Bishop promotes clusters to reconnect the connection

By Erik Alsgaard*

Bishop Timothy Whitaker preaches at a "plantation cluster" worship service in Pompano Beach, Fla., as Aurilus Desmornes translates the sermon into Creole. UMNS photos by Erik Alsgaard.

POMPANO BEACH, Fla. (UMNS)-For anyone unsure what the United Methodist "connection" means, consider the "cluster."

The "connection" is a concept that began with Methodism founder John Wesley to refer to the entire church organization. Local churches are not independent entities but rather are connected and in relationship with one another, as well as with annual conferences.

However, many clergy today view the connection as "a kind of institutional mechanism," according to Florida Bishop Timothy W. Whitaker.

The leader of the church's Florida Annual (regional) Conference shared that assessment while speaking Jan. 27 to clergy and lay leaders from eight Florida churches that are informally known as a "plantation cluster."

Whitaker said the early Methodist Church viewed the connection as necessary. "All of the societies, later congregations, were parts of circuits," he said. "Whenever you had quarterly conferences, they all came together for a time of worship and to be held accountable for their ministry. The experience that Methodists had in (early) America was one where all the different congregations came together."

The bishop launched Florida's cluster plan in 2005 after the conference went from 14 to nine districts. Designed to complement the connection, Florida's clusters are sprouting new ministries and bearing fruit but also are sometimes not working at all. The bishop's visit to the regular plantation cluster meeting at Pompano Beach United Methodist Church was designed to show his support for what he considers a vital link in the denomination.

"Asking congregations to be in clusters was a way to try and experience again what the connection once was-a living relationship with one another," Whitaker said.

Corporate culture
The bishop offered his own theory of why United Methodist churches gradually have become more autonomous.

"Our church tended to follow the culture in American society," he said. "In the middle of the 20th century, American culture was dominated by certain kinds of corporations and bureaucracies. Our church started patterning our life after them, and that's when each individual congregation started seeing itself as standing alone and each pastor saw him or herself as having a relationship only to the church to which she or he was assigned."

By trying to mimic corporate life, Whitaker said, United Methodism lost some of its customs. "As we all know, that culture has pretty much disappeared, but it survives in our church."

The plantation cluster is one group that is beginning to experience more connections among its churches.

At the cluster-led worship service during Whitaker's visit, more than 300 people prayed for each other and their churches, listened to the Sanctified New Jerusalem Mission choir sing in Creole and celebrated communion.

For the Rev. Debbie McLeod, superintendent of the Florida Conference's South East District, it was a wonderful evening.

"This was a great experience of vibrancy in worship tonight," she said following worship. "This is a lot what The United Methodist Church looks like in Southeast Florida. … We're no longer all white. It's a wonderful thing for people to come together and experience Christ."

McLeod sees a strong benefit in churches coming together, like those in the plantation cluster, to do ministry or just be together.

"In South Florida, the communities are very fragmented," she said. "The churches can become like silos, and it's hard for people, even though at work and school they know people from other cultures. It's hard for the church to really be the Kingdom. Having a chance to come together with other United Methodists who may worship in a different language or come from a different culture or country is a wonderful way of being together in Christ."

Modeling the Kingdom
The Rev. Mary Beth Packard, pastor at Norland United Methodist Church in Miami, said being in the cluster has been helpful. She said the church recently went through a painful process of losing its previous pastor, and cluster members literally showed up and prayed with and for that congregation.

"The cluster has also helped me to learn about the diversity of culture, both within and outside the congregation," she said. "They've helped me deal with my own prejudices and assumptions."
Jonas Milice leads the Sanctified New Jerusalem Christian Mission, which served as host congregation for the worship service. His church is growing as it reaches out to the Haitian community in Pompano Beach.

"The church is having a big explosion," he said. "When we became United Methodist church, God gave us a bigger place, a nice sanctuary to worship in."

Milice and his wife started the church three years ago in a storefront and recently began worshiping in the sanctuary at Pompano Beach United Methodist Church. Today, they have more than 300 people in worship, a youth group of more than 25 and a choir of 30.

Milice and his church are new members of the plantation cluster, a connection he welcomes with open arms. "God has blessed us; God makes us a good explosion," Milice said. "We're from Haiti. A lot of people have immigration problems, but God keeps moving with us. We feel the Holy Spirit with us when we worship. I want people to pray for us, pray for me."

Whitaker said the conference gives clusters freedom to determine how to organize. Some have organized around geography, some around ethnicity and some on doing ministry together. "We have a cluster in Port Orange that is starting a new congregation this year," he said. "They came together and decided they were being led to start a new congregation."

Whitaker mentioned another cluster in which a mega church is working with churches in the poorest communities of its region. This move frees the mega church from being isolated from the poorest members of its community and offers support to the smaller churches in the cluster.

One cluster in rural North Florida has started a creative outreach program. After learning about a high concentration of single mothers in their community, cluster leaders began asking how they could reach out to that group. One church's spare room was Laundromat, and church members offered to babysit for mothers doing their laundry.

Breaking down barriers
Whitaker dreams that clustering with help the church break down the walls of segregation.

"I heard about your cluster, not as one that was focused on doing something, but as a cluster of churches that represented people of different ethnic communities who came together for worship, in order to build a spirit of unity among different communities," Whitaker said.

"We have very diverse congregations, ethnically, in our conference," he said. "So often, though being in the same locale, there's no real interaction. Clusters encourage people to come together."

Whitaker estimates one-third of the conference's clusters are doing exceedingly well. Another third are in a somewhat "awkward" place and seeking to figure out where the Holy Spirit is guiding them. For the final third, the cluster concept is not working well.

"It does take time if a cluster is going to be a means of grace," he said. "It takes patience to build relationships. You can't live the Christian life all by yourself."

*Alsgaard is director of communications for the Florida Annual Conference. This article first appeared in e-Review, the online news service of the Florida Annual Conference.