Greetings Trinity Family,
Jesus said, “Open your eyes and look at the fields! They are ripe for harvest.” John 4:35b (NIV).
“The harvest” is not an abstract idea or a lofty vision to promote. The harvest represents souls. There are people living throughout our communities who need to know Jesus Christ, experience the transforming grace and holy love of God, and become part of worshiping communities where they are growing as disciples.
This is why I’m grateful for the lay and clergy leaders across our Trinity Conference who are helping us put our Equipping for the Harvest Strategic Plan into practice. Approved by our Annual Conference in College Station last June, our Plan has three goals to achieve over the next three years:
An important first step toward Equipping Every Disciple to Make Disciples is answering a foundational question together: What do we mean when we say “disciple”?
To help answer that question, I invited a team of lay and clergy leaders from across the Conference to spend an entire day working through a shared definition and the rationale behind it. They brought perspectives from our local churches, examined its biblical grounding, and worked toward broad agreement on what it means to follow Jesus and help others follow Him.
I’m pleased to share that the Connectional Council recently approved the resulting definition and supporting rationales: A disciple is someone becoming like Jesus.
These few words reflect the thoughtful work of many people and speak to the heart of our Wesleyan faith. Becoming like Jesus means growing in holiness, moving toward what we in Methodism call entire sanctification, or Christian perfection: hearts made perfect in love for God and neighbor. This was a central theme of our 2026 General Conference in South Africa, The Beauty of Holiness, echoing the call of Scripture to “be holy, because I am holy” (1 Peter 1:16).
Guided by the Holy Spirit, we pursue each of these practices daily as God’s grace shapes us to reflect Jesus in our everyday relationships.
This is an early but important step in an ongoing, shared effort. Lay and clergy leaders will continue to polish these core practices as we work to equip local churches with the tools to successfully establish a clear discipleship pathway; the shared outcome we committed to at Annual Conference.
I invite you to pray for this work and begin a conversation within your own congregation: How are we helping people become like Jesus, and how can we intentionally extend this effort in our local context?
Your experience and engagement matters. I’m eager to witness what God can do as we learn from one another, follow Jesus together, and help others do the same.
Peace,
Jason Burnham
Conference Superintendent
