Found at: http://www.anguillaguide.com/article/articleprint/5166/-1/140/
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YOUNG WOMAN WELCOMED TO METHODIST MINISTRY Rev. Niles: "It's Going To Be Rough, Sister"
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Jamaican-born Reverend Carleen White was welcomed to serve as the new Minister in the Anguilla Methodist Circuit on Sunday, September 2, at Bethel Church.
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Reverend Carleen White
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Reverend White, who will be 31 in December, is fresh from the United Theological College of the West Indies in Jamaica which she attended for four years and obtained a Diploma in Theology. She holds a Bachelor’s degree in Theology from the University of the West Indies which has a joint relationship with the college.
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Rev. Lloyd charges Rev. White. Rev. Niles and Cecil Niles at left
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The main welcome was extended to her on behalf of the Circuit by Superintendent Minister, the Reverend Dr. H. Clifton Niles, who is in his 40th and last year in the ministry. He noted that at times a minister was appointed to an area where the work should be ‘easy and smooth sailing,’ but he cautioned her: “It’s going to be tough and rough, sister. If you are not careful you are going to go mad, sister. There are people who should be holding up your hand, strengthening you, but some of them [will be] weakening you…Prayer is the tool you have to discover that would keep you going.”
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A section of the congregation in song
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He told her that if she had the passion of the Biblical Nehemiah she would succeed in Anguilla where she was being welcomed to be an effective leader, equipped and called by God. He challenged her to follow five qualities of Nehemiah, thus becoming a person of piety, prayer, passion, progress and perseverance.
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Other sections of the congregation
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Reverend Niles advised her to adopt a number of guidelines which had helped to influence his own performance in the ministry over the years. These were: be committed but not fanatical; collegial but not condoning; critical but not judgmental; compassionate but not slack; courageous but not disruptive; Christ-like but never pretend to be Christ. He encouraged her, like Nehemiah, to discover the right balance between love for God, love for country and love for people.
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Other sections of the congregation
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Circuit Steward, Cecil Niles, who joined in welcoming Reverend White, challenged her to motivate the members of the Church, instil a new zeal in them and to participate in a new membership drive so that Methodism could grow on the island. He wished her a fruitful and rewarding ministry. She was also welcomed by representatives of Zion, Sandy Ground and Immanuel, three of the six Methodist Churches for which she has been given responsibility.
Reverend White was inducted into the ministry by Reverend Joseph Lloyd, on behalf of the President of the Methodist Conference in the Leeward Islands District, Reverend Franklyn Manners, who was being welcomed that same day as Superintendent of the St. Thomas Circuit in the US Virgin Islands.
In an interview following the welcome and induction service, Reverend White told The Anguillian that Anguilla reminded her of her home town in a small village called Swift River in Portland, near Port Antonio, Jamaica.
“I was brought up in the Church of God of Prophecy and I remember my Sunday School teacher telling me about Jesus in the temple at the age of 12 and I told myself that when I became 12 years I want to do what Christ did,” she recalled. “However, it was five years or so after that the Lord placed a call on my heart to the ministry.”
She noted that there were not many opportunities in her original Church and with the encouragement of her Methodist sisters she eventually converted to Methodism. “I really saw my place in the Methodist Church and that is where I believe God has called me,” she stated.
Reverend White is the last of ten children on her father’s side. Two of them and her parents are deceased. She has no immediate plans to establish her own family and is committed to her ministry in which she finds great satisfaction.