Linda Scott, from North Naples UMC, and Simon Osunlana (front right), from St. John UMC - Ft. Lauderdale, pray for an Angolan patient (yellow shirt).

Editor's Note: This event has been postponed. Any updates will be posted as they become available.

With a renowned keynote speaker and pristine outdoor settings, the upcoming Mission: Ignite and Engage, offers Florida Conference church leaders and ministry valued time away. Scheduled for the weekend of Sept. 30 through Oct. 2, the event will be held at the Life Enrichment Center in Fruitland Park.

To further ignite participants’ passion for mission, the Florida Conference’s department of Missional Engagement will award four $500 mission scholarships to active Florida United Methodist Church members who attend our Mission Ignite & Engage Conference. Click here for the scholarship contest rules.

There are 13 workshops and five chat rooms designed to ignite ministries. “This will be a forum in which you can learn from each other, share best practices, and empower one another,” said Clarke Campbell-Evans, director of Missional Engagement for the conference. He also talked of how it will help in discovering new ways to engage with communities.

“This is a mission encounter for a conference that cares passionately about mission with our neighbors,” Campbell-Evans said.

The speaker is Dr. Dana L. Roberts, the Truman Collins Professor of World Christianity and History of Mission. Roberts is also the director of the Center for Global Christianity and Mission – and author of the book, Christian Mission: How Christianity Became a World Religion.

Bishop Ken Carter will also meet with participants as part of an effort to accomplish quadrennial goals of the denomination.

The chat rooms are designed to share best practices. Scheduled topics will include:

• Hunger ministries (food banks, soup kitchens, community meals, gardens and pack-a-sack)
• At-risk children ministries (mentoring, visitation and trafficking issues)
• Health Ministries (parish nurse, yoga, health clinics, weight-loss groups)
• Creation care (environmental, recycling, watershed, forestation and air quality)
• United Methodist response to the recent Orlando massacre

Workshops will offer a broad spectrum of interests including the following:

• How to Get Started with Church-School Partnerships
• Spirituality & Theology: The Mutuality of Mission (presented in English and Spanish)
• Mission and Money: Funding the Mission (presented in English and Spanish)
• Introduction to Missions: Mission 101 (presented in English and Spanish)
• The Haiti-Florida Covenant – Ways We Partner Together
• East Angola Florida Partnership: Working Together to Educate and Heal
• Young Adults in Mission (18-30 year old youth seeking to serve outside church walls)
• UMVIM Team Leader Training (UM volunteers in mission)
• Healthy Models for Mission: Zoe Ministries
• Methodists United in Prayer (Cuba-Florida partnership)
• Missionaries: Who They Are and How to Become One
• Palestinian-Christian Perspective on the Arab-Israeli Conflict (beyond news headlines)
• UMVIM: Mission Volunteer Training (breakout sessions including, immersion missions and mission trip training for youth leaders and pastors) 

The event opens Friday, Sept. 30 with dinner and opening worship. It concludes Sunday morning with breakfast, closing worship and sending forth. Click here for more details and to register.

Questions may be directed to Katherine Lain, Office of Missional Engagement, at 800-282-8011, ext. 146, or klain@flumc.org.