MOAC Announces Staffing Change
News
The Office of Mission, Service and Justice has named Rev. Lucas Endicott as Senior Mission Strategist. In this redefined role, Endicott will provide daily management for the Mozambique Initiative, Global Connect (formerly V.I.M.) and the Conference’s short-term recovery project in Puerto Rico. An ordained elder, Endicott was appointed to the Conference staff in 2015.Endicott has worked in the Office of MSJ as Mission Strategist since 2015 where he created the formational missions resource tool called Global Connect and helped establish various mission. projects around the world. Following 2017’s Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico, he has provided leadership for the Conference’s response to the island of Vieques, Puerto Rico. To date, Missouri’s efforts have brought in almost $50,000 toward a $150,000 goal, and 43 Global Connect teams have committed to serving in Vieques through March 2019. The teams represent a diverse sampling of local churches from across the state, and seven of the groups are comprised primarily of young adults.
Originally from southwest Missouri, Endicott has extensive experience in global mission. He worked for the General Board of Global Missions during his time at Princeton as a theological trainer for the young adult program and helped design the current global mission fellow program. Following seminary, he served as the first Director for Faith and Service at Central Methodist University. With a goal of learning more about how students access higher education, he studied on the border with Mexico, and in the spring he will complete his doctoral dissertation on “Innovation in Higher Education: Voices from Latin America and the Caribbean.”
Endicott loves coupling research and practice and is passionate for how the local church reaches out in ministry to all the world. Through his work, he hopes to contribute to the Methodist axiom “do no harm, do good, and stay in love with God.”
The Office plans to implement this change immediately. As of this announcement, Endicott had recently returned from meetings with the Iglesia Metodista de Haití and was making initial plans to be in Mozambique, alongside representatives from the Office of Finance and Administration and the MI team, in early 2019. He will be working in the coming weeks to be fully transitioned to the MI project. Since Craig Stevenson’s departure in July, the MI has been managed by Missouri’s representative in Mozambique, Ezequiel “Ezy” Nhantumbo.
As 2018 comes to a close, local church gifts and commitments to covenant partners in Mozambique is more important than ever. The Office of MSJ invites you to renew your financial commitments to your covenant partners before December 31, 2018, as a sign of encouragement and faithfulness. Please send your gifts to the Mozambique Initiative to the Missouri Annual Conference, 3601 Amron Ct., Columbia, MO, 65202.
Larry Jacobs has been hired as the Disaster Response and Readiness Coordinator. This is a part-time position. Jacobs will primarily work out of his home in St. Charles when not working directly with local churches on disaster response or conducting training events. Expect to see him a few times a month in the Conference Office as he works on sustaining and building systems that help our conference and local church disaster response. In the near future you will be able to reach him at ljacobs@moumethodist.org.Jacobs retired in 1993 from the American Red Cross after 15 years of service in various program and management positions in Disaster Services. He also worked from the St Louis Midwestern Operations Headquarters (now dissolved) as Emergency Preparedness Coordinator for Region 2, which covered five states, and Chief of Disaster Services which covered 17 Midwestern states in preparedness and disaster response.
An active member of Church of the Shepherd in St. Charles, he is involved in community missions leading biweekly services at a Memory Care facility, a member of the audio visual and hospitality team, and he will begin training in January as a Stephens Minister.