catalyst for Action
- [Discipleship]: Finding and Growing Fruitful Leaders