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Apportionments Volunteers In Mission

OKUMC Volunteers In Mission Web site

The work of mission is properly the work of the local church, the gather­ing of the followers of Christ, whose purpose is not to build an organization but to partner with God in the building of God's kingdom.

Therefore, Volunteers In Mission exists not to do mission on behalf of the local church, but to facilitate it. VIM is one among many expressions of what the churches of our Oklahoma Conference do in mission.

The apportioned item for VIM is not by itself designed to accomplish the task of mission, but it is a solid commitment on behalf of the Conference to facilitate and strengthen the ability of each congregation in our Confer­ence to find its own way into Christian service. With about 5,000 people being sent out from or to Oklahoma mission opportunities, more and more churches are discovering the impact willing volunteers can make on an enormous number of people and circumstances.

VIM participants have, in the past year, contributed almost half-a-million dollars to various projects and provided almost a quarter-million volunteer hours. The volunteer hours are valued at more than $4 million, according to the Points of Light Foundation's valuation of such labor at $17.19 per hour. These volunteers serve within Oklahoma in many local churches and Conference ministries, as well as around the nation and across the world, always in response to requests from United Methodists or affiliated Meth­odist organizations. We partner with our friends in the Oklahoma Indian Missionary Conference, with other United Methodist conferences across the United States, with the Central Conferences of The United Methodist Church in Africa and Asia, and with other Methodist denominations around the globe.

Oklahoma VIM is a vi­brant expression of the local church in mission-and the apportionment money we put into it signals a deep-seated belief that each congregation is properly a mission-send­ing station.