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Adapting to Changing Seasons

“Round my door, the leaves are falling and a cold wild wind will come…” The words of Bob Dylan ring true around this time of the year. The changing seasons are a reflection of life. As the great philosopher, King Solomon, wisely said in Ecclesiastes 3:1-8, there “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, time for war and a time for peace.”

Life is about change.

Churches are not immune to change either. Because the church is a living organism, led by God’s living Spirit and filled with living and ever-changing beings, things rarely remain static. Every church goes through different seasons and cycles including sadly, death. While seasons and cycles are both ways to describe the rhythms of rising and falling, ebb and flow, give and take, each of them requires a different mindset, different methods and different expectations.

Knowing and appreciating the differences between them is essential to understanding a church’s current situation and developing ways for churches to move forward towards greater health and effectiveness.

Just like our natural seasons, we cannot control the seasons of life, but we can do something about the cycles. The wisdom of Solomon’s words acknowledges the reality that all of life comes to us in ups and downs, ins and outs, joys and sorrows.

In our natural world, spring, summer, fall and winter are expected. They can be measured and anticipated by the movements of the earth around the sun, or the moon around the earth. Others are ordered by planting and harvest, birth and death, weekdays and weekends, and more.

Seasons happen to us. We can prepare for them, adapt to them, get used to them, dress for them, remember them and build a future on them. But there are two things we cannot do when it comes to seasons. First, we cannot stop them from happening. The Earth will keep turning, births and deaths will keep happening. Secondly, because we cannot stop seasons from happening, we have to stop kicking against them. Surgery and anti-ageing creams can only delay the inevitable.

Remembering and appreciating past seasons is nostalgic. But with every season change, people comment. Remember when it was warm… Wanting to live in the past is irrational. Not liking your current season, such as winter, is normal. Denying it and dressing as though it is still summer is delusional and dangerous. Rather, we need to appreciate the seasons that have passed, anticipate the ones yet to come, and build on the lessons we learn every time they rotate by us.

Cycles are similar to seasons in that they also have a sense of change and rhythm to them. But they are very different from seasons in that we can affect the cycles of our lives. With ageing, we can make dietary changes and increase activity to lessen the effects. Churches are the same. Although traditions are good, when they become idols and lose their effectiveness, maybe they need to be changed or even stopped.

In journalism, they talk about a news cycle. It is the anticipated time that a particular story is likely to be active. But that cycle can be adjusted by a variety of factors, from the frequency of events to the agenda of the news organization, then to the attention span of the public. Reporters and editors can adjust stories to lengthen or shorten a story’s lifecycle.

It is the same in our lives and the churches we belong to. When it comes to cycles in the church, we can adapt or make changes to stop an ineffective program. We can try to stay firm to our forms or adapt to cultural shifts to contextualize our message and ministry, remembering the function or purpose is what matters most. It might be a change in focus towards prayer, the Word and relationships rather than programs and matrixes.

Cycles change in our personal lives all the time. Every time we get a new job, move to another town, start a diet, establish a different behaviour pattern, or reframe the way we think about something, we start a new cycle in our life.

Churches are no different when it comes to seasons and cycles. I have been a part of churches in all stages. From the earliest beginnings to seeing a church close its doors. Church leaders in particular need to know the difference between a church’s seasons and cycles.

Many churches use an ecclesiastical calendar. It gives Scripture readings for each week based on yearly holidays and seasons of the year. You can religiously follow it or use it as suggestions. But there are seasons that every church goes through that they have no control over. Seasons of gain and loss, birth and death, planting and harvest. The challenge for a leader is being able to take note of the seasons and to help the church adapt, adjust, and walk through them in a way that keeps them on purpose and effective. The struggle is not trying to force change or complaining that things are going the way they expect.

Instead, we need to ask ourselves, “What can be changed?” What attitudes, behaviours and habits have we been repeating so often that they have put us in a bad place of our own making? Those are the cycles.

Every church goes through seasons. Taking a blunt and objective look around her can be difficult. Even while experiencing a difficult season of losses that are beyond our control, with God’s Spirit at the helm and a sense of unity within the church family, things can change and a new cycle of fellowship, joy and hopefulness can bloom.

Taking an honest look at things, at what can be changed and what cannot, will help us adjust and make changes that can help the church adapt and rekindle the joy of our salvation in our lives and make us more effective for Him in world.

Reinhold Niebuhr’s Serenity Prayer can be a help for churches as they go through this process: “God grant me the serenity to accept things I cannot change (seasons), courage to change the things I can (cycles) and wisdom to know the difference (wisdom).”

As much as many Christians and churches want to “remain the same” or return to the “good old days,” if we are to be and remain effective ministers in our culture and world, we will need to adapt. As the seasons change, so must we.

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