Several years ago, God called us into full-time vocational ministry. As most fans of Seasons of Life Ministries already know, His call was a touch vague: “be available”. Most fans will also tell you this has allowed me a lot of room to get into trouble – overextended, wiped out, overcommitted trouble. However, last quarter – 4th quarter of 2011, it seems like (and I hope, this is in humility) both Cristine and I were in full agreement with what God wanted us to do, more importantly what He wanted us to not do. We did our best to stay out of His way.
In 2011, God used us to reach hundreds of people through one on one discipleship, couples discipleship, DivorceCare, DivorceCare 4 Kids, through existing environments like ONE TH1NG and Men Step Up, our Speak Life programming, and That Day production. This is pretty mind blowing to me as I type it, because while I know I’m a pretty high capacity guy, to see all of this done despite going through what we went through personally is clearly an act of God. Me? Not capable of all of that in one year. Him? Able to do abundantly more than all we could ever ask or imagine.
- For Q4, our goal was God sent – “only do what I tell you to do”. We were able to train two leaders for ONE TH1NG and several more for service at FreeChapel for their DivorceCare and DC4K program. But, again, only by God’s grace and not because we’re anything special. Totally “a God thing”. Goal met. As we’ve heeded God’s call to do less stuff for greater impact, He’s seen to this kind of impact:
- More important than the numbers is the depth of effect – to have a guy call me on the phone or text me to say “we need to get together” or “thanks, for your prayers” is a humbling honor.
- To see a man who’s been in the word, active in his church, and obedient in the marketplace finally break through the wall of “prays regularly with his wife” is a milestone. To watch a woman respect her husband when he’s not being respectable so that he may be “won over
- As we look at God’s mission for Seasons of Life “Realigning lives with the Way, the Truth, and the Life of Jesus Christ”, we saw a great ROM (Return on Mission) in last year – God repositioned Cristine to speak into the lives of women who’ve undergone emotional and physical abuse, struggled with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, and now is able to speak out boldly about how God has redeemed the abortion she had over a decade ago. God has widened her ability to minister to the broken because He’s God and “in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. (Rom. 8.28)”
- God has called me to begin the process of duplicating myself – in a few unique ways, He’s begun to bring that process to fruition as we’ve released a few leaders to shepherd others in pastoral care and men’s ministry. Where that may lead through the use of technology and improvements in our Social Media strategy is entirely up to Him, but we stand just past the threshold of 2012 with our ears open and feet “fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of Peace”. What does that mean? We’re awaiting His next orders and you’ll hear about it both online and offline.