Meeting Minutes List

Describe the item or answer the question so that site visitors who are interested get more information. You can emphasi1
DRAFT Minutes from Kingdom Advancement Commission
Thursday, February 12, 2026
Bishop in Attendance: Kimba Evariste
Members in Attendance: Wes Griffin, Paul Lawler, Linda Davis, Sherri Tabaka-Morrissey, Max Wilkins, Kabah Kasongo Mwenze, Steve Cordle, Simon Mafunda, Mariela Mihailova, Jeff Jernigan, Luciano Pereira da Silva, YoonHee Kang, Mwenge Muyombi, Fe Olonan, Musa Danjuma Omar, Heather Carter-Young, Terry Vanderslice, Amber Tolbert, Greg West
Staff Liaison in Attendance: Teresa Marcus
Welcome and Opening Prayer - Wes Griffin & Paul Lawler
Devotion – Amber Tolbert
Amber shared a brief report from her and Heather’s January trip to the Middle East with GMC missional partner, Impact Middle East. IME’s work among persecuted churches and refugees has recently seen a significant increase in Muslim background believers, possibly aligned with the spread of awakening since the Asbury outpouring. She highlighted the crucial work of discipling the next generation of believers in these regions and recounted the story of a young man whose evangelism efforts among Muslim youth cost him jail time and heavy fines. Believers there have counted the cost to follow and proclaim Jesus and are more than willing to pay the price. She encouraged the commission to persevere in their work, despite lack of local church support for some, noting that God is moving and working through their efforts.
Minutes from Thursday, October 2, 2025
The minutes were approved via email in November 2025. Minutes will now be submitted via email for approval and comments so we can meet the new requirement for timely Commission meeting summaries.
General Updates - Wes Griffin and Paul Lawler
The ABLAZE Initiative is a new effort from the Kingdom Advancement operations team aimed at providing church planter training, Engage missions mobilization training, and disaster response training across conferences on an annual basis. It begins as a three-year initiative with goals to expand across the GMC over the next three years. Initial trainings will take place in Central Asia (Kyrgyzstan), West Africa (Abuja), Nairobi, and Johannesburg prior to General Conference.
2026 budgets were approved and teams are updating their 2026 Strategic Plans and working on their three-year plans. The Commission’s operations team is in strategic conversations with other
2
commissions to ensure we are working synergistically. The Commission is also considering legislation needed to strengthen our Book of Doctrines and Discipline, particularly around the areas of church multiplication, cross-cultural workers, and evangelism. Be aware of conversations coming out of annual conferences and other commissions that might help us in this regard.
The GMC now numbers 7,111 churches around the world. Global planning is still in preliminary stages, but the team is working to design a strategic planning framework prior to General Conference. The team is focused on creating a culture of equipping at the general church, annual conference, and local church levels. Of particular importance is selecting bishops who don’t simply manage systems but who have apostolic giftings and histories of equipping and multiplying disciples.
It’s time to consider commission nominations for General Conference 2026. Those interested in continuing to serve on Kingdom Advancement should contact their conference officials. Current members are qualified and encouraged to continue serving.
TEAM UPDATES
Church Multiplication and Evangelism - Max Wilkins and Steve Cordle
Much of the expansion from just over 4,000 to more than 7,000 churches has come from denominational transfers. Long-term vitality requires growth through evangelism, new believers, and disciple-making. Moving forward, multiplication of disciples and churches must be the primary strategy for denominational growth and mission impact.
Rapid development is occurring in emerging areas such as Western Europe, India and neighboring nations, Brazil, Pakistan, Vietnam, and multiple Latin American countries, with some of the fastest growth occurring in challenging or restricted contexts. The creation of regional leadership teams in
seven of the eight global regions has strengthened the church’s ability to coordinate evangelism, church planting, and discipleship initiatives worldwide. While more than 400 new church plants were documented in 2025, there is a need for improved systems to gather reliable data and assess the effectiveness of multiplication efforts.
Looking ahead to 2026, the team will shift from a focus on organizational development to active implementation of disciple-making, evangelism, and church multiplication strategies. Strategic training for apostolic leaders will combine Methodist theological foundations with practical training in evangelism, discipleship, and multiplication strategies. Another key priority is recognizing, mobilizing, and releasing lay leaders to plant churches. Clergy educational expectations will require flexibility to sustain a multiplying church movement. Conferences are encouraged, though not mandated, to develop church planting leadership and structures, maintaining a “ground-up” approach that allows regional teams to shape the culture and DNA of emerging areas.
3
Missions Mobilization and Unreached People Groups - Sherri Tabaka-Morrisey
The GMC must function as a movement, not merely an institution, so the focus is on cultivating a culture where churches actively engage in mission rather than simply maintain inherited structures. The Acts 1:8 Mission Engagement Health Check will be available soon and is a mission planning resource to guide local churches in engaging mission at local, regional, and global levels. It provides a structured approach to help churches think strategically about their missional calling. A key emphasis is ensuring that mission efforts prioritize evangelism and disciple-making. Engage Training equips churches to think about mission in different cultural and ministry contexts. The program, which initially launched in the MidSouth Conference with six regional training events has expanded there from six to sixteen locations and is being integrated with other training opportunities and conference gatherings.
Accountability metrics will be important in ensuring churches measure outcomes that reflect their missional values and priorities. The Acts 1:8 Award helps to do this and encourages churches to pursue holistic mission engagement and prayer. The recognition is intended to inspire commitment rather than function merely as an achievement.
The Resource Library website is being developed as a central resource hub with over 1,600 resources and materials in 25 languages, including content for discipleship, mission, partnerships, prayer, and mobilization. The development of missional partnerships and transitional partners is ongoing. Quarterly gatherings for leaders engaged in transitional partnerships will begin in April.
Upcoming priorities include sustainable community development, formation of missional collectives, and expanded collaboration with other commissions and GMC leadership bodies, particularly Just Ministries.
Disaster Response - Linda Davis
This Commission and this team are not gathered merely for administration but for a holy assignment. God calls His church beyond maintenance into mission and beyond preservation into proclamation, and the team works to steward that calling faithfully. In reviewing the 2025 accomplishments and the 2026 strategic plan, the team looks ahead to their upcoming April meeting where each strategic priority will continue to be refined. One important focus is engaging with the Voluntary Organizations Active in Disaster (VOAD), a network of volunteer groups active in disaster response, with a vision of activating collaboration on a global scale. There is great anticipation around a deployment to Jamaica March 6–18 for the installation of a $50,000 water purification system. The team is in need of incident commanders to join that work team. Alongside these initiatives, strategic disaster response training events are being planned to strengthen preparedness and expand impact across global response efforts.
In addition to the number of responses handled by the team, many more disaster responses are handled at the local church and conference levels.
4
Bishop Evariste affirms that the Disaster Response team always provides a prompt response to requests for assistance and thanks them for their support in eastern Congo and Burundi.
Additional Updates, Questions, Discussion
Please review the 2025 Executive Summary for the Kingdom Advancement Commission that we submitted to the Assembly of Bishops, Connectional Council and other Commissions. It is a powerful testimony of God’s work through the Kingdom Advancement Team around the world.
Bishop Evariste celebrates the wonderful work of the Kingdom Advancement Commission and challenged us to stay united, support each other, and pray for the church.
Upcoming Meetings
March 14-16, 2026 (In-Person) ∙ July 9, 2026 ∙ October 1, 2026
9am Eastern Time (New York)
Length: Two Hours
Via Zoom
https://us06web.zoom.us/j/6772364252?pwd=dStIbHdIV3czcHJRSGtHT0E1VUxQUT09
Closing Prayer – Bishop Kimba Evariste
Adjourned at 10:42am ETze this text with bullets, italics or bold, and add links.