Time for Change

Dear Huffman UMC Family,

After a great deal of prayer and discernment with my wife Carrie, I have made the difficult decision to leave Huffman. This process has been a long time in the making, and I don’t want anyone to feel like they have done anything to run me off or hurt my feelings (or those of my wife). I am leaving Huffman without resentment or anger, and I still believe that the church on Gene Reed Road has a vital role to play in the community around it. Unfortunately, I simply do not see myself being a part of that role. I request that this decision be respected as a final one. The purpose of this letter is not to solicit reasons to reconsider, but to part with Huffman UMC on good terms.

I want my reasons for leaving the church to clear. When my family left Huffman in 2002, there was a bitterness to our departure that left me feeling like I still had unfinished business there. When I came back in 2010, it was with great joy and relief to be in a familiar place with a church family that I knew cared for me. I want to thank everyone, and in particular, the folks in Limbo, for giving me a chance to come back and feel welcomed with open arms.

During the last four years, Huffman gave me a place to grow spiritually without feeling judged, and that has meant the world to me. Huffman also gave me a chance to believe I can be a leader in the church. I was privileged enough to serve on the Staff Parish Relations Committee from 2011-2013, during which time I feel we made important progress towards equipping Huffman with a staff that is ready and able to meet the needs of the congregation and community. Most importantly, the last four years have taught me that I have something to offer to the church; that regardless of my own imperfections, God can use me in the service of His kingdom.

The previous point is one of the primary reasons now is a good time for me to find a new church home. Huffman is the church I “grew up” in, both during my teens and a difficult time during my 20’s. It is the church my family attended and worked in. But it is not the same church my family went to, and it shouldn’t be. I am not the same person I was four years ago when I returned to Huffman. Huffman is a comfortable, secure place for me, but what I need now is a place for my family to live into the identities that God is calling us to. To move forward, I have to leave what is comfortable for new challenges, new friendships, and new opportunities for service.

I do not want anyone to misunderstand me on this point. I do not feel like Huffman has “failed” me or doesn’t care about me. My family and I have a lot of history with Huffman, good history, but the plain fact of the matter is I need a church home where I don’t have a family history. To be faithful to my identity in Christ, I need to find a church where people’s ideas about who I am are not defined by who my parents and grandparents were. I need to find a church without preconceived expectations about who I am based on who I was 15 years ago, or even 4 years ago.

In the same way, Huffman is not the same church it was 15, 20, or 30 years ago, and this is a good and natural thing. I firmly believe that Huffman UMC has a wonderful opportunity to serve the community around it in new, Christ-inspired ways. But to do that, it needs the room to develop a church identity that is not burdened by the history of the church it used to be. I see new and different faces emerging to lead Huffman, with new ideas about what the church can be. I applaud that. At the same time, I recognize that I am part of Huffman UMC’s history, not its future. As much as I need to make this change to become who God is calling me to be, I believe Huffman needs the voices of the past to give way to the voices of the future. If I can offer one hope for the church, it is this: that Huffman UMC will embrace the changing nature of its mission, let go of its past, and open itself to what God is calling it to be. Instead of clinging to the question “How can we get back to what we used to be?” I hope Huffman UMC will fearlessly pursue the question “Who are we called to be now?”

The first time I left Huffman, it wasn’t on my own terms, and it didn’t feel good. Now, I am choosing to leave on my own terms, and I have zero regrets about the time and energy I’ve invested into being a part of the Huffman UMC family. As my wife and I embark on the next step in our journey, I want you all to know that we love you very much, and this is not goodbye. We may not see you at the building on Gene Reed Road, but the relationships we have at Huffman are important to us. When Limbo officially disbanded a few months ago, we made a promise to stay in intentional relationship with one another, and it is my hope that the same will be true of the other relationships I have been fortunate enough to build with the rest of my church family.

With Love in Christ,

Philip Gibson