Congratulations, Dr. Melvin Mangana – General Secretary of the Convention of Philippine Baptist Churches

Dear General Secretary Mangana,

I join the cloud of witnesses today who offer their congratulations and who are praying for you and the CPBC we all love so much but often serve so poorly.

For your leadership for such a time as this, I invite you, Dr. Mangana, and your friends, colleagues, supporters and fellow church members, as well as those who challenge your leadership, in the exercise of your shared vocation, to consider the following:

• Lead in such a way that when someone thinks of fairness, kindness, and integrity, he or she will remember you;
  
• Follow in such a way that when someone faces diversity, inclusion, openness, or struggles to find one’s religious or spiritual home, she will remember you;
  
• Speak in such a way that when someone needs compassion, understanding, or safety, he will remember you;
  
• Listen in such a way that when someone needs hospitality, encouragement, or finding her own voice, he will remember you;
  
• Empower in such a way that when someone rises to question, protest, or challenge, he will remember you;
  
• Persevere in such a way that when someone insists on preserving their self-hood, their integrity, their humanity, she will remember you;
  
• Fight in such a way that when someone asks for protection, counsel, or accountability, he will remember you;
  
• Yield in such a way that when someone requires forgiveness, recognition, or gentleness, he or she will remember you;
  
• Engage in such a way that when someone dreams of dialogue, collaboration, or partnerships, including shared governance, he or she will remember you;
  
• Imagine in such a way that when someone aspires to the impossible, refuses the mediocre, and links the improbable to the desirable, he will remember you;
  
• Organize in such a way that when someone pursues “ecological excellence,” “the theological sustainable,” “the institutionally appropriate,” she will remember you;
  
• Create in such a way that when someone seeks to build, work with, or innovate within sluggish or intractable institutions, as well as inhospitable communities or societies, he will remember you;
  
• Pray in such a way that when someone struggles for justice, peace, and transformation, he or she will remember you.
  
• Above all, live in such a way that when someone seeks to heed God’s call, he or she will remember—not you, but the faith, hope, and love of Jesus Christ—and will believe that the greatest of these is love.

Go with God and with God’s people.

Lester
Member, Jaro Evangelical Church