July 23, 2026
Beloved HUMC Community,
I’m so grateful for you! What a good run we’ve had together, almost 21 years!
Back in 2005 I was looking to change jobs. I wanted work that more closely aligned with my life purpose & my call to ministry from God, so I answered a little classified ad I saw in the print edition of The Columbus Dispatch for a “Small Groups Coordinator” at a Methodist church in Hilliard. (Remember when that’s how we used to look for jobs??!!)
Who knew what joy I was signing up for! Who knew that this would turn out to be the best work of my life, in the best context, with the best people?! Who knew that God would grow me and challenge me and love me in such beautiful ways in this place, with and through you all!
I will always be grateful for the amazing pastors I had the privilege to work with — especially Jim Waugh, Lori Lossie, David Ziegel, Karen Muntzing, April Blaine, and Jon Osmundson. Each of them invested in my growth and development as a person and a ministry professional, and I learned so much from them.
HUMC is going to thrive under Pastor Steve’s leadership. I think he’s the right leader for this place I love, and I know we would have worked well together and done some good ministry together!
I’m beyond grateful for all the life-giving learning and growing we did together in Adult Discipleship! Church-wide studies with 200 participants in 20 groups! Overnight retreats! Women’s retreat days on August Saturdays! Lenten studies. Learning about spiritual practices together. The important work we did together in the Anti-Racism Book Group. Small group leader trainings. Figuring out how to do community and offer classes on Zoom during the pandemic! Labyrinth walks. Coaching you all to teach and lead your own classes and groups! The work of spiritual formation with adults is just the best.
I so enjoyed serving with our Welcome Teams and Livestream Hosting Teams! You all are so good at what you do, and it makes a real difference for our communities in person and online.
I really loved learning about the Enneagram and getting certified to teach it, and then watching you all see yourselves with new eyes, watching your relationships heal, your self-acceptance and compassion grow.
I hold close to my heart the Caring Ministries work! Our Care Partner Ministry was so beautifully designed by an amazing team, with whom it was a privilege to serve, and it was such a pleasure to see you all care for each other in such loving ways.
I’m thankful for the dive into Deeper Waters that some of you undertook, our next-level “discipleship 2.0” experience. What significant and good work we did together around the embodied practices of contemplative prayer, self-awareness and inner work (with the Enneagram), social location and cultural competence, and leadership! It has been a joy to see all the ways you are using that experience to impact the people around you toward the transformation and healing of yourselves, your relationships, and the world.
I have so appreciated all the new skills I’ve learned at HUMC, all the different hats I’ve gotten to wear. I learned WordPress and how to create the new look and then maintain our website. I learned basic graphic design and created 99% of our graphics and slides for the last several years. That was fun! (I keep saying I’m a theologian not a website content manager or graphic designer, but I really enjoyed that work!)
I found it so satisfying to edit the Letters of Encouragement and write copy for the website and congregational emails, to help tell the stories of how we were all pouring love into each other and our community.
What a blessing to be in on the Discover HUMC gatherings for newcomers and the membership classes (Engage) for folks ready to take that step. Those were such meaningful times together, hearing your stories, seeing how God has been at work in your lives.
We did a lot together, and you taught me so much. I am so grateful.
If there’s one thing…
If there’s one thing I hope you learned from me over our years together, it’s that God is above all a God of love — not disappointment or shame or judgment. Love.
I remember a video clip that Pastor Karen shared in worship some years ago, a talk by theologian Brennan Manning, in which he asked (something along the lines of) “When you meet God at the end of your life, what do you think God’s first question will be for you?” My brain immediately thought, “I hope I loved people well.” (Meaning, “I hope I was a good person; I hope I did enough to earn your love.”)
Manning’s thought? He thinks God will ask, “Did you really believe that I loved you?”
The nature of God’s grace is that it loves us just as we are. Not for anything we did or didn’t do.
Anne Lamott, one of my favorite authors, writes, “I do not at all understand the mystery of grace — only that it meets us where we are but does not leave us where it found us.” (Traveling Mercies [Pantheon Books, 1999], p 143.)
I hope I’ve contributed to your deep and sure awareness that God actually does love you no matter what, just as you are, right in this moment.
I am still learning this, too.
Ours is a God who is consistently in our corner, loving us without conditions, welcoming everyone into the family, erasing the lines between us, and gently inviting us out of our comfort zones.
It’s a love that helps us forgive ourselves and let go of all our hurts and hang-ups so we can be free to go do the work that God calls us to — the work of loving people (literally everyone), and caring for the poor and the dispossessed, elevating their voices, believing their experiences, and taking care of each other, and bringing more hope and love into the world.
This is what the life of faith is about — receiving God’s indiscriminate, reckless, all-encompassing love, and showering it all over everybody else!
Sendoff this Sunday
My friends, I hope you’ll come to the sendoff that SPPRC is hosting for me this Sunday, July 26, after the 11am service in Warehouse 839, so we can say goodbye.
It is recommended for long-term church staff that I take some space from HUMC for at least six months, maybe more. This will give you all the opportunity to form new connections and relationships of care after I’ve stepped away from my role on staff, and it’ll help the next person who does this work to be successful as they lead. After that we’ll see where God leads me.
God has given me so much clarity that this is the next right step in faith for me. HUMC has had my heart for years, and I love you all, so I will be sad to leave. And also, I am well, and very much at peace, and excited about God’s faithful promise to love me into my next chapter.
Thank you for all the ways you have blessed my life and work these 21 years! You have showered grace upon me, my friends, and I am not where you found me.
With much gratitude and love,
Beth Palmer
