3rd September, 2025
At the African College of United Methodist Bishops meeting in Luanda, Angola, the Resident Bishop of the Sierra Leone Episcopal Area, Bishop James Boye-Caulker, was among the few episcopal leaders identified to lead devotion and speak at this grand assembly.
Speaking to colleagues Bishops on the theme: On mission, who? and why? With text from Jonah 4:2 to 11, Bishop Boye-Caulker started off by reminding them about the third stanza of the hymn: What a friend we have in Jesus. “Are we weak and heavy laden, cumbered with a load of care? Precious Saviour, still our refuge – take it to the Lord in prayer! Do your friends despise and forsake you? Take it to the Lord in prayer! In his arms, he’ll take and shield you; you will find a solace there”
Bishop Boye-Caulker revealed that God wants a relationship with each and every one of us, and that He calls us to join Jesus’ mission to befriend others. God wants humans to share His passion for reaching nations and beyond.
“What would be different if God’s love were to go beyond your borders?” The bishop asked. “But thankfully, we have gone well beyond our borders and found it to be an amazing experience of love expressed, growth achieved, and obedience defined,” Bishop Boye-Caulker maintained.
The book of Jonah, he said, is a book of surprises. For example, other books of the Old Testament have prophets speaking a word of judgment against the surrounding pagan nations, but Jonah actually travels to Nineveh. The story of Jonah, he recalled, was written to Jews who had returned from exile in Babylon.
“This story of Jonah and God together challenges God’s people to rise above their hatred of others and see the world through the eyes of their Creator God, Yahweh. The only thing that is greater than God’s power to churn the seas is His love for His creation. God hates nothing He has made. He yearns to restore it to Himself”, Bishop Boye-Caulker acknowledged.
Bishop Boye-Caulker further shared Tolkien’s epic story, “The Lord of the Rings”, reminding the gathering of Frodo, the young hobbit, who was given the burden of bearing the One Ring of power. Recalling that the ring has the power to plunge Middle-earth into the darkness and terror that is just beginning to spread. With a fellowship of different characters, he was determined to destroy the ring by throwing it into the volcano- MOUNT DOOM- from which it was forged. He would be going into enemy territory where the people are monsters of cruelty and pure evil. It was a frightening road ahead, and he lamented to Gandalf the Wise that the burden of the ring had ever come to him in the first place.
“Do you know, the Bible contains many stories like this?” The bishop asked. *“Noah spent one hundred years, faithfully building the ark to save the human family”. “Abraham was a pilgrim all his life to create a family and find a land that God would use to eventually bring forth the Saviour”.
Bishop Boye-Caulker underscored that the ultimate example of that story has to be Jesus, who would not be turned from going to the cross to bring salvation to each of us. “Stories like these are what we are expecting when God calls the prophet Jonah to take the message of salvation to the cruel Ninevites. If you know the story of Jonah, you know that thinking, the thinking of Jonah the Hero in God’s story pressing on to victory, that thinking could not be more wrong at least initially”, he explained.
In her soft-spoken voice, Mrs. Janet Boye-Caulker, who is happily known as “Mama Bishop” in the Sierra Leone Annual Conference, met with pastors’ wives, urged them to continue to keep their husbands in constant prayers while they work to keep the gospel of Jesus Christ alive.
“Without us, there is no church. As partners in ministry, we should always stand by our husbands and work to the glory of God Almighty”, Mrs. Janet Boye-Caulker expressed.
