Rev. Hannah Lovaglio

Before the meetings begin and the programs return, there’s still a moment to ask what matters.

My first child arrived a month early, on Labor Day.

In my mind, we had a whole month to prepare – to pack a bag, build a crib, organize diapers, be showered with advice from loved ones.

The new season began before the calendar said it would, before everything was finished, and certainly before I felt ready.

My body remembers that feeling, around this time every year. Especially so in the church.

All summer, September sits safely in the distance. We know it is coming. We know the programs will return, committees will reconvene, budgets will require attention, and calendars will fill. We tell ourselves there is still time.

And then, suddenly, fall is here.

When a season arrives before we feel ready, our instinct is often to move faster. We make lists and schedule meetings and pack a little more doing into the day. We search for the right curriculum, the better system, the new tool that will help us organize everything and catch up.

There is comfort in choosing a tool. In believing this will be the year we master a digital calendar with integrated to-do lists, show up to staff meetings prepared, and finally get our workflows running seamlessly. It gives us something concrete to do. It creates the feeling of forward movement.

But while a tool can help us move more efficiently, it does not help us discern where we are going. A perfectly packed hospital bag is useful when the moment arrives, but it cannot tell us when it is time to go—or what the moment will ask of us.

In the sixteenth chapter of Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus and his disciples arrive in the district of Caesarea Philippi. They have already traveled a long way together. They have heard Jesus teach, watched him heal, helped him feed hungry multitudes, and crossed stormy water with him. They have participated in his ministry without yet fully understanding it.

And then Jesus pauses.

“Who do people say that the Son of Man is?” he asks.

The disciples offer the answers they have heard: John the Baptist, Elijah, Jeremiah, one of the prophets. They know what other people are saying. They understand the conversation around them.

Then Jesus asks the question that will carry them into everything that comes next:

“But who do you say that I am?”

Peter answers, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”

Only after something essential has been named does the journey turn toward Jerusalem. Matthew marks the transition with the words, “From that time on.”

From that time on, Jesus begins to show the disciples where he is going. From that time on, they begin to learn what following him will require. They do not understand it all at once. Peter, having answered one question faithfully, almost immediately gets the next thing wrong. Still, there is now a direction to their journey, grounded in the identity of the one they have chosen to follow.

Churches often approach the fall by asking, “What are we going to do?”

What programs will we offer? What events will we host? What needs to go on the calendar? What will we fund, promote, purchase, or change?

These are necessary questions. They are simply not the first questions.

Before deciding what to do, a congregation needs some clarity about who it is. Before choosing a tool, we need to know what we are asking that tool to serve. Before filling the calendar, we need to ask what God may be calling us toward in this particular place and season.

Otherwise, it is easy to confuse activity with direction.

A full calendar can tell us that we are busy. It cannot tell us that we are being faithful. A new system may help us accomplish something faster. It cannot tell us whether that thing deserves our limited time and energy. Even a beloved and successful ministry can continue long after we have stopped asking what purpose it serves.

Clarity is better than speed.

Clarity does not require certainty. Peter’s confession did not mean he suddenly understood everything about Jesus or the road ahead. In the church, we rarely receive a complete map. We listen. We name what we know. We take the next faithful step, trusting that more will be revealed along the way.

But even partial clarity can change the questions we ask.

• Who has God gathered us to be?
• What has been entrusted to us?
• Who are our neighbours now?
• What does love require of us here?
• What might become possible if we gave our attention to fewer things more faithfully?

Questions like these create direction. They help us recognize which ministries need renewed energy and which may have reached their natural end. They bring coherence to decisions about staffing, buildings, stewardship, communication, and programming. Questions of clarity help us choose tools because those tools support the mission, rather than allowing the tools available to determine the mission.

When my child arrived early, there were things left unfinished. The bag was not packed. The nursery was not ready. Many of the items we thought we needed were still sitting on a list. And God bless us, some of the thank you notes were never written.

But his arrival brought its own clarity. There was a child to receive and love. Everything else could be finished later, rearranged, borrowed, or released.

Perhaps that is what this threshold between summer and fall offers the church: not enough time to do everything, but enough space to remember what matters.

September will arrive whether we are ready or not. The meetings will begin. The programs will return. The calendar will fill, because calendars always do.

Before it does, we have a moment to pause.

To listen again for the voice of the one we follow.

To become clear about what has been entrusted to us.

And then, from that time on, to choose the tools that will help us travel faithfully in that direction.