Times and Seasons

I wrote the following article as a devotional for a Mission Area meeting and thought I would post it as an entry in this blog. To be clear, I am removing some names from the post, and the reader should understand that every person sitting in this meeting is a Senior Pastor of a church in Northern Vermont, so the audience is a little 'different'. With that said, on with the show...

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Times and Seasons

There is a well-known song from about 1965, written by Pete Seeger and made a hit by “The Byrds”. The title is “Turn! Turn! Turn” It was adapted almost verbatim from the book of Ecclesiastes using the KJV. There was a little moving around of the text, but it is close to the original.

The text in Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 from the NIV says…

1 There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under heaven:
2 a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to uproot,
3 a time to kill and a time to heal, a time to tear down and a time to build,
4 a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance,
5 a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them, a time to embrace and a time to refrain,
6 a time to search and a time to give up, a time to keep and a time to throw away,
7 a time to tear and a time to mend, a time to be silent and a time to speak,
8 a time to love and a time to hate, a time for war and a time for peace.

It seems that we go through seasons in life. There are cycles and there are cycles within cycles.

In our own lives we go through seasons where everything seems to be going well, and then there are times when life just caves in around us. I don’t know about you but for my family we have had seasons when it seemed like everyone was walking up the aisle. There are other times when people are having babies. Then comes the times when we seem to be attending one graduation party after another. Those are happy times. We rejoice with our friends and relatives and life just seems good. The sky is blue and the weather is warm, the birds are singing and laughter is in the air.

Then we have those other times when we feel like we are walking down a dark hallway with no light at the end. People are sick and in the hospital. Every time the phone rings it is another person telling us about a doctor visit that ended with bad news. Someone has cancer; someone else has illness and tests but no definitive diagnosis. Someone has been the victim of a crime. Another has just filed for divorce. The unemployment is running out. A child is addicted to drugs or alcohol. Our prayers go up, but there seems to be no answer, and we don’t know what to tell people anymore. The old saying is that ‘the skies have turned to brass’.

There is a line from Mr. Tumnus in “The Chronicles of Narnia” which always resonated with me. “Always winter, but never Christmas”. That catches the mood of the season very well.

I know that we have probably all applied these thoughts to ourselves and to those around us. Maybe we have even preached using this text at a funeral or maybe on a happier note during a baby dedication. But have you ever thought of this text in connection with your church? Churches go through ‘seasons’, too. We learn in Bible school and seminary that churches have a ‘life cycle’. But like a wheel within a wheel, they also have seasons.

Maybe your church is going through a time of decline right now and you are wondering why. You do everything you can to improve morale and reach out to people and it seems like nothing is working. You take people out for coffee, you pray with your church board, you hold revivals with special guest speakers. And yet, the darkness and gloom cannot seem to lift.

Maybe it seems as if the church is growing…you feel inept and yet the church is growing by leaps and bounds even when it seems like you couldn’t boil water without burning it. You make every mistake in the book and still the good things just keep on happening.

I think maybe we need to think about what season the church might be in. What has been happening to her recently? Has the church been through a trauma and needs a season of healing? Has the church been in an autumn, where they have been surrounded by the golden leaves of the past and gotten used to looking back at the ‘good old days’? Or is the ice starting to melt, and you see green under the snow?

Just recently I saw a note from Pastor G that his church is starting to broadcast their worship services on local TV. The funny thing is we in St. Albans have been doing that same thing for several years now, but a few months ago decided we would stop. In thinking about it we realized that the season for doing that ministry had passed. For East Charleston it may be right and in season; for us the season has passed.

In his book “The Purpose Driven Church”, Rick Warren says something very significant. He says that as pastors we are like surfers, surfing the wave of the Holy Spirit. We can do great things on that wave. But we CANNOT MAKE THE WAVE. We have to find out where the Holy Spirit is, and then we need to cooperate with Him. Otherwise we are just paddling aimlessly and ineffectively. Last year my wife and I went to Hawaii for our 25th anniversary. I took a surfing lesson at our hotel. During that lesson I learned some good things. One of them is that it is exhausting paddling a surfboard. Trying to do things without the power of the wave behind you will wear you out quickly.

Another thing I learned is that waves rarely come to shore in a straight line, they come in at an angle. The wave doesn’t hit along the shore at each point at the same time. That means that someone close to me in the water might catch a particular wave a few seconds ahead of me, or a few seconds after me. The same wave, but different timing.

The lesson for me is that while the Holy Spirit is doing one thing in St. Albans, He might be doing something different in Williston and another thing in Leicester and yet another in Johnson or East Charleston.

The key thing here, the main lesson, is to recognize the working of the Holy Spirit as He is working in your place, recognize what might be the ‘season’ for your church, and to place yourself in position so that He can use you. We do that through prayer. We do that through spiritual discernment. We do that through a spirit willing to submit to His will. Are you ready for that challenge?

“There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under heaven”

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Too many things

It has been roughly six months since I have posted anything. Nothing to say? Not really...actually, too many things to say. It seemed that every time I thought to write a post there were several issues on my mind. Strangely enough, this did not result in multiple posts in the blog about each of the items, it resulted in my being paralyzed with a lack of decision. How did that happen???

I think that often we encounter this issue in our own lives. We get discouraged because we don't see anything happening, or sometimes because we know there is too much to do (any husbands out there with loooonnnggg to-do lists?). So, instead of digging in and tackling the job we just sit on the couch and watch a football game. The dishes pile up, the laundry overflows, the Christmas tree is still up in March and the car needs an oil change...but I think I'll take a nap. I made a resolution to read the Bible this year, but I slacked off and now it is too late. I failed.

It is time to get up. I have not posted in six months, so I simply restart now. I cannot recover that lost time, but I can start anew and make the future better. Whatever it is you have to get done, start now, even if it is a small step. Don't wait.

Now, if only I could remember what those things were I wanted to write about...

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