“Say it with your chest.” It means to speak with confidence and boldness — like you really mean it.

It’s the way that followers of Jesus should proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor, said Lesley Francisco McClendon, senior pastor of C3 Hampton, a Mennonite congregation in Virginia, during the final worship service of the Mennonite Church USA convention in Greensboro, N.C., on July 12.

We can speak and act boldly because the spirit of the Lord is upon us, McClendon said — just as it was upon Jesus when he read from the scroll of the prophet Isaiah, as described in Luke 4, the convention’s theme scripture.

Wearing a T-shirt with the words “Preacher: I will not be silent,” McClendon emphasized that proclamation isn’t just words but action.

“Proclaiming is not just what you say, it’s what you live,” she said.

Because words can be empty, and we are called to be “cross-bearing truth-tellers.”

“Don’t tell me you’re proclaiming if you’re neighbor’s still hungry,” said McClendon, who also teaches at Duke Divinity School, Eastern Mennonite Seminary and Anabaptist Mennonite Biblical Seminary.

“Don’t tell me you’re proclaiming if your church is silent about injustice.

“Don’t tell me you’re proclaiming if the only ones who feel welcome are the ones who look just like you. . . .

“Proclamation isn’t passive, it’s prophetic. It disturbs systems. It redefines what is possible in the name of Jesus. . . .

“Here’s your uncomfortable statement for the day: If your proclamation makes the powerful comfortable and the oppressed invisible, you’re not proclaiming the gospel, you’re just broadcasting privilege. . . .

“What are you saying with your life? Because the scroll is still open, the Spirit is still speaking, and the people are still waiting.”

She invited the crowd to say with her: “When the scroll is handed to us, we will proclaim, because Jesus did.”

After the sermon, a video announced that the 2027 convention will be in Cincinnati.

The convention ended with volunteers throwing pairs of socks into the crowd with the convention theme, “Follow Jesus,” stitched on them.