Reflections from G26 in Abua, Nigeria
by John Guernsey
My wife, Meg, and I were privileged to participate in Gafcon’s G26 conference in Abuja, Nigeria, last week. As a retired bishop, I wouldn’t have been invited, but my role as chair of the Trustees of Gafcon meant that I was to be there.
One of the blessings of these gatherings is the opportunity to reconnect with friends from across the globe one rarely gets to see. The Nigerian music team that led us each day was the same group that led Gafcon III in Jerusalem in 2018. A team from DOMA had coordinated the worship for that conference and had worked closely with this choir, and it was such a joy to reconnect with them (and to see Meg dancing with them in worship!).
Bishop Onesimus Asiimwe, a longtime friend, is now the Bishop of the rural Ugandan diocese which provided a home for All Saints’ Church in Woodbridge when we left the Episcopal Church in 2006. He shared how the Lord is at work in so many lives there, and I saw photos and videos of the 20,000 people, passionate to go deeper in Christ, who are gathering quarterly for their days of prayer and fasting.
Gafcon rests on the foundation of the Word of God, and so the conference, not surprisingly, featured strong Bible exposition each morning. The 12 conference talks were important reflections on the movement, where we are and where we’re headed. Significantly, no draft statement had been written when the conference began. After each set of three talks on a particular subject, all the attendees were given, through a newly created app, 15-20 paragraphs crafted from material in those three talks. We could indicate whether we did or did not support that paragraph, we could offer possible edits and say whether we would support it only if edited as we proposed. This was done after each of the four sections of the conference and again with the draft Conference Statement. It was the most open, responsive process for the creation of such a statement that I’ve ever experienced.
As you’ll have read elsewhere, this conference decided to leave the door wide open for all who affirm the Jerusalem Declaration to be a part of what is now being called the Global Anglican Communion. Since the Anglican Church in North America and our diocese affirm the Jerusalem Declaration in our Constitutions, that includes all of us.
I left Abuja encouraged, renewed and hopeful about the breadth and unity of our fellowship and our mission to proclaim Christ faithfully to the nations.
The Rt. Rev. John A. M. Guernsey is the first bishop of the Diocese of the Mid-Atlantic (retired).
