Pre-Conference Events (Optional)
Two optional pre-conference events will be offered this year, Ubuntu Day of Service and Mission Forward Symposium. They are both offered all day on Thursday, April 29. You can register for a pre-conference event when you register for Assembly. Because they are both happening on Thursday, you may only select one or the other.
Ubuntu Day of Service
“Umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu: A person is a person through other persons”
A South African saying
Ubuntu is a unique word, a concept, a worldview which captures the very essence what it is to be human. A Zulu phrase, Umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu says, “I am only because we are, and since we are, therefore I am.” It recognizes each human being as part of a community. Above all, it is a gathering of God’s people to celebrate God-with-us, Immanuel, who moves us to action on behalf of neighbor. Ubuntu is a celebration of being in community with people as mission.
Ubuntu Day of Service, a pre-conference experience on Thursday, April 29, is designed to celebrate mission as relational. Field Trips offer opportunities to experience how communities are impacted by persons and systems are how people are making a difference.
For $50, Ubuntu Day of Service includes:
- A day of giving back to the community
- Bus transportation to and from field trip sites, as well as service options at the America’s Center
- Lunch
- An Ubuntu Day T-shirt
Types of work opportunities are available. You can indicate your first, second, and third choices on the online registration form. Due to limited space, all selections are based on a first come, first serve basis.
- Administration: Filing, envelope stuffing, etc.
- Personal Interaction: After-school activities, arts and crafts, work with youth, teaching English as a second language, work with seniors.
- Light Work: Food bank help, packing, sorting items.
- Heavier Work: Yard work, painting, beautification projects, gardening.
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8:00-8:30am
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Gathering
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8:30-9:15
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Orientation
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9:15-9:45
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Commissioning Service
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9:45-10:00
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Assignments and Boarding Buses
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10:05
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Travel to Worksites/Inside Work Assignments
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12:00-2:00pm
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Lunch (Determined by worksite logistics)
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4:30
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Return to America’s Center
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4:30-7:00
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*Dinner on your own
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7:00
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Closing Celebration
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Mission Forward: Lay Women, Vocation & Calling
The Mission Forward Symposium, an optional pre-conference event on Thursday, April 29, offers an opportunity to learn where mission has been, the changes and shifts that have happened in being in mission, and how to engage in forward-looking mission. Mission scholars, mission practitioners and church leaders share their insights on mission.
In a one-day symposium, we will listen to presentations and panel discussions on:
- What is the multi-layered story of mission about?
- What are the stories of persistence?
- What is it to do mission in a pluralistic society?
- How does context determine mission within the U.S. and abroad?
- What is the nature of calling today?
- How to live into God’s calling for mission today and tomorrow?
We will have interactive conversations, music and visuals that engage us in the synergy of God’s mission inviting us to live into the story of transforming mission yet to be told.
For $50, Mission Forward includes:
- A series of panels on mission history, vocation and the future of mission
- Lunch
- Keynote address by Dana Robert, author of the 2010 Mission Study
- A packet of “Mission Forward” resources
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Worship Service |
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Keynote Address by Dana Robert, author of 2010 Mission Study, “World Mission in an Age of Global Christianity." |
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Panel I: |
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Lunch (Provided) |
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Panel II: |
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Panel III: Mission: Vocation & Calling |
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“A Charge to Keep” by Inelda González, President, UMW & Harriett J. Olson, Deputy General Secretary, Women’s Division. |