Sun | May 19, 2024

‘Church needs to be sharing in the love of the world’

Rev Keum of Council for World Mission wants to spread message of unity across Caribbean

Published:Friday | May 3, 2024 | 12:15 AMAinsworth Morris/Staff Reporter
From left: Rev Dr Jooseop Keum, general secretary at the Council for World Mission; Mrs Jennifer Martin, author of the Beyond Reflection for Action book; Rev Carlene Walford, chair of the Finance and Administrative Support Group, Caribbean and North Americ
Antoine Lodge
From left: Rev Dr Jooseop Keum, general secretary at the Council for World Mission; Mrs Jennifer Martin, author of the Beyond Reflection for Action book; Rev Carlene Walford, chair of the Finance and Administrative Support Group, Caribbean and North America Council for Mission; and Rev Norbert Stephens, general secretary of the United Church of Jamaica and the Cayman Islands, looking at a copy of the book Beyond Reflection for Action at the book launch held at the King’s Gate United Church in Kingston yesterday.

On Sunday when the United Church in Jamaica and the Cayman Islands meets in Montego Bay for their first convocation in six years, Reverend Dr Jooseop Keum, general secretary, Council for World Mission, will have a message to deliver about unity.

While speaking at a book launch for the book titled Mission 2023 and Beyond Reflection for Action held at the King’s Gate United Church on Hope Road yesterday, Dr Keum said he wants to challenge the United Church in Jamaica because he wants to see them continuing to do mission work and inviting others into the Christian faith.

Dr Keum is now in the island from Korea, where he serves as a Presbyterian pastor. He will be a guest brining greetings on behalf of the Council for World Mission to the United Church at the Montego Bay Convention Centre, where the event will be held.

“The Church can easily be centric institutions, but God built church in this world to be [a] foretaste of the Heaven [and] to be God’s love in the world, so if church serves only for self-preservation, it is not church any longer. So church needs to be the sharing of the love in the world,” D Keum told The Gleaner.

“The United Church in Jamaica and Cayman Islands (UCJCI) has played a significant role leading this global community of churches doing mission together. Particularly, the UCJCI has been a source of new inspiration in doing God’s mission, so first of all, I would like to be challenging the church here: What is God’s mission today, and how we can participate in doing together God’s mission by the churches all over the world?” he said.

Secondly, Dr Keum said he is here to learn about the issues that threaten life in the Caribbean region and also to be guided by the churches and support their missions and charity work in the region.

“Also, we would like to connect other countries like Cuba, Haiti, Suriname, Trinidad and Tobago, and other Caribbean countries through the church here,” he said.

Sunday’s convocation event in the Second City will be held under the theme ‘Re-Ignited by the Spirit’.

It will be the first gathering of its kind for this religious group since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Prior to the pandemic, it would have been held biennially.

Dr Keum will also be visiting some of their institutions and working alongside some of their leaders as part of his official visit.

The book launch was one of the numerous activities lined up by the UCJCI for him to attend.

The book was produced and published by Caribbean and North America Council for Mission and edited by Jennifer Martin and Diana deGraven.

ainsworth.morris@gleanerjm.com