I've  been asked by two different people, maybe more: "Can you please tell us in a sermon what you're all about.  Can you tell us about yourself, what you're thinking and what is your vision for the church."  We'd like you to speak about this the next time, or, the first time officially as president of the United Church of God here in Cincinnati.

Well, to be very honest, I'm a little bit uncomfortable to put myself forward about any kind of my vision or any statements of that sort.  I think it's a fair question to say and to ask, what do I think, what is my background, where do I come from, what are some of the characteristics that make for what I am because I will be president here for the next three years?

I'd like to tell you a little bit about the timeline of how things have happened because literally three months ago I had no idea that this would turn out this way.  This could not have been planned, this was not orchestrated in any way.  This was not in any way dreamed of, in fact it was even resisted as to where I've come to at this point.  Things have happened so fast.  On February 24th, Sunday, which is not that long ago, Mr. Luker, Mr. Denny Luker told Robin Webber and me on a Sunday morning that he was going to retire from the position of president which didn't shock me.  I knew that Denny wasn't feeling very good, but I didn't realize that he said that he would retire and that it was final and he didn't want any further discussion about it and he was going to announce it to the Council of Elders the next day which was February 25th.  This was unsettling because I really had no idea.  I knew that he wasn't feeling well.  I said: "Denny, you're just not feeling good right now and you're thinking is colored.  Why don't you think and make this decision after you get to feeling better because he thought it was another condition altogether."  But, on Monday morning, February 25th, Denny Luker did address the council for the last time and he did say that he was going to withdraw his name from serving any longer as president of the United Church of God after his term expired which would have been at the GCE in May.  We had a meeting later that evening.  He spent the whole day with the Council of Elders, he even had an evening meeting to have a discussion about something that was quite demanding and he was very engaged in that discussion Monday evening.  But, he was getting worse, very, very quickly.  On Tuesday night, he was feeling so badly that Peter Eddington and the Davis'es, I'm not sure who exactly was there said: "Denny, you've got to have somebody take a look at this, we've got to get you to the hospital."  He said:  "No, let's just wait, I'll feel better in the morning."  Well they got there in the morning and he wasn't feeling better so they took him to the hospital and had some tests being done.  This was on Wednesday.  That was the first inkling that we had that things weren't well.  Shirley Davis and Lisa Fenchel were there and the first telephone calls came to us were with tears that Denny was not doing well and this was a premonition that something was very, very bad.  On Thursday, which is the next day, the results were many of the results of the tests came that he was very gravely ill with an advanced cancer which absolutely stunned and was very, very disconcerting. 

That weekend I went to Boston on a church visit and when I came back on Monday, Denny had already come back home to his home and asked if I would come over.  He asked me if I would perform his funeral.  This was a literally a week after he said goodbye or after he said his  last words to the Council of Elders.  He said:  "I'm planning on going back now to my family.  I'll be leaving a week from Wednesday so I can spend some time with my children.  The decline was much more swift than we thought because  the first indications were that he would have months, perhaps a year to live.  But even in a week it was progressing, he moved his trip back to Sunday and the Doctor basically said that if you want to come home and see any of your family with any quality time, you'd better go now and so Denny left on Friday and had a chance to be with his family.  He wanted like everything to have one more visit with the home office staff who he loved dearly.  As you know Denny was always waving and talking to everyone, greeted everyone in a very friendly way.  He wanted to do everything he could to be brought to speak to the home office staff, but he could not, and so Lee Ann came on Thursday, March 7th and on Denny's behalf addressed all of the home staff, family and friends with Denny's final words. 

I want to give special thanks to people who were right there; Bob and Shirley Davis, Peter and Terri Eddington, Matt and Lisa Fenchel, Paul and Dana Burnes from Atlanta and who came and helped out. 

On March 14th, Lee Ann called me and said Denny died and this was so quick, so fast, that our heads were spinning in different ways.  Two weeks later on March 30th, we had the memorial for Denny for the entire church where more than 300 people came in the Seattle area and two weeks after that, April 13th, was the memorial right here where many of you were there. 

A process then began for a selection of a new president.  The process is quite simple, every elder has the predictive of nominating a person or persons I believe to serve as president.  From that list, the Council of Elders select one person to be on that list of finalist.  A council member came to me asking and stating the he would like to put my name forward.  Honestly, I did not think of it at all.  Why?  Not that this role isn't interesting, exciting and has a lot of challenge to it, but I had the best job I could possibly manage having in life.  I was Operation Manager or Operation Manager for ministerial services and I was doing it at a time of peace, a time of development of the ministry that was very positive, a very, very exciting time.  I thought I'd have to give up something I really, really love and feel very confident in what I'm doing, and something that with Chris Rowland we were just really doing a job very, very well.  I knew we were doing a fine job and why would I want to delve into something uncertain.  Presidents have a bad history in the United Church of God.  I loved the interaction with the ministry, particularly I loved the challenge of the development of our leadership.  To me that was the most exciting thing of this past year; the development of our on-line training center, the fact that we've had even certain mentors and teachers that have arisen from the field ministry that have turned out to be excellent instructors and we really wanted to advance this particular process which will continue to be advanced, believe me.  I really want to endorse our work in that way.  I've had this job doing ministerial services on different occasions in the past and it's always been under trying and traumatic times.  I said I'm finally doing it when times are good and I want to enjoy it because working this job when people are growling and snapping at you is extremely disconcerting.

Second of all, I was unsure about this particular role because I didn't feel like I was the presidential type.  I don't really feel that comfortable in public, in a state from the fact of being flashy or charismatic.  I'm just not that way.  I like doing things that are public but more in the background and I pretty much like it that way.  I feel like I'm a rather plain person and I kind of want to keep it that way.  But, we thought about it with my lovely dear wife who is very encouraging and also very honest because if she would say, forget it Vic, you're too dumb to be president or whatever, I would certainly have to go along with it.  But amazingly, we were talking about the job and what we were doing and I spent three years with Denny Luker literally seeing him every day that he was on the job, literally with three, four or five interactions a day, we were seamless in the way we operated.  We were the best of friends and any decisions that needed to be made, he came into my office, I came into his office, it was just seamless, we just knew each others rhythm and sequence of thoughts and came up with decisions that for the most part were helpful and healthy decisions.  I basically knew the ropes and knew that the job of ministerial services and the job of president were quite similar.  We dealt with ministers, we dealt with ministerial matters and even right now with what I'm doing without a ministerial manager just yet, I'm finding that I'm doing basically many similar things except that I'm involved with other aspects of the work.  Also I thought I do have an interest in media.  On the Council of Elders I had been head of media committee and I thought that I would enjoy working with people and my relationship with Peter Eddington is outstanding.  I really consider him to be my best friend because I talk to him a great deal.  We talk about personal things, we talk about business things, we talk about technology, we talk about the direction of the department that he manages.  I also have an interest in technology, I call myself a godly geek in some ways that I like the latest technological things and I really do enjoy the proclamation aspect of the work.  I do enjoy the written word, I enjoy the proclaimed word, I enjoy being able to say things right to the public and also I have been able to keep juggling things and keeping several tops spinning.  So I left my name in as a result (probably more than anything the fact that my wife didn't say no) and that I could consider all these other factors and that we were willing to take it on and on May 9th I was selected as president. 

The first question I had was, now what?  What happens now?  Before I go there I'd like to tell you a little bit about my spiritual footings since people have asked will you tell us what you're thinking about your spiritual footing and your spiritual roots.  Well, I'll tell you about that and doing it very shortly here because I do want to tell you about some of the important aspects that we all have to face in doing the work of God about which I feel very positive and very confident.  I'm surprised sometimes how confident
and positive I feel, but it's not really me.  I really do believe that Christ is the living head of this church, of His church and I do believe that we have a very important role to fulfill yet before His return, I'm confident of that.  We've been against the wall several different times.  I look upon this as just one more challenge and one that God will get us through of. 

My parents were war refugees and they came to work in an apple orchard in Minnesota after living in a refugee camp for four years in Germany; that was in 1949.  Their employer gave them a bible which I still have and looked at this morning.  It was printed on cheap paper but it was the bible that we had in English.  When I was in second or third grade, I was seven or eight years old, I took that bible down off the shelf and started reading it.  I found it to be very, very fascinating, even at that age it was something I was curious about and between second and third grade summer, I started reading chunks of it from the book of Genesis and kind of found it hard going through Joshua and Judges.  But I still remember going through it and I jumped ahead to the book of Proverbs which I found to be very enlightening and just started reading the bible through.  I didn't get to the whole bible, but I was fascinated by it.  It was something that was a challenge and something that was an important book on my families bookshelf and I was reading it.
My church roots was that I was Ukrainian Orthodox, a branch of the Greek Orthodox church and our family and myself were serious and devout parishioners in that church.  I was very involved.  My father was one of the trustees of the church.  I worked with the priest as I was growing up as a teenager and I was very devout as an altar boy who did above and beyond work in helping with matters in the church.  I was very devout about my morning and evening prayers which the priest encouraged us, all of us young people to do.  I did it because he said to do it and on my knees every morning and every night I read from the prayer book until I virtually wore it out. I was serious about that, I was serious and interested in the history of the church as he went through and talked about how the church in the Ukraine was established in 988 before the great split between the Catholics and the Orthodox church and I found all this to be very, very interesting. 

I was very interested in theology and the sacraments of the church.  I was very interested in the Holy Spirit and exactly what that was.  My father did a lot of paintings for the church and he drew depictions of the Holy Spirit as a job and I always wondered how could that dove have that much power.  What is it, exactly what is it that the Holy Spirit is that's defined in that dove? 

But at age 15, I came across the World Tomorrow radio program.  The reason is that I had a crystal radio set that I had built and also I had a tube radio with a long wire that I strung up into the yard which got short wave and also I was able to bring in signals very, very strong.  I especially enjoyed in the evening, as evening and nighttime came on, to listen to AM skip from around the country, AM stations coming in from afar.  It was so interesting at that time before internet to hear something from Denver and I lived in Minnesota.  But one radio station that really came through in a very powerful providential way was KAAY Little Rock, Arkansas, the (mighty to ninety.)  The top forty station I listened to it because it had top forty music which I enjoyed, but right at 7:30 in the evening the programming took an obvious screech to a halt and the World Tomorrow program came on.  It was so odd you know, the programming was top forty, Ken Knight the disc jockey and all of a sudden from 7:30 to 8 o'clock you had the World Tomorrow program.  There were a number of questions that really intrigued me.  I listened for a whole year before I did anything.  I worked that summer at a miniature golf course and just sat there and listened to this program.  I made it a point every evening to listen to this program.  Did you know that Christmas was kept 2,000 years before Christ?  He asked that over and over and over again every night, but he would never answer the question.  He said you liked to hear the news reported, how would you like the news to be predicted?  Jesus Christ did that and I thought, when did that happen?  But he didn't say how or when.  He would talk about writing for literature and for the Plain Truth magazine.  Did you know that one third of the bible was prophecy and that 90% hasn't been fulfilled?  And I said, "oh come on."  I heard that over and over again.  I was becoming curious as to what 90% hasn't been fulfilled and where is it?   I didn't know how big the bible is and one third of it is prophecy?  I was very, very curious and I really wanted to find out more.  Why do you go to church on Sunday when the fourth commandment tells you to keep the Sabbath day?  I said well that's easy, that just means Sunday, but then I went to my priest who again I had an excellent relationship with.  He was great with young people and he was very patient with us and answered my questions so I spent long periods of time talking to him.  He said hold on, it is Saturday, it is not Sunday.  I said well how come we keep Sunday?  Then he gave all the reasons that are typically given as reasons for changing Saturday to Sunday and that didn't wash with me.  I honestly said this is not really honest, it's a flakey answer, it's not a complete answer, it's not right.  I asked many other questions and just found that the answers were unconvincing.  When further discussion about Christmas, the origins of Christmas, the origins and customs of Easter came up, New Years and so forth, I began to see the church that I loved and revered and respected was extra biblical and based on tradition and based on very dangerous tradition, not derived from God and had withdrawn from the basic truth of God.  This was about age 16 or 17.

In 1965 I applied to Ambassador College and surprisingly was accepted right away.  My parents really wanted me to go the University of Minnesota and the Institute of Technology.  My dad said I want you to be a mathematician Victor.  I want you to be a Mechanical Engineer.  I want you to be an Electrical Engineer, whatever, but I want you to go to the Institute of Technology at U of M.  But I had made this big shift in my mind about questions relating to spirituality, about what the bible had to say what the bible teaches.  At that time I knew nothing about any church because there was no church spoken of on the program;  it was Ambassador College presents the World Tomorrow.  The first inkling I had that there was any kind of grouping of people was when I got the college catalog and it showed pictures of big crowds of people.  I thought what in the world, where are they, what are they doing?  It didn't say it was the Feast of Tabernacles.  It just showed big crowds of people.  But I knew that I wanted to be part of this, I wanted to learn more about where this came from because every answer that I got from Ambassador College rang true.  It rang true with the bible and had meaning.

The minister of the local church came out to visit me, to interview me for college, but I told him I was already accepted and I said I wonder if I should go.  He said of course you should go and then he invited me to church services.  This was two years after the Minneapolis church started and my first service was in August of 1965.  My parents were on vacation and were not to come back until Sunday, but low and behold they arrived home Friday and said we're going to church with you.  Oh great!  So we went to church, the address was the seedy part of Minneapolis and so my parents and I drove down there and we found the church on the corner.  We tried to open the door and it was locked.  I said I wonder if they're holding services here.  But here is the American Legion hall, maybe 300 or 400 feet away with a lot of people standing around it.  So we go up there and say, do you know where the Radio Church of God is?  Yes, we're here, this is it.  We were welcomed with open arms.  I told the minister, Shawn McMichael, I said I bought my parents.  He said; "no you didn't."  I said, "yes I did."  At that time of course it was much more restrictive as to who came.  So he was visibly shocked and troubled.  He told me that he had changed his complete sermon on the spot.  He spoke about hell. 

I told my parents that I wanted to go to college and I wanted to go next month.  I had no money.  My parents were absolutely devastated.  How could their son, who did so well in school, go out as he put it, with holy rollers and fruits and nuts.  He said if you go to California for anything religious, that's what you'll have, that's the way they put it.  I really didn't have any money and they said we're not going to let you go.  I was seventeen years old, not yet eighteen which I was going to be in October.  That may have been the best thing that would have happened because I did go to the University of Minnesota.  I had a few scholarships that I couldn't have used at Ambassador College.  I did have money to go to U of M and during that time, to make a long story short, my parents started studying because when I started going to church, which was not until December 25, 1965.  I didn't go to church all that time but I started going at the very last part of the year.  When I came home I would go through the entire sermon with them and they were almost ready, they were sitting there waiting for me to come in the house and asked what did they say, what did they preach about, what did they teach?  I would tell them, I went through the scriptures one by one, I could not believe I was almost going through the sermon in real time because literally we had an hour or two of discussion because I was so excited about everything that I was hearing.  Finally my father asked for a visit.  The minister came and talked to him until after 2 o'clock in the morning.  They had question after question and they started coming to church.  My parents then left the Orthodox church as well. 

I went to Ambassador college in the fall of 1966.  I love it, I loved everything to do with the college.  But I had very little church background.  I was not one who had grown up in a church or had Imperial school background or any of that type of thing.  In fact there were a number of us students, a goodly number of us students, that had no previous church background, both men and women that came to college that year, that had no church background.  I loved all the classes; harmony of the gospels.  The next year I absolutely just went ecstatic about every word that I learned in the Epistles of Paul class.  I was able to go through in three years because of my year at the University of Minnesota plus they waived my foreign language requirement and something else, I forget what they waived, English or something.  I was able to get through in three years and half way through my college career, I was transferred to Bricket Wood, England and that's where I graduated.  But in spite of the fact that I enjoyed classes as much as I did, I never was a leader of any sort in the class.  Maybe that's what makes me a little bit reluctant to many leadership positions.  In Ambassador club, the highest rank that I achieved was Sergeant at Arms which was to put the gavel up on the front table and make sure there was water in the glasses, that was my claim to fame at Ambassador club.  I never was a class officer or any of that sort of thing.  I was  more of a person in the background who enjoyed doing things.  I enjoyed travel and enjoyed the things especially in England.  I didn't really speak that well, at least I didn't think I did, I was very nervous about it and it took me a long time to prepare for a speech in class.  I usually got a very difficult evaluation and after my first semester in my senior year, I told my teacher: "You know I think I should drop out of speech class because I really don't like it."  I was hoping he would say, no, no, stay on:  He said, "good o.k., good."  Now wait a minute, but I really thought that's not what I was cut out for.  What I was cut out for was to be a photographer which I haven't quit to this very day because I did all the basketball games, did all of the pictures and set up shots for the Envoy and so forth and was very, very involved technically more that way rather than in a grandiose way. I never had a spiritual job at Ambassador college.  A spiritual job was when you graduated from cleaning toilets and working gardening to answering letters, opening letters.  Those were spiritual jobs.  The job I had the day I graduated was the same one, I worked in the dark room.  I worked in photography and when graduation came, my assignment was to work in Israel as a photographer basically in the office.  I was to work with Mr. Ray Bick.  That was my assignment and I said:  "God, thank you, you have spoken, I am satisfied." I praised God that after three years at Ambassador college, that's what my career would be.

Well what happened though in the spring of 1969, the year I graduated, we had what were called, graduate school lectures.  This was a period of a big spurt of growth in the church.  This was when a leading evangelist and so forth came up from Pasadena, spoke to crowds of people around the country and we had a lot of new prospective members, I mean a lot.  The churches literally exploded in attendance in that period, 1968 and 1969.  So the word from Pasadena was, can you spare another ten trainees from this class?  I was put on the B list.  I thought wow and I was sent to Sioux Falls, South Dakota, that's where my assignment was.  My first sermonette was to be an ice breaker.  I spoke for eight minutes.  Even my pastor said: "You can say more about yourself, can't you?  I mean when we go to afternoon service?  It would be nice if you speak more than eight minutes, it's way too short for anybody."  I thought o.k., so while in the car I worked another four or five minutes, I'm getting those two extra minutes in there about my life and I think I stretched it out to ten or eleven minutes in Sioux Falls.  I started in Mankato, Minnesota and 165 mile drive, half of it on a two lane road from Mankato to Sioux Falls, South Dakota.  That's where my career began in the ministry.  After that time in South Dakota, Wyoming, then in several places in Minnesota, California, then my final assignments were in Lafayette and Terre Haute which was my longest assignment, literally sixteen years before my wife and I permanently moved here to the Cincinnati area.  I started working in ministerial services which at that time was begun in a turbulent period and it got to be good and I didn't really want to change it.  Now I have become the president of the United Church of God.

I wanted to tell you a little bit about my background, where I've come from, what I believe and where I'm at.  After being chosen, again like I said, the first thing I said was now what?  I received a compliment just this past week from someone from back in Worldwide Church of God who called me and he said: "Vic  congratulations.  He said, you know something?  I'm so thankful that they choose somebody normal and not some quirky person with some delusions."  That may sound like a crazy statement but I took it as a compliment.  I really want to be normal and if you were to say that if there's anything that characterizes my attitude towards outside of my mind and body, you know I love God, I really do, I really have from earliest times had a wonderful experience with Him.  Even from the time that I prayed from the prayer book morning and night and the big shift was when we were to pray, not using vain repetitions, but to go into our closet and pray to God according to the model prayer, it's been a wonderful experience.  I have felt that God has been with me, with our family, that He's guided me, protected me, kept our family, kept our churches and is with the United Church of God.  I really believe that.  I feel that He is here right now and that He is guiding and directing us.

After I was selected president I went to Rotary club and I told our club director, while I was walking in he was the first one I saw and we have probably about six or seven presidents of other organizations, many of them right here in park fifty and this particular one is the district governor of Rotary as well and he's been a manager of transit systems in Cincinnati, Indigo in Indianapolis before that and I told him, I said:  "Guess what, I was made CEO or made president of the United Church of God."  Of course they know that because I've talked about that and I've told them about the death of Denny Luker and so this person whose name is Peter stuck his finger into my chest and said: "Good, don't be a caretaker president."  That's the first thing he said and he said it so very, very loudly too.  He said:  "Don't just be kind of floating and just making things just go on their own and just kind of work through operation managers without any response.  You will fail if you do that, he was very distinct about that.  He said: "You may find people who will resist you and so forth, but he said work with people and develop your initiatives as you work with them."  Well, I mentioned this in my e-news that I plan not to be a care taker president, it was taken wrong by people; you mean you won't take care of us?  I said: "Oh no".  I guess I better define that a little more but that's what I meant.  There's a lot of sit back and just operate the managers and ask what are you guys doing now this week and basically let it drift.  Then he goes and announces it to the whole club.  We have what we call happy bucks.  You have to pay a dollar to make comments like table topics to get our meetings going on a Tuesday morning and he says: "Hey Vic here was made CEO of the United Church of God, up on the hill."  They call this place the place up on the hill.  We have people from Downing Displays across the street here, we have people from PPG, we've got people from Siemens, we've got different engineering companies down there on the hill and a CPA firm just a little bit higher from here where he drives by and he says for seven or eight years I've been driving by and always wanted to know who's there?  What do you guys do?  So they were glad to meet somebody from the United Church of God.  I've had a number of the people who were president and said: "Do you need any help or need any tips or anything you can talk to us about, please feel free to talk to us."  I found that to be very, very helpful. 

I also had another person tell me this past week about the church.  He says please don't allow the United Church of God to become a dusty COG, a place that just collects dust with older people and nothing new and nothing exciting.  Please don't do that.  This came from a younger person.  Well the question arises, what can I do to contribute to the well being of the church in all aspects?  Again, I strongly believe in Providence and God's guiding hand.  If I was to say what is my vision, again I feel that that is very pretentious and not something that I want to define in that way.  However I do want to use another vision which is the vision that I wish to have.  I have a chapter of the bible that I have set aside that if I'm ever asked to speak extemporaneously or if someone doesn't show up for a sermon, they say: "Hey can you give the sermon today and I don't have notes or even a bible." I have this chapter that I would give a sermon from and I've done it.  That's Colossians, chapter one because this chapter casts a vision for the church that Paul puts in far better terms than I possibly could.  It's a very broad vision, it's a very looking out vision, it's a very personable vision.  I said two things that I can honestly say that I feel about my vision as far as my outlook.  One is I love God and I love people, I love you.  I can honestly say that without any reservation.  I just love people, I love people from all over the world and I have been involved with a lot of different kinds of people; Eastern Europeans, Soviet people, Africans, rich ones, poor ones, people from all walks and different congregations around the country.  I can truly honestly say that I love people and I hope that that can come through.  I love the people in the home office.  My wife knows when I leave home a lot of times and get into the car, and she packs my lunch and so forth, I say I just love going to work, I just love coming into the building.  I love saying hi to Whitney and Catherine and I love talking to the people as I go up the steps, I honestly love it and that spirit won't be leaving me because that's just part of the way I am. 

I'd like to read from chapter 1 of the book of Colossians because the apostle Paul who actually the indicators are from this particular chapter had not yet been to Colossae, but had heard about this church through another minister who had established it. 

Colossian 1:1  Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God, and Timothy our brother,
Verse 2:  To the saints and faithful brethren in Christ who are in Colossae: (Which is in Western Asia Minor)  Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

I do believe that theses were not just empty words or just standard greetings like hello or good bye, where we don't think of the origins of those words.  I truly believe that when he said grace to you, he said all the most wonderful and greatest of gifts from God, me to you, he really meant it and peace.  This is the greeting that he used for many of the churches.  He said I wish above all that you have peace; peace of mind, peace in how to get along with one another, peace from the government, peace in all respects.  A truly wish that on the people in his churches and honestly that's what I wish for our congregations and churches.  Peace has been an elusive commodity even in the churches of God.  If there's going to be any one thing that I will strive to defend and maintain is peace because we have it and I don't want it to slip through our grasp and anything develop that's happened before.  But Paul is wishing them peace and I will do everything I can to maintain peace.  Find ways to work things out, find ways to settle things, find ways to move on, find ways to consider the greater good of the church rather than stir up and exacerbate conflict.  We give thanks.  I'm so glad that Mr. Cloris spoke about thankfulness and that one of the reasons we do the things we do, even humanly or humantarily, not that he mentioned humantarily, but it's an expression of our thanksgiving to God.  But the apostle Paul was lavish in his gratitude for people. The greatest miracle is more spectacular than anything is the conversion of someone from a nature of being what we used to be, to being transformed into what being like Jesus Christ and the apostle Paul was grateful for that phenomenon. 

Verse 3:  We give thanks to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, praying always for you,

I've read over and over again about how the apostle Paul prayed for the people of the church and I know that I have not been as good as I should have been.  This morning as I was praying and took extra time this morning, I asked God to be with our people all around the world, be with our people who are suffering, who are going through trials such as the Bishop family.  I talked to the grandparents of Emily this week. She's a twelve year old girl who died of Leukemia earlier this week.  Be with them.  Now praying for people who are going through hardships and trials and praying for the stability of the church so that we can do the work we have.

Verse 4:  since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of your love for all the saints.

These two things he emphasizes.  I thank God, you know why?  Because of your faith in Jesus Christ, considering this church in Colossae was not really much of a Jewish church.  It was very, very Gentile and here these people had faith in Jesus Christ.  They had abandoned asceticism, all the background religions that they had been a part of, now believed and had faith in Jesus Christ and also they became loving people as well and had love for all the saints.  This is one of the characteristics of this church, that they were loving.  Why?

Verse 5:  Because of the hope which is laid up for you in heaven, of which you heard before in the word of the truth of the gospel,

So the gospel converted you, the gospel gave you hope and as a result of that hope you have faith and you love the brethren.  What a vision.  To me perhaps is explaining what they were, but I look upon it as really the vision that we should have as we go forward in preaching the gospel of the Kingdom of God.  What's it to do, what's it to accomplish, what are the outcomes to be from it?  We want them to have hope.  We want them to change their status from being hopeless to hopeful, then what?  Have faith in Jesus Christ.  Then what?  To love others, to love others as themselves.  That's where I want us to get to.  To where the things that we are learning, the things that we absorb turn into action and the apostle Paul brings that out so well here, as he does in some of the opening letters and it comes from the gospel, it comes from the teachings of Jesus Christ.

Verse 6:  which has come to you as it has also in all the world and is bringing forth fruit,  (He mentions this a couple different times about this gospel is actually bringing about results.  Fruit.) as it also among you since the day you heard and knew the grace of God in truth;   It mentions fruit again here coming up, but the apostle Paul was very inspired by the growth and by the results in peoples lives.

That's why it's a question I'm going to be asking our operation managers over and over again.  What are we doing to bring about growth?  What are we doing to involve people more?  I was so encouraged by the results we have of those who are coming to the Kingdom of God seminars.  I'm hoping that the next level of the seminars and other plans that we have for publicly proclaiming the word of God does bear that fruit and grow.  I will not rest until we see growth and fruit results.  Why shouldn't we be praying for growth?  Why shouldn't we take a look at John 15 where Jesus Christ said:  I'm the vine, you are the branches and I want you to grow and to bear much fruit in quality individually and also in numbers.  I don't see why we can't in a peaceful environment.

Verse 7:  as you also learned from Epaphras, our dear fellow servant, who is a faithful minister of Christ on your behalf,  (This is what he had heard, he didn't see this first hand, but he had this in another port.)

Verse 8:  who also declared to us your love in the Spirit.  (We really praised you.  We really bragged on you about being a loving congregation in church.)

Verse 9:  For this reason we also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you and to ask that you may be filled with the knowledge of His will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding;

He prayed for these people to really get it and to have understanding and to have wisdom.  That's the thing  that I pray for, I pray for wisdom most every day for myself because I know that my impulses often don't choose the wisest course of action and I have to slow down and think things through and ask God for guidance. 

Verse 10:  that you may have a walk worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing Him, being fruitful in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God; 

That's where I want to see us go.  Help us all increasing, having being more wise and to grow; grow individually and to grow as a church.  I'm not going to apologize at all for saying that I would like to see growth in the church and I want to see what we can do to be facilitators of that growth.  Oh yes, I'm very well aware of John 6:44 that no man can come to me unless he's called of the Father.  But how many people have we turned aside, how many people have we offended, how many people have we stunted when God was calling them because of our behavior and our appearance?  I truly believe that if we clean our act up, which we have, I truly believe that if we are lights, if we are desirable, if we're a magnet to others, then others will join us just like I did when I came to the church and saw what I did in the Minneapolis church.  I saw a church that was united. I saw a church that was together, I saw people who had expressions of love one for another in services and if anything, that drew me more than anything else.  Of course I was very up on doctrine and I was interested in developing more that way but it's the behavior of the people that had a lot to do with the fact that I stuck to that group. 

Verse 11:  strengthened with all might, according to His glorious power, for all patience and longsuffering with joy;

He talks about power, he talks about the spirit of God.  We've had a lot about the Holy Spirit here with our theme at the GCE which was spiritual gifts.  We've had the Feast of Pentecost, we've talked about power.  I've prayed for God to give us more of His power.  Why shouldn't He?  Why shouldn't He?  Why if I'm asking for bread would God give me a stone?  If I'm asking for fish would God give me a snake?  God loves to give us His Spirit.  His Spirit isn't just something that is a good feeling.  It's a powerful tool in doing His work and that was very evident in the lives of the people in Colossae.  

Verse 12:  giving thanks to the Father who has qualified us to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in the light.
Verse 13:  He has delivered us from the power of darkness and translated us into the kingdom of the Son of His love,

We've all been dragged out of this world and we've been put in front of the Kingdom of Light, the Kingdom of God which is almost becoming a by-word or something that is part of what the United Church of God is.  It's the people who talk about the Kingdom of God.  I hope that that is something that sticks to us, not just something for the seminars and oh it's the people who understand the Kingdom of God, the people who are proclaiming the Kingdom of God, the people who truly understand what it means Thy Kingdom Come, not here yet, the Kingdom that is coming and their job is to proclaim that Kingdom for Jesus Christ coming back as King of Kings.  Then he talks about Jesus.

Verse 14:  in whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins.
Verse 15:  He is the image of the invisible God. the firstborn over all creation.
Verse 16:  For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers.  All things were created through Him and for Him.

They're talking about Jesus Christ who is the executive of the Old Testament.  He is the God of the Old Testament, the Creator, one who divided the heavens from the earth.  The one who divided the waters from the dry land, the Creator God. 

Verse 17:  And He is before all things and in Him all things consist.
All processes of the universe are there now because Jesus Christ has set them in motion.  Without God it would all collapse and disappear.  Do we really believe that?  Do we really see the hand of God in life itself, in the creation that's so boldly speaks of the existence of God, of a great intellect, of a great designer, a great sustainer?  That's the way we should all be thinking more and more.  To me the vision of the church is to produce that type of picture in all of our minds and hearts as we look to the future of a real God in our lives and there's more here:

Verse 18:  And He is the head of the body, the church, who is the beginning, the first born from the dead, that in all things He may have the preeminence.

Jesus Christ is the head of the church, the living head of the church, not somebody who got it going, took off for heaven to return to the Father and really doesn't have anything to do with it now.  I can tell you story after story about I have seen the hand of Jesus Christ working in this church in these last three years and I believe He will continue working as we yield to Him, as we humble ourselves before Him, that we show thankfulness and gratitude, I truly believe that Jesus Christ will continue.  He is the living head of this church.

Interesting, one friend of mine who gave tours to people in Pasadena had a group of people from another seventh day church come to visit.  I forget which one it was.  But, he gave a tour and these people asked who is the head of your church, expecting to get the name of a person.  He said, well we consider Jesus Christ to be the head of this church.   No, no,  that's not what we meant, who actually inspires, directs and does the work of this church?  He said, Jesus Christ.  Now wait a minute, I know that, but who's the guy that reveal.  He wanted to make the point that we really believe that Jesus Christ was the living head of the church.  It's not something that's run by men.  What we do is try and understand the will of God and fulfill it.  One thing that I do pray for, God show me what you want, make it clear, make it obvious, intervene, and you know something?  I've had it happen over and over again to a series of events and how things play themselves out, I've seen the hand of God where I've not pushed my way, but allowed Him to work.  That's what I hope that all of us can do.  Believe me, I'm not perfect, in no way am I expressing myself to be somebody great in any way.  I want to be considered a servant.  In fact if there's any way that I could be classified as who am I?  I don't want to be a Nehemiah, I don't want to be a Joshua, I don't want to be a Moses, I want to be a servant.
In fact, in the way the NIV translation has:

Verse 23:  If indeed you continue in the faith, grounded and steadfast and are not moved away from the hope of the gospel which you have heard, which was preached to every creature under heaven, of which I, Paul became a servant.
This I like better than the word in the new King James which is minister which denotes some type of authority or rank.  Basically I have become a servant.

Verse 24:  I now rejoice in my sufferings for you and fill up in my flesh what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ, for the sake of His body, which is the church.
Verse 25:  I have become a servant (again) according to the commission God has given to me to present to you the word of God in all His fullness.

I find that what's here in Colossians 1 is absolutely amazing about the work of God and as far as the vision of the church.

Now, what are some of the challenges that we have set before us and what are some of the things that are very much on my mind?  I'd like to cover some of the things that are most important that you'll probably be hearing more from me because these are some of the points that I brought out to the Council of Elders when I was first going through my interview or I was being interviewed for this particular role.  I feel that the main challenge of the church is in preserving peace and unity that we currently have in the church.  Like I said, I'd like to put amber alert lights in the hallways.  Then if something happens that isn't right we can have these amber alert lights go off saying, woe, there's something missing, there's something wrong, let's correct it right away.  I think we should be looking to that because once an argument or some spat gets to be out of hand, it's so hard to bring it back.   Let's get things resolved quickly.  Let's get things resolved in a way that really thinks what's best for the whole church, rather than perpetuating the problem.

They say that the job of a manager, that thirty to forty percent of his time can be spent in dissolving conflict of one sort or another.  I was saying that to Richard Kennebeck and he laughed at me.  He said our department is virtually nothing.  I hope that we can say that in all the way across the stream of all of our departments, and even in the ministry that we can learn to be peacemakers, that we can maintain that.  There's an expression in World War II in many shipyards.  They have these posters that say: "Loose lips sink ships."  In other words, here you can have people who are working on things and they start talking about things they shouldn't and in that particular case it was about the secrets perhaps of the design of a ship and spies could be listening and sending information to Germany or to Japan and they would then develop weapons that would sink these ships. "Loose lips sink ships."  Well, in the one sense you could say that applies to us, loose talk, unproductive talk, unchristian talk about people, tearing people apart, tearing people down, not ending a conversation about anything good can lead to sinking ships as well.  Let's be careful in the things that we say and the things we do and to be motivating, being complimentary and being Christian.  I think you've known or seen the book "Everything I needed or learned in life I learned in kindergarten" (don't kick, don't bite, don't spit.)  You know some of these simple things, if we could do that as far as how we treat one another, it will go a long way. 

Next, I feel that church demographics are changing.  We can be a church that is really up to speed to communicating with the outside and I do believe we're really trying hard to find ways to communicate better, we've told our people and talked to Peter Eddington, I feel like we have.  We want to get people going up a ladder of involvement to where they see us on the internet or see a Beyond Today program and say, oh that's interesting, that's good, click, or a booklet, click, you know, watch something on T.V. you know, and go call the 800 number, whatever.  But, somehow we just don't get any activity beyond that.  So they pick another rung up the ladder, but then the loose rung or a broken rung and they can't get past that and we can't get people up to the next level of involvement.  Where is it?  Where is that broken link or broken rung?  Is it in the contact they have with us?  Is it their first experience in church?  Is it a time lapse from the time they communicate with us?  Whatever.  Where are we failing?  I just really feel that we have to bring all this together to have a holiest view of the start to finish of dealing with our people.  Is our literature something that needs to be updated, is it too old, is it too archaic, is it asking questions that nobody's asking, what is the matter with areas that we are not being successful in?  I'm going to keep asking these questions until we find answers, until we find ways to make things work.  I know we're doing a lot, but what are the outcomes of what we are doing?  How are we communicating with the various generations?  Now most of the leadership of the church are baby boomers, but we have two other generations after that the X'ers and the Millennial's .  Can we communicate with them?  I like hopefully think that I can communicate with younger people.  I enjoy our gang at work, Mitch, Julie, Rudy and others.  Sometimes I feel like I'm a millennial in a boomer body.  I like talking with them, I like talking about the things that they have.  Are the things that we say, are they affective and relevant?  Are they really up to date?  What outcomes do we have? 

Another challenge that we have is our ministry in our congregations.  As Chris Rowland knows we have the whole country covered and back when I worked with Worldwide Church of God we had 390 full time elders on top of 600 local church elders.  We had a thousand in the ministry for the same geographic area.  Now we have about 250, about one fourth that amount of which only 80 some as compared to 390 are full time.  We have a challenge and many of them are older.  Many of them have come out of retirement.  Many of them will not be able to go on and on and on and on.  Brethren will be asking what assignment do you want when you get to be 105?  It's not going to happen.  We're going to have to think about our younger people, our younger leaders and we've had some wonderful experiences in that when things went south two or three years ago, we've had a number of young people that have risen to the fore, that have been unearthed that have taken up.  They've been ordained and are now pastors.  Oh yes, some make mistakes, rookie mistakes, o.k. but let's develop our leadership, let's develop our men and women into doing the work of God.  But that's going to be something that will be a challenge of staffing our congregations around the world, not just in the U.S., but to bring about the kind of leadership that we need in areas where there is solid growth and solid holy spirit in South Africa, in East Africa and South Central Africa, West Africa and the Philippines and other places.  We ask for your prayers for us to be able to find solutions to all of this.

I want to work (this is more internally here) with employee compensation and benefits.  They say how come you're talking about these personal things?  Well, they're important.  We haven't gone through or reviewed in a long time and I've had employees come to me and say we have inequity in certain areas and actually in our Tuesday meeting (our management meeting) we're going to go about setting up employee compensation committee to take a look at what we have so that the people that we have working for us are not discouraged because we don't pay attention to their needs.  That is very, very important. 

We're going to continue working on constructive relationships with groups and churches that are of like belief.  I feel this is very, very important.  We are not a silo church that wants no contact with others or feel so exclusive that we're the only game in town.  We're not, we're little, we're insufficient as far as the world is concerned.  We're small.  I'm asking God to please help us to get our act together and truly have a light shine and to be able to perhaps rebuild to one degree or another the relationships that have been split apart over time.

I want to read a few notes that I received from leaders of other churches.  This one here is from Roderick Meredith.  Dear Vic, (this was four days after I became president) Greetings from Charlotte.  I want to sincerely congratulate you on your election as president of the United Church of God.  As you have indicated, your desire is to follow in the footsteps of Mr. Luker.  I know that our relationship should be friendly and cooperative.  I certainly hope that we can continue down that path which we have already begun.  It was a pleasure to see you and Mr. Luker and Mr. Eddington here a while back to visit us.  I pray that God will guide all of us to love one another, cooperate as best as we are able and to do our best to feed God's people the full truth and do His work.  I will be praying for you personally and would appreciate your prayers for me and the Living Church of God as well.  With Christian love, Roderick C. Meredith.  I found this letter to be absolutely beautiful.  I wrote back to Mr. Meredith, Dr. Meredith.  Thank you very much for your heart warming letter.  I appreciate very much your well wishes, thoughts and future desire for both of us to walk together towards our destiny, the Kingdom of God.  We have so many values in common and I pray and hope that we can continue to work together and cooperate.  This was clearly apparent in the conversations that Dennis Luker, Peter Eddington and I had with you and the leadership of the Living Church of God.  Let's continue that momentum.  We were greatly saddened at the loss of our dear friend Dennis Luker, he left a legacy of faith, courage and total reliance on Jesus Christ for God's will to be fulfilled.  I indeed intend to follow those footsteps and keep that spirit and rely on prayer and humility and complete submission to the living head of His church, Jesus Christ.  I would like to consider a date for us to meet again and will contact you on specifics.  Thanks again for your kindness and confidence.  In Christian love, Victor Kubic.

Another one from Dr. Meredith's son, Jim.  Good morning Vic.  Just wanted to send you a quick note to congratulate you on being president of UCG.  You have a lot of weight on your shoulders now and I pray that under your direction that UCG can continue to serve the brethren well.  As we discussed at Denny Luker's memorial, we in the Living Church of God are happy to keep open file lines of communication.  If there's anything we can give help in, please let me know.

Then another one that I received from the Church of God Seventh Day who we've had contact with.  I visited their headquarters on two occasions.  I've been to two of their conferences as a fraternal delegate.  For one of their conferences, they paid my expenses to come and gave Life Nets a twelve and half thousand gift for Tsunnami victims.  This is from Wade Rose who is the head of the Church of God Seventh Day. Brother Kubic: News of the passing of brother, Dennis Luker came as a surprise and saddens me. I never met him personally but heard enough about him to know that he was a special person.  My condolences and prayers on behalf of the general conference of the Church of God Seventh Day to his immediate family as well as the entire United family.  We are in prayer for the United Church of God as you move on without the leadership of this good man.  Speaking of which, let me also offer my personal congratulations to you on your new appointment.  I'm now recalling our indirect interaction through elder Bill Hicks regarding mission efforts around the world.  You have my prayers and support and are welcome to call on us at any time.  In fact, please stop by our Omaha convention coming up soon, July 1st through 6th in Omaha, Nebraska if your schedule permits.  Beyond convention, I look forward to closer communication collaboration where possible.  Meanwhile may the Lord richly bless you in your efforts.  With rich blessings, Wade Rose.  I think that's absolutely marvelous  that we can be able to keep that kind us to have exchanges and we'll see where these things lead.  So pray that this works. 

I want to work with two other areas of great importance.  One that was brought up earlier today from a ABC young adult that is extremely important to a group in our church.  This is a priority because our future leadership will come from our young people who are chomping at the bit to do great things in this church.  We have a wonderful church.  I truly believe that we have a wonderful little church that can do great things by people who are rattled to the ordinary because we have great power through the Spirit of
God working in us and with the initiative that is already started through ministerial member services, we're starting with our Friday night web cast around the world and we want to bring interaction and more young adults into the fray.

Women services, we don't want the momentum that we started and has been built in the past two years with developing services where women can participate in, initiated in great part by Lee Ann Luker.  Now in many ways is being managed by Lisa Fenchel.  They perform services that maybe you aren't even aware of that have been so helpful to ministerial services in recognizing, being recognition to ministers, doing things in our office that have been helpful in giving us a real personable touch in working with our ministry and membership.  A meeting will be held with the women this coming Thursday at the home office at 1:30 to discuss more completely what has been done.  But at seminars, they have discussed subjects as spiritual gifts as they did at the GCE or adventures in prayer and bible study and many other subjects where women want to discuss these things in their terms and their manner.  I find this to be very, very helpful.  A question has arisen even this morning.  Will this be something that will go out to all the ladies in the church?  That is our hope that we can extend some of the products that are discussed to all, that we have been met with great enthusiasm.

Another area of great interest and concern, not concern so to speak, but challenge is our work in the international areas.  Now in this country we have 315 million people and beyond this there is 6.3 billion potential sons and daughters of God.  What are we doing there?  You see our work is daunting, it's huge, it's got to be something that we cannot neglect.  Pray that God will give us the resources and leadership to be able to spread the gospel far and wide to touch the hearts of people around the world.  We already have certain plans and certain processes in motion to do some of this. 

Education.  We do want to advance education in the church relating to family seminars, growing children God's way, to ABC, continuing education and we're working with Gary Antion and with other people of educators in this.  Plus developing a more robust online training facility for our ministry.  I truly believe that this is a way to be able to very systematically train our people and to train future leaders.

So, that's just some of what I look upon with what's needed to be done in the church.  I was hoping that I was able to tell you a little bit about myself, what my thoughts are, what my outlook is toward the church, towards the work, towards you individually and where I am in a very sincere way.  I ask for your prayers as the apostle Paul did, pray for us and pray for us that the gospel can go forth unimpeded without the road blocks and with the alligators snapping at us as we've had before and that we can really go forward and do something that's constructive and something which truly benefits the world, something that will turn the world upside down.  I often wonder how is it that the apostle Paul could set out with just a small crew of people, with Silas, with Barnabas at first, with Timothy.  He didn't have a large group but he would go to Philippi, establish a group with Lydia and then go on down and establish a church in Thessalonica, spend a couple weeks there and it says in some places he would ordain elders and move on.  How in the world did he do this in three weeks?  Maybe it's something we don't understand as to how it was done, but the church grew in a mighty way at that time and the smallness should not dissuade  us, but humble us into receiving more of the power of God to do those things that need to be done.

So I will be praying for you.  I make this a point now to say I will pray for the people of God.  I will pray for those at the home office, I will pray for the ministry but I ask you to also pray for us that we can do the work of God.