We have a simple challenge for anyone who is serious about starting.
Come out to the church. Give us one year of your life.
One year in which you hear the Word. One year in which you speak the Word. One year in which you do the Word of God.
And we guarantee your life will never be the same again.
I have been in ministry for over thirty years, and I have said this to more people than I can count. Some of them laughed. Some of them thought I was being dramatic. A few of them said, That’s a big ask, Pastor.
It is a big ask.
But here is what I have learned watching people walk this out: a year is both longer and shorter than you think.
Longer, because it requires something of you
Showing up on Sunday when you don’t feel like it. Opening your Bible when your day is already too full. Sitting in a small group with people you don’t know yet, being honest about things you’ve kept private for years. Finding a place to serve even when you’re not sure you have anything to offer.
That is the Hear, Speak, Do pattern — and it doesn’t happen once. It happens week after week, month after month, until it stops being a discipline and starts being a life.
That takes time. It requires something of you. It is, in the truest sense, a long walk.
Shorter, because it moves faster than you expect
The year goes. Life goes. The question isn’t whether twelve months will pass — they will. The question is what kind of person you will be on the other side.
I have watched people come into this church carrying things that had followed them for decades. Anger. Grief. Shame they couldn’t see past. Marriages held together by habit and not much else. I have watched those same people, a year later, look different. Carry themselves differently. Speak about their families differently.
Not because we did something to them. Because they gave the Word a year to work.
If you are reading this and something in you is stirring — that is worth paying attention to.
You don’t have to have it all together. You don’t have to have every question answered before you begin. You just have to show up.
Come out to the church. We will meet you there.