Through the glass in the door, I saw the lights go out in the Kindergarten room. Then they began flickering. I looked in to see what the problem was. As I opened the door, the singing began.

“This little light of mine,

I’m going to let it shine.

This little light of mine,

I’m going to let it shine,

Let it shine,

Let it shine,

Let it shine.”

Every child in the class had a flashlight and the flickering was the shining of their lights "all around the neighborhood" while they sang. As I left the church parking lot after the services, I found myself humming the tune and wondering if people saw a light shining when they looked at our church. Then I wondered if people saw lights shining when they looked at our members. Next a thought came to me that really got my attention. Did they see a light shining when they looked at me?

I am glad to say that lights "are" shining in the Lake Union. During the past quinquennium, the membership of our collective local conferences has grown to 79,525. That is a net increase of 6,797. Last quinquennium the increase was 4,217. When you consider economic woes across our territory have caused more people to move away than to move here, that number takes on added significance. All you can say is “Praise the Lord!”

As the keeper of the records, I could bore you with statistics—but I won’t. (Somebody just shouted, “Amen!”) Two areas, however, caught my attention. The first is bad news/good news and is more general than specific. Because our larger churches tend to be in areas more highly impacted by the economic slump, their growth, if any, has been extremely slow. During the next five years helping these memberships adjust to their changing demographic conditions will be one of our priorities. However, smaller congregations are growing at an excellent rate overall. There is something to be said for the warm, family atmosphere of smaller groups.

The second area is more clearly defined. As a union, we now have more churches to shine a light then we did five years ago. Today, we have 503 established churches compared to 485 at the end of the year 2000. When you add to that 45 companies, more neighborhoods in our largest metropolitan areas and the remotest counties of our territory are glowing for Jesus.

In my mind I can still hear the Kindergarten children with their flashlights singing,

“Let it shine till Jesus comes,

I’m going to let it shine.

Let it shine till Jesus comes,

I’m going to let it shine,

Let it shine,

Let it shine,

Let it shine.”

Rodney A. Grove is the Lake Union Conference executive secretary and ministeral director.