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19 Jul

July 19, 2025 |

While most of the photos you will see and the stories you will hear of this year’s national conference, it is important to note that one of the primary reasons we gather as a denominational body every two years is to do the business of the denomination. This includes hearing reports presented by national directors, discussing and voting on discipline revision proposals, and electing denominational leaders. 

Director Reports

This year we welcomed Dr. Robert Pepper, President of Huntington University, to the stage to report as the Director of Higher Education. This was the first time many of us had met Dr. Pepper, and he was eager to share what he has learned about HU since he moved to town as well as his vision for what is ahead for the university under his leadership. 

You can read Dr. Pepper’s report along with the reports from other national directors here.

Discipline Revision

In 2024, Bishop Todd Fetters assembled a task force, led by Pastor Gary Dilley, to take a fresh look at how the United Brethren Discipline defines “church.” Historically, it had been defined by a certain number of members living within a specified radius of the church building. However, as culture shifts and the church expands, new expressions of the church are coming into existence that are no longer bound by a physical location or membership from a geographical radius. 

This task force spent months examining and scrutinizing, through biblical, theological, and historical reviews, our traditional definition of a local church. They developed a white paper to present to the conference based on their work along with fourteen proposals for discipline revision. All fourteen proposals passed, some with a few minor wording adjustments. 

Election Results

The final important piece of business of the meeting involved electing the Bishop and four members of the Executive Leadership Team. Tim Sherman, chair of the nominating committee, presented the ballots for those positions, and votes were cast. The results were as follows:

Office of Bishop

Todd Fetters was elected to another four-year term.

Executive Leadership Team

Brent Leichty (east region) and Jason Holliday (west region) were elected as clergy representatives.

Tyler Bates (central region) and Bob Tobey (north region) were elected as lay representatives. 

And one more thing…

 

We took the opportunity to celebrate Cathy Reich, whose love and passion for the church have been evident for the 27 years she served at the United Brethren National Office. Cathy retired in the fall of 2024 but was able to pop back in to help us with a few details leading up to this conference.

We will share more about the conference in the coming days, including photos from the week and videos of the worship sessions.    

15 Jul

July 15, 2025 |

The Grand Wayne Center in Fort Wayne, Indiana is full of energy as people begin to arrive for the 2025 United Brethren Nationsl Conference. It’s good to see so many pastors, delegates and UB families walking the familiar halls of the convention center and catching up on life and ministry since the last time they saw one another.

The conference officially kicks off this evening at 6:30 with worship service lead by Chris and Bethany Solyntjes from Renew Communities and featuring keynote speaker, Rob Wegner. If you are unable to join us in person for worship, you are invited to join us via livestream. This link will be available for every worship service this week — Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday at 6:30 pm and Friday at 9:00 am. Live streams will begin 5 minutes before each service with a welcome and conclude with an interview after service with our keynote speaker.

You can also keep an eye on our facebook page for photos and videos of the conference as it happens.

Are you ready? Let’s move!

10 Jul

July 10, 2025 |

As many of you prepare for National Conference next week, we wanted to make you aware of a few updates we have made to the downloadable reports, primarily dealing with the numbering of those reports. The document titled, List of Reports, is accurate and has the reports numbered correctly. However the reports they refer to have been numbered incorrectly until now. They are being corrected and will be re-uploaded by noon today.

One other change has been made to the Rules and Procedures page. The date has been changed in item 35 from 2022 to 2024.

We apologize for any confusion and inconvenience this may have caused, but we want to ensure we are all working from the same documents when we arrive for the business session next Wednesday morning.

02 Jul

July 2, 2025 |

National Conference begins two weeks from today and we are looking forward to seeing so many of you there. For those who may have missed the registration deadline, we have good news. We have extended the deadline to Monday, July 7. If you or others in your congregation are still planning to attend, you can still register here.

The reports for the business session have also been posted on the conference webpage and are available for download. If you are serving as a ministerial or lay delegate for the conference, please take a moment to download those documents and read through them before you arrive. We will be adding a few additional documents in the coming days as well, so be sure to visit that page a couple of times this week to ensure you have everything you need to prepare for the conference business session.

Please note, hard copies of these documents will not be provided on site at conference. If you prefer a hard copy, you will need to print it before you leave home.

The countdown is on… We’ll see you soon!