Sacrements and Deacons

I heard today that Deacons in the United Methodist Church have been given sacramental authority by the General Conference. I'm not sure how I feel about this. On the one hand, the church has needed to respond to a changing understanding of the Deacon. Asbury, for instance, has deacons as associate pastors the same as elders. These deacons are even the leader of the worshiping congregation, but not the sacremental leader. Certain services at Asbury have had to bring in outside elder leadership. That doesn't make any sense. However, Asbury has also hired to additional elders so I think they have solved their problem.

The new understanding is that deacons can serve the sacraments in the absence of the elder with the consent of the Bishop in their appointed setting. Kind of confusing. Makes me wonder when that would ever be the case. Is this intended for agency work, because when else would an elder not be present in the life of the church?

This is a step in the right direction in getting the sacramental power outside of one order, however, I'm not sure it is defined clearly enough by the Discipline. Some people could manipulate that pretty easily and have a bunch of deacons and give them sacramental authority. However, most deacons understand that they have given up that authority to take that order because that order is not intended to lead the church through order or sacrament. It kind of makes me think it is just for agency work.