Seasons
On Friday, July first, 1983, Lori, our nine-month-old daughter, Tricia and I moved to Colorado Springs to start a church. On Sunday, July 3rd, we launched. Twenty-five people gathered at a La Petite Academy Day Care Center for our first service.
I have been involved in leading church plants and networks ever since--for the last forty-plus years.
What have I learned? I’m old; life moves fast; God is the same yesterday, today and tomorrow. What’s the once big lesson that stands out to me after forty years?
I’m assuming we know to stay close to God, pray regularly and take care of our family. But what else stands out:
One lesson that has hit me for forty years is: Life involves seasons. Life, ministry, leadership, church planting is made up of seasons.
The second wisest man who ever lived wrote:
“For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven:
a time to be born, and a time to die;
a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted;
a time to kill, and a time to heal;
a time to break down, and a time to build up;
a time to weep, and a time to laugh;
a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
a time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together;
a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
a time to seek, and a time to lose;
a time to keep, and a time to cast away;
a time to tear, and a time to sew;
a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
a time to love, and a time to hate;
a time for war, and a time for peace.”
Life has seasons. Some are great, some are not-so-great. As a church planter I experienced several years when ours was the “It” church, the hot church, the place to be. And I experienced some years when the hottest church in town certainly wasn’t ours.
Some seasons bring in a lot of money; some seasons see money fly away--times are tough, tight, and trying.
There are seasons of dreaming; seasons of deciding; seasons of delay, difficulty and dead end. And there are seasons of deliverance. And another season comes.
A big part of a leader’s responsibility is to anticipate, appreciate, mitigate, alleviate, moderate and celebrate the season you are in and the season you are heading into. The leader’s job is to recognize, realize, maximize and capitalize the seasons at hand.
“from Issachar, men who understood the times and knew what Israel should do”
“All the trees are losing their leaves, and not one of them is worried.”
Some seasons are short; there can be a limited shelf life and a narrow window.
After a number of years I learned that Sundays have seasons; weekends have seasons; we can anticipate what season a weekend might bring us.
For years I would categorize the entire year of Sundays into A, B, C and D Sundays.
A Sundays are those great days—Grand Opening; Easter; The Sunday before Christmas and Christmas Eve; Palm Sunday; a few weekends in the Fall; maybe Mother’s Day or the last Sunday in February.
B Sundays were pretty good. Weekends leading up to Easter as well as many Spring and Fall Sundays.
C stands for crappy. There are some crappy weekends for church in Northern California. Summer; the first couple of Sundays in December suck. We always saw a drop off the first two Sundays in November, then the Sunday before Thanksgiving scored a B.
D stood for disaster. You recognize these weekends. The Sunday after Easter. Often the Sunday between Christmas and New Years; Memorial Day; Labor Day. The two worst possible Sundays in my experience are December 26 and July 5. We changed the D to a T and called them Training Sundays. Then we changed it back to D and called them Development Sundays.
Those are the days you develop other people. If you are the Lead Pastor and you preach on a D Sunday, the D stands for Dummy! Get other people to lead those days.
We would budget according to the score. It is possible to move a weekend up a full grade with some event or marketing or excitement. But a D will never become an A.
Some seasons are short, some seasons last a long time.
The point is life has seasons, the church has seasons.
What season are you in? What season is your church in currently?
I bring up this lesson because Networks have seasons.
We’ve had some interesting seasons at Excel. When I decided to go full-time with about ten years ago, my wife asked me a question, “Can we not?” I knew what she meant. She was asking, “Can we not push, can you not just pour your entire life into this right now? Can you take a beat, a breath so we can catch our breath.”
Lori recognized the season. I asked our leaders not to pay me for a while. I wanted to just not. It was a season to cast away stones.
Then after our first gathering of what is now Excellerate, Luke Allen said, “We need a goal.” It was time to build, to plant and we set a goal to sign 16 planters in 2016.
We did it! Then I suggested, “How about 17 in 2017?” And our team said, “What a sad banana goal? (Not their actual quote) We’ve got to do at least twenty.” It was a season to push it. And we signed twenty-two that year.
I remembered thinking even years before that with our leaders we should be signing at least thirty a year. So, we set that as a goal and hit it in 2018.
The questions of what next led us to the parable of the Sower.
“And the seed that fell on good soil represents those who hear and accept God’s word and produce a harvest of thirty, sixty, or even a hundred times as much as had been planted!”
The obvious goal after thirty is sixty, and we met that mark in 2019.
Heading into 2020 I sensed we were in a season of deepening our roots—that turned out to be prescient.
Then for 2021 we decided to see how fast we could do 100. It took us 19-20 months.
Then came the “23andme year for 2023. It was the year of Jubilee for me, a season of resetting and forgiveness.
Last year we wanted to “Do more in ’24.” The first nine months were signed more planters than ever and gained more partners than ever.
But then came September and a tweak of our vision.
Several factors pushed me toward gearing up for a huge goal for 2025.
I received a call from one of our leaders who said he had a number of churches that Excel helped start, but they haven’t signed with Excel yet. He wanted to bring them into Excel. We have a grip of other planters who are ready to sign.
I sensed we are heading into a season of signing. What if we set a goal to sign one hundred planters in 2025.
Why?
There is a need. We need more churches.
It’s the clear next step: 30, 60, 100.
We’re poised to make a difference. Who else is going to start these churches? The denominations? Probably not. Other networks? Probably not.
There is a famous quote that is attributed to Hillel the Elder, John Lewis and JFK: “If not us, who” If not now, when?”
We can hit the ground running. We do have a waiting list of potential signees. So, this goal is definitely doable.
Big goals move us beyond complacency. I agree with Scott Adams, James Clear and the great Brian Burman who advocate for systems not goals. I suspect we need both.
My friend Tim Celek mentioned that too many church planters start out with lofty goals and then settle for complacency.
Big Holy Audacious Goals spark momentum.
If we’re going to dream, we might as well dream big.
“Remember this: Whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows generously will also reap generously.”
BHAGs help raise money. “Give to our ministry, we’re not doing much” doesn’t play as well as, “Let’s sign one hundred planters this year.”
One hundred in 2025 just works. We can call it “A hundred in 25” or “Race to 100” or whatever name works best. One hundred in 2026 or 2027 doesn’t sound as clean.
I want your church to be in on something really great. Your church can help multiply itself one hundred times this year.
Life is made up of seasons.
What season are you in? What season is your ministry in? This ministry, Excel is in a season of amazing opportunities.
The Message version of the parable of the Sower has an interesting take in Mark’s account:
“ Some fell on good earth and came up with a flourish, producing a harvest exceeding his wildest dreams”
God is able to do immeasurably more than anything we could ask or image. He can do more than our widest dreams. Let’s prepare for an amazing harvest season together.
Cutting Room Floor
“Still other seed fell on fertile soil. This seed grew and produced a crop that was a hundred times as much as had been planted!”
“…patiently produce a huge harvest.”
“The seed that fell on good soil represents those who truly hear and understand God’s word and produce a harvest of thirty, sixty, or even a hundred times as much as had been planted!”
“Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows. 8 Whoever sows to please their flesh, from the flesh will reap destruction; whoever sows to please the Spirit, from the Spirit will reap eternal life. 9 Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up”
“Every season is one of becoming, but not always one of blooming...”
“Be aware of what season you are in and give yourself the grace to be there.”
“If you stay stuck in the past season or fixated on the future season, you will miss the one you’re in.”
“There are years that ask questions, and years that answer.”
“Instincts under pressure crush the carbon of conformity and create diamonds. Each new season of life offers to train us for the next season if we pay attention and adapt.”
“The Bible teaches that true joy is formed in the midst of the difficult seasons of life.”
Seasons aren’t meant to be lifetimes. There is a season for everything under the sun—even when we can’t see the sun. For one it’s the change of seasons, for another, it’s the season of change.
I like the Four Seasons. It’s a nice hotel.
“Everything has seasons, and we have to be able to recognize when something’s time has passed and be able to move into the next season. Everything that is alive requires pruning as well, which is a great metaphor for endings.”
“There are only two seasons - Winter and Baseball”
“He changes times and seasons; he deposes kings and raises up others. He gives wisdom to the wise and knowledge to the discerning.”
“Yet he has not left himself without testimony: He has shown kindness by giving you rain from heaven and crops in their seasons; he provides you with plenty of food and fills your hearts with joy”
“You are observing special days and months and seasons and years!”
“There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens:
a time to be born and a time to die,
a time to plant and a time to uproot,
a time to kill and a time to heal,
a time to tear down and a time to build,
a time to weep and a time to laugh,
a time to mourn and a time to dance,
a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,
a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing,
a time to search and a time to give up,
a time to keep and a time to throw away,
a time to tear and a time to mend,
a time to be silent and a time to speak,
a time to love and a time to hate,
a time for war and a time for peace.”
“A hunch is creativity trying to tell you something”
“Procrastination stops; courage keeps going. Often when we think of making a big commitment, we think of facing fear and uncertainty. Courage is your response to all those worries and fears, but the important thing is to keep going forward despite the temptation to procrastinate or to turn away from the commitment. The difference between procrastination and courage is that the procrastinator feels the fear and stops while the courageous person feels the fear and moves forward.”
