General Assembly is over

Well, the Church of God General Assembly in San Antonio is over and I am back home in Illinois. The GA was good in many respects, frustrating in others in that we were unable to bring about some needed changes. The most frustrating thing to me was that we were unable to get the measure to allow women to serve on the Pastor's Council approved. The measure was fiercely debated and then lost by only about 100 votes. To me, it is absolutely hypocritical that in the Church of God we have women who serve as pastors of churches, yet a women cannot serve on a council in that same church. We have women who have retired from pastoring or being a missionary or evangelist who sit in churches and are unable to serve. So hypocritical.

It was great to see friends from around the United States and around the world last week. A real highlight for me was to finally meet, face to face with Adam and Abisag Zygarewicz from Saint Petersburg, Russia. I have spoken to him by phone, email and letter and supported his work for about 7 years now, and it was a real pleasure to get to meet this precious family. We are discussing the possibility of setting up a trip for Adam to come back to the U.S. for a few weeks and preach in some of our churches to share what God is doing in Russia and help raise some very much needed funds for his ministry.