Good News Magazine, the leading theologically conservative publication that has influenced the United Methodist Church since 1967, has announced that it will cease publication.
Good News President Rob Renfroe and Good News Vice President Thomas Lambrecht issued a joint statement Monday saying, “Our board and management have decided it is time for Good News to wrap up its work.”
“So over the next few months we will be closing our office and a final issue of the magazine will be published after the first General Conference of the Global Methodist Church in September of this year,” they said.
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“We will continue to publish the weekly edition of Perspective in the fall, and our website will continue to be available as an archive of Good News’ ministry and history.”
Renfroe and Lambrecht noted that they had both transferred their membership to the Global Methodist Church, a theologically conservative denomination founded in 2022 as an alternative to the UMC.
Although they credited Good News with helping them avoid thousands of congregations leaving the UMC because of its theologically liberal orientation, the two former UMC pastors spoke positively about their former church.
“We are eternally grateful for the life and ministries God has given us and for the opportunities provided by the UM Church,” they continued. “It was the UM Church that recognized our gifts, affirmed our calling, and allowed us to serve their communities.”
“Welcoming us with open arms over forty years ago is a decision that some in the UM Church regret. But we are grateful for a church that has made a place for us to be in service, to do God’s work and to follow His calling on our lives.”
In assessing the ultimate impact of the Good News on the UMC, Renfroe and Lambrecht were convinced that things would have turned out differently without the testimony of its publication.
“The vast majority of traditionalists would have left the UM Church years ago, the church would have become radically progressive long before then, and whatever evangelical movement emerged from it would have been, at best, a mere shell of the GMC,” they said.
“We could not imagine a better life than the one God has given us. And we could not be more grateful. Grateful to the United Methodist Church for giving us the opportunity to be in ministry, to those who led us to faith in Christ, to our wives and children who supported us in ministry, to the churches who blessed us, to the men and women who inspired us, and to all of you who supported us and the work of the Good News.”
In recent years, the UMC has been embroiled in intense debate over whether to amend its Book of Discipline to remove provisions prohibiting the blessing of same-sex unions and the ordination of non-celibate homosexuals.
While Good News and other like-minded organizations within the UMC succeeded in adhering to the measures set out in the Book of Discipline, many theologically liberal leaders refused to follow or enforce the rules.
At a special session of the UMC General Conference in 2019, delegates passed a temporary measure allowing more than 7,500 congregations to leave the denomination amid ongoing debate, most of which joined the GMC.
After these congregations left the UMC earlier this year, delegates at General Conference voted overwhelmingly to remove the actions from the Book of Discipline.
In February, before the changes were made, Renfroe told The Christian Post that the upcoming General Conference would be the last time his group participated in the churchwide legislative assembly.
In 2022, the Confessing Movement, another unofficial conservative advocacy group within the UMC, announced its closure because it viewed GMC as failing to fulfill its mission.
“We believe we have achieved our goal,” said Patricia Miller, executive director of the Confessing Movement, in a previous interview with CP. “We believe that with the formation of the Global Methodist Church, we have achieved our goal of a faithful community of faith.”
“Our goal was to get the United Methodist Church to be true to our doctrine, our faith in Jesus Christ, the Son, Savior and Lord. And now the Global Methodist Church is true to that faith. So the Global Methodist Church does not need a renewal group.”
