Some Encouraging Signs
Planting a new church is a lot like planting a garden. You can’t expect immediate results. You have to prepare the soil, plant the seeds, carefully water and nurture the new growth and then trust that as you put in the effort, God will do the rest. It can be a long process. Some plants grow quickly with seemingly little effort on our part. Zucchini is probably a good example of a plant that produces abundant fruit (usually more than anyone wants or needs) with almost no effort. It’s a great plant for new gardeners or those without a green thumb. But other plants require much more care and grow much more slowly. Orchids come to mind. Not being a gardener myself, I can’t name very many others off the top of my head.
But the point is that planting a church has many similarities to planting a garden. Having done this before, I’m familiar with the process. And so I am encouraged by some of the signs I’m seeing in our new church plant lately. Our worship attendance has grown slowly but steadily, we keep seeing first-time visitors at every worship service and a good percentage have returned. We have over 50 people either signed up or otherwise committed for our Thanksgiving Celebration. And I keep hearing very good comments about the quality of our worship services.
Starting a new church with worship services on Saturday evenings is always an extra challenge. I am certain that when we move our services to Sunday mornings at 10:00am beginning January 4th we will see an immediate increase both in worship attendance and in first-time visitors. I believe that 2009 will see Spirit Song become a vital and vibrant church, on schedule to meet the membership and financial goals set by our Annual Conference.
I’m encouraged and I hope you are too! See you Saturday for another time of worship and fellowship as we continue to grow this church for the glory of God.
Blessings,
Steve