Tell Your Ten-Year Story to Help Other People Tell Their Story

-Photo of my family a decade ago, May 2010.New Year's Day/New Decade's Day: January 1, 2020Yesterday I came across a Facebook post by a guy I don't know, David Fairchild (we've been in the same room many times before, perhaps we've met) who wrote a brief New Year's Eve reflection on the major events of his story over this past decade. Reading Fairchild's story got me more in touch with my story, reminding me that we read stories to better make sense of our own story. Author James K.A. Smith puts it this way: “Dave and Arlene aren’t sharing their stories so you can get to know them; they’re sharing their stories so you can get to know yourself" (On the Road With Saint Augustine, p. 161). A few hours after learning about Fairchild's decade I took my wife on a long walk where we recounted our ten-year story, which proved therapeutic and clarifying...and turned into extended praise, lament, prayer, and dreaming. I woke up this morning with a desire to pass on what Fairchild unwittingly gave to me—to tell the high-level/big-event version of my ten-year story in written form in hopes that it helps you tell your story and blaze a wise trail into this next decade. Again, James K.A. Smith writes, "maybe someone will see themselves in my story" (Ibid., p. 160). Fairchild only wrote a paragraph or two, but without hearing his story I would've had the idea to look into and tell my decade story. What I wrote here took on a life of its own. Who knows what you'll want to write or speak. This is a different kind of article, and of a much longer word count than usual. You'll either love it or hate it (I might even hate this). Let me know. Or tell David Fairchild, this article is his fault.Note that I devote more words to the first half of the decade, as they were most crazy, difficult, amazing, and foundational. Or to use Andre Agassi's words: "a wrenching, thrilling, horrible, astonishing whirl" (Open, p. 25). I've dated most big events correctly, but a few details were fuzzy and I may have put under the wrong year. And, remember that I don't know you and my life is just as messy and complicated as yours (or more so, because being a pastor is really complicated and public), so there are some events I don't share here. Also, I wrote this really fast...I wanted to get it out on New Year's Day, so forgive me for, and alert me to, any typos. My main goal wasn't to write thoroughly about every big event, but to write something of substance and press "publish" on New Year's Day (I lost steam towards the end, where my writing gets more terse; and I've surely left out some key events/people that I didn't recall with my quick writing today). My aim wasn't to write something perfect, just to write something. I took this afternoon and evening to write this. Finally, to God be the glory. He's the hero, constant, foundation, sustainer, provider, motivation, inspiration, healer, redeemer, and end-goal of my story.

2010

• I continue my recovery from ill-advised surgeries on both of my knees a decade earlier. I emerge from experiencing major knee-pain and being out of shape through most of my 20s, feel free and myself again as I heal and get back into athletic shape (I'm 20 lbs. lighter). Three breakthroughs/new habits set me free: A doctor tells me to start wearing SuperFeet (I use green, 10 years in I'm never without them), Lino Cedros teaches me a magical/painful stretch that takes away my knee pain (I still do this stretch 3-5x a week, otherwise my knees start to hurt), and I fall in love with trail running—I run far, fast, and as often as I can on as challenging terrain as I can...running uphill remains my favorite and is best on my knees.

• Preach my farewell sermon at Central Peninsula Church (Pictured above. Link takes you to audio or transcript of the sermon, and this link is to more pictures from the day). It's an amazing day where the elders lay hands on and pray over us and we enjoy a big going away party as we follow God’s strange call (this wasn’t my original dream) to plant a church in downtown Phoenix. My family experiences so much love and honor on this day that I question if I'm an idiot to leave such an amazing community to plant a church (see the letter that went out to our church about my departure). One of the best things that happened to me in the previous decade (when I was 27 years-old) was an opportunity to work at CPC with Mark Mitchell and the other elders and pastors there. The deeper I get into my journey as a church planter/Lead Pastor the more I see that most church planters didn't get to receive the healthy foundation/training/experience I received at CPC (see this article from 2009, 14 reasons why I love my church). My friendship with Mark Mitchell, John Brandon, Rob Hall, and others from CPC continues to be a huge gift in my life. As a 5th generation Californian and with an original dream to plant a church in the Bay Area through CPC (which then evolved to wanting to plant down in the South Bay after CPC's vision changed to video multisite campuses), this day of announcing that I was moving to plant a church in Phoenix was a really big/strange day in my life.  

• Two weeks before moving my family to Phoenix red flags show up and we realize it's no longer wise to move there, so we pull out. This brings enormous financial and social consequences (such as having preached a farewell sermon a few months earlier telling 2,000 people God's called me to plant a church in Phoenix. Just kidding! Now I'm not going. I'm still here! ...this feels really awkward, and is really humbling). I go on a trail run in Edgewood Park, collapse prostrate in the dirt, cry my eyes out, pour my heart out to God—I ask him how unemployed me is supposed to take care of my family, and I ask him if his call on my life is for me to revive my original dream of planting a church in the South Bay...where Taylor and I lived before taking the job at CPC. I'm more afraid than I've ever been in my whole life. Yet, I also feel a foreign freedom over how much God seems to be summoning me to trust him, and over the fresh daydreams of forming a community of disciples in Silicon Valley. Besides my wife, six people were huge in walking me through this season: Ryon Paton, Toby Kurth, my mom and dad, and my in-laws Suzanne and Jeff. 

• Four weeks after this aborted move to Phoenix, my wife gives birth to our third son. We’d already moved our medical insurance to Arizona, so we had to scramble to get California insurance and figure out the financials. I'm so excited over my new family of five, yet as head of my family I feel a heavier weight of responsibility than I've ever felt before. I don't know what to do.

• The financial crisis is bad. The economy is bad. About five years earlier I'd made the stubborn and foolish decision to take all our money we had in savings to put 10% down to buy a small condominium in the Bay Area. The monthly payments were a huge stretch for us, but we believed it was a wise long-term investment. Nope. The sub-prime mortgage crisis hits the American economy and now the value of this condo is -30% what we paid for it, and I'm unemployed and have a family of five in this small space. After much wrestling of conscience and counsel, we decide we have no other choice but to start the process of short selling the condo. I spend a full day at Toby Kurth's house using his printer and scanner to submit all the short sale paperwork. I'm so stressed out. And I'm questioning if this is the right decision, and if it's an ethical decision (don't I owe the bank the full amount of my loan?). I don't usually struggle with insecurity or negative self talk, but on this day I feel like a big fat loser...a failure, I don't even want to go home and face my wife. 

• Funny fact: There's one piece of evidence that makes it look like I actually moved to Phoenix. If you can find a first edition copy of Darrin Patrick's book, Church Planter, you'll find an endorsement from me that lists me as a church planter in Phoenix. I had left my old job and hadn't yet moved to start this new thing, so when the publisher asked what to put down for the endorsement this is what we came up with.

• I have a life-changing phone call with my mom. She tells me that my whole life I've always been afraid of everything falling apart (somewhere in my story/sin/wounds that's where my control idol comes from). She goes on to say, "And now, everything has fallen apart. Your greatest fear has happened." This discourages me more. But then she says, "But, guess what? God is bigger than your biggest fear." Those seven words, "God is bigger than your biggest fear," power and guide me through the rest of the year...probably the whole decade. This is probably my biggest lesson of the decade: the bigness of God, the smallness of me; learning radical dependence on God. This DNA becomes deeply part of the church I will plant, it will become the first word of our mission statement: "Depending on God to grow disciples deep & wide for God's glory." 

• I begin guest preaching anywhere I can to make some $. I begin preaching every Sunday at a church in Oakland that asks me to be their Lead Pastor, but my heart is set on planting a church I want to call “Garden City Church” in the city originally nicknamed “The Garden City.”

• Taylor and I have always been good savers, but we've never invested in the stock market. My mom encourages me to talk with a guy she knows at Charles Schwab to learn more about investing. I learn. I start taking a little bit of action. In this deep dip of the financial crisis I begin very small amounts of money. We have very little to spare, but whatever we can spare I invest. This decision/this new habit becomes one of the best decisions of the decade, and probably my life. Part of this is wisdom, and much of this is lucky timing of beginning to invest at the beginning of this incredible bull market we've enjoyed this whole decade. 

• For some reason I start combing my hair into a faux-hawk. The style sticks.

2011

• All of this stress, pain, humbling, loss, and load has been great for my prayer life. As I remember it, I pray all the time. I don't have anything else to do, any other way of finding my way. The vision that was developing in my during my CPC years for the type of church I wanted to start is now being sharpened by lots of prayer.

• We feel like ghosts, living in our old community but having already departed our old community. I've got a vision, a name, a logo, and a 5 page prospectus for "Garden City Church." Basically, I have an idea. We decide we can’t keep waiting to see if this short sale will get approved to move south to launch this dream I've sketched out on paper. We're 40 minutes north of where we sense God is summoning us to start this church, we need to move and get acclimated and gather some people. God provides so wonderfully. Our old next-door neighbor from our days of living in the South Bay offers for us to rent his home at a discounted rate. It's the only place we could've rented...I'm unemployed and have no paystubs to show a landlord. Five years earlier we left this street as a family of two, now after a deeply disorienting year we end up next door to our old place as a family of five. God writes redemptive stories. The house is small (850 square feet, one bathroom), but charming and perfect. We expect to live here just 1 year, but that turns into 4 years.

• On the day we move, besides my little family of 5, we have just 3 other people (who I barely know) committed to this idea of a church plant and $3,000 that I've raise for the church...mostly from family members. When my friends who helped move me (thank you Rob, Mike, Ryan, Dad) pulled away, my stomach dropped. I realized that the next day I had to figure out how to plant this church. 

• I develop a friendship with Steve Fuller, pastor of Mercy Hill Church. We create an arrangement where the Mercy Hill elders will provide oversight for me/the church as I get it started, and where Mercy Hill will send some people to join the core group I'm forming to plant Garden City. Read more about this here in this post from 2011. When I'm not guest preaching somewhere else on a Sunday, my family and I worship with Mercy Hill Church.

• Within two weeks of moving I receive a book contract from Crossway Books to write what will become Date Your Wife. I'm ecstatic. I wonder if Crossway realizes they just offered a book contract to an unemployed guy trying to figure out how to plant a church. Here's my 2011 post about receiving this contract. I begin to write. This book is in my bones and comes out fast and furiously.• It feels like things are starting to click, starting to work. I begin meeting a lot of new people, start sharing the vision for this church and forming a core group to start a church with.

• We spend a summer gathering as a core group, preparing to launch Garden City Church.

• I receive an out-of-nowhere phone call from John Bryson (we've never met, but he's heard about me through Stew Stewart, a guy I'd met just once at a conference in Chicago) inviting me to take part in a church planter residency program through Fellowship Associates. The opportunity sounds amazing, and totally ridiculous—they want me to fly to middle-of-nowhere Little Rock, Arkansas for 3 days every other week for 9 months. I can't do that. I'm one month away from starting this church. I say yes. It's one of the best decisions I've ever made, Fellowship Associates brings me incredible training and lifelong friendships with John Bryson, Bill Wellons (who is still my coach and counselor, we have regular appointments), Steve Snider, Nick Bogardus, James Roberson, and Jerome Gay.

• September 14th, I reach the summit of Mount Rainier (an old college buddy invited me to come on this expedition to be the pastor of the expedition) and I turn 33 years-old. 

• September 18th, four days later, we launch Garden City Church. The usual happens, it's a great day and lots of people/supporters/family members come to the big launch, then the next week we have maybe a 40% return rate. We become the first Acts 29 church plant in the Bay Area.  We remain there, at our first location, for about a year. I still miss this location, and often pray that God would do something crazy and give us this as a permanent location. 

• The church grows, people get saved and baptized, disciples get made, God is at work. I make many new relationships in our church and city. 

•  Three of us church planters who have been long time friends start a tradition of an annual church planters retreat where we spend a few days away together to check in on our hearts, our families, our churches, and our dreams and struggles. I still do this every year with Eric Simmons and Toby Kurth. Today one of the guys sent me words I wrote in our 2011 emails about getting this started: "We really should covenant to doing such a trip annually. It will shape the 3 of us more than we know and will make a difference in the kingdom." This has proved true.

• Church planting is fun.• I pray for revival.

2012

• Taylor and I have been wrestling for years about how we should educate our kids (public school, private school, home school?). We decide on public school, our oldest son starts Kindergarten, and we get deeply involved. Later our son's Kindergarten teacher will respond to an invitation to visit our church. She and her family keep coming. She gets saved and baptized in our church, and they've become great friends of our family. During that first Kindergarten orientation I meet Mike Courtney, a man who has become an incredible friend and has helped me in so many ways. 

• Date Your Wife is published, and Crossway sends me on a speaking tour to promote the book. I don't know comparables with other first time authors, but this first book remains my best selling book. It's currently sold 41,000+ copies and I receive correspondence about the book from readers almost weekly. 

• I'm working really hard, long 6-day weeks. But I keep my promise to my wife to keep a weekly sabbath (sundown Friday to sundown Saturday), lead a weekly date night, and protect annual rest/vacation.• I love pastoring our church, and I find it difficult...people are difficult.• I continue my habit from CPC of visiting people from our church at their workplace as a way to better know them and show them how important their Monday-Friday work is to the Kingdom. Here's a 2010 article I wrote about this practice. And here's a 2017 article I wrote for The Gospel Coalition about why: Pastor, Visit Their Workplace.• I learn to surf.• I run my first ultramarathon with my same buddies I ran my marathon with. After the race I decide running 33 exhausting miles is not the best form of fitness for my body. I start reading about other forms of fitness that are more well rounded.• Sermon Preparation is published, a book that I contributed a chapter to. My preparation process has changed considerably since writing that chapter. I hope to write and share my current process (which I've enjoyed for years) in a future article. • While at an Acts 29 pastors and wives retreat I receive a phone call from my mom. She tells me her cancer has come back, that after a long remission the cancer has now returned and this time it is in her bones. My heart sinks. My mom was first diagnosed with breast cancer in 2000, had a double mastectomy, and came very near death. I start praying. I wrote this in 2012 about the return of her cancer. I'm scared. I don't want to lose my mommy.• My brother goes through a divorce.• I set a culture/start a habit of taking the month of July off every summer to get refreshed and stay healthy as a pastor. Many of the pastors I know are burned out and un-excited, and I figure if I can take a month in the middle of the summer to basically "not be a pastor" (to not produce a sermon, not care for anyone's soul, not be on email, etc) and just be present to God and my family that I might have a chance of lasting in this calling for forty years. We have a free place to stay on the east coast with my wife's mom, being 3,000 miles away from Silicon Valley helps me rest and reset. This has been a game changer for me, my family, and my church. I'm healthy, refreshed, and excited about what I do. I attribute this to the core relationships around me and to this habit of rest where I have the space and pace to be in touch with my heart and seek to live wholeheartedly.• Garden City moves to its second location, Church of the Valley. We don't have to do baptisms on the street anymore, and this more expansive location feels more permanent.• Chris Carney visits our church after reading one of my books. He gets saved and baptized at our church, and over the years becomes one of my best friends. He and his (eventual) wife become so safe and precious to Taylor and me, help us feel like we can just be normal humans in our church and not "pastor" and "pastor's wife." We feel so known and loved by them.• Our church is really becoming something special—a community where people are known and loved, a place where best friends are made, a church family drawing closer to Jesus taking fresh steps to follow him into new territory.• I pray for revival.

2013

• My beloved grandma dies.• 2013 feels blurry as I try to reflect on it. My growing family and church kept me occupied, and the constant weight of cancer eating away at my mom.

• Why Cities Matter is published. It was fun and challenging to co-write a book with my friend, Stephen Um. This important but niche book hasn't sold as well as some of my other books, it's sold about 8,500 copies so far.

• The Big Story is published by Moody Publishers. Some of my friends tell me they think this is my best book. Personally I think this is my 2nd best book, and I hope it can reach many more people. Currently it has sold about 9,000 copies. • John: A 12-Week Study is published. I had no idea this one would get as much use as it has. It's my second bestselling published work, right now it's at about 30,000 copies sold.• I take a break from writing.• My research about fitness convinces me that CrossFit provides a more well-rounded fitness (I was able to run an ultramarathon, but could probably only do 2 pullups). I start doing CrossFit and love it.• I also change how I eat, switch my bodies' main fuel source from carbohydrates to protein. I start eating 3 eggs for breakfast every morning, and there's probably been only a handful of days in the last 7 years that I've deviated from my same boring old breakfast.• Garden City becomes financially independent, not reliant on or receiving any outside funding.• I wrestle with my sons all the time. It's one of my favorite ways to play and unwind.• My mom gets dramatically weaker. Her joy in the Lord as her body wastes away is stunning. I'm scared, I'm sad, I'm proud of her, I'm grateful, I'm a mess.• Friendship with guys like Leonce Crump and Ryan Kwon and others grow. Many of my close friends are church planters, we understand each other.

• I start "Guys’ Nights," gathering my Christian and non-Christian friends in my backyard to relax and have long talks/debates about life. 

• The church is growing and becoming more than I can handle as the only pastor on staff. 

• I spend Christmas Eve taking my mom to chemotherapy.• I pray for revival.

2014

• February 7th, my mom dies. She's 60 years-old, much too young. Her last words to me: "See you in heaven." To this day, whenever people talk about different types of cancer (colon, breast, bone, pancreatic, etc.) I can never remember what type of cancer people have or are talking about. It's some kind of mental block/defense I have. All I know is that "cancer" is the worst word in the world and I hate it. This is the obituary I wrote for my mom:

Joany was born 9/20/1953 in San Francisco and died 2/7/2014 in Elk Grove, CA. Joany loved Jesus, her family, her friends, and the many people she encouraged and helped as both a Marriage & Family Therapist and as co-owner of Liberty Bell Alarm Inc.

Joany lived her life to the fullest, happily pouring herself out to help others. After a 14 year battle with cancer, Joany is now at home with Jesus in heaven. She is survived by her loving husband (Ron), sons (Justin & Mark, and their wives Taylor & Jessika), six grandkids, and her sisters Lonnie & Paula. Joany’s Funeral/Celebration of Life service will be held at First Covenant Church on 2/15/14 at 2pm. 10933 Progress Ct, Rancho Cordova, CA, 95670.

• I didn't take any time off of work when my mom died. I should've. The church was just so demanding, but looking back I wish I'd given myself more space to grieve. • We hire additional staff to help care for the church.• We experience our first big wave of transience in the church. People are always moving in and out of Silicon Valley (and therefore our church), but this year is the first year it feels like lots of people moved away. It's mostly the expense and pace of Silicon Valley that makes it a difficult long term home for many people.• I miss my best friend from college, Campbell White. I wish we could just get in a car again and drive across the country with no responsibilities. We did this twice in college, hit almost every state. We called our adventure, "The Epic Journey." There are films: Epic Journey I, and Epic Journey II. Let me know if you ever want to watch them.• I spend more time with my dad than before, we get closer.• I pray for revival.

2015

• My relationship with my dad grows estranged and broken. We see each other only three or four times over the next 4 years.

• I write this reflection on the one year anniversary of my mom's death: This Blurry Year Has Been A Lesson in the Life of my Heart.• I'm trying to figure out how to do a lot of new things at the same time: Be a good Lead Pastor, shepherd well, hire well, be a good boss, be a good friend, be a good preacher, be a good husband, be a good dad to three small boys, grieve well, pray well, evangelize well, administrate and manage money well, etc. I do the best I know how to do, but I'm often overwhelmed and don't get it all right.• We enjoy our biggest Sunday yet at Garden City.• My growing friendship and working relationship with Rob Georges, a new Garden City elder (and a church member since the beginning), is a stabilizing and wisdom-rich gift in my life. Oh man, I love Rob and he has made a huge impact in this decade of my life/Garden City's life.

• We have to move out of the little house we've been renting. We pack all that we own into a small pod, and get on a plane to Europe where we take a 3 month sabbatical. We enjoy a beautiful time in Italy, France, and Spain for dirt-cheap through various connections and my wife's famous deal-hunting. I cherish the extended time to recover from the first four years of church planting, which feel both joyous and a bit like a street fight (ever been in one?). I pray and read a lot, and play with my family.  I miss my mom. I miss my dad. I miss my brother. I receive more reports of pastors burning own, blowing things up, sinning, quitting, etc. I do a lot of thinking and praying about how to be a healthy pastor for the long haul. I continue to write my best books of the year list, and my 2015 list includes many of the books I read on sabbatical.

• God provides again, a new place for us to rent in our same community. Friends from our church serve us so well and move our furniture out of the pod and into our new rental before we arrive home. 

• I return from sabbatical with lots of energy to shepherd, lead, and write, but most of that energy goes to navigating 4 of our staff members preparing to transition into new futures and me trying to figure out how to hold things together. Ronnie Jenkins transitioned to full-time real estate, remains one of my closest friends, and is on our elder team. Chad Francis (who married Garden City's first staff member besides me, read: Every Church Plant Needs a Karen) became a pastor in Washington and is currently back in Silicon Valley/at Garden City as a member. Steve Patton became a pastor in Washington, and we've kept in touch. Nick Smith became a pastor in his home state of Texas and we don't keep in touch.•  We experience our first funeral at our young church, a funeral for an infant. I hate doing funerals for infants, it's so sad. I did three of those at CPC.• I started working a 5-day work week instead of a 6 day work week. That story and rationale is here.• I lead my sons through various rites of passage that I'm crafting as I go. I love doing this. I wish for more mental space to put more intentionality into their formation. I feel guilty over how much intentional/creative energy I give the church versus how much of that type of energy I give my sons.• Kevin and Leslie Cathey continue their incredible gift to Taylor and me: 2x a year they have us over for dinner to encourage us. These invites always seem to come at just the right time. They still do this for us, and it has been so powerful.• The 49ers have a terrible season.• I pray for revival.

2016

• My wife launches her blog/business, Simply Silicon Valley, to help people "live the good life on less." Over the years this has grown into something really special that helps local business, helps Silicon Valley residents, and helps our family.

• We call the church to pray and to fast weekly as we seek to make 3 key hires for our staff team. God provides richly, giving us Ben Moore (Worship Pastor), Fred Mok (Associate Pastor), and Rob LeLaurin (Youth Director).

• My wife and I begin a two-year journey called "Soul Care" with 25 other Lead Pastors and wives within Acts 29 West. Taylor and I learn so much from Rich Plass and Jim Cofield. We devoured their book during our sabbatical, and now the opportunity to learn from them in person for 3 days at a time (our group met 7x for 3 days over the course of 2 years) along with fellow church planters is such a rich, revelatory, and redemptive gift. 

• I sneak into a party for Apple Computer. Where having so much fun, until I do back flip on this trampoline/bungee contraption and tear my right bicep. It hurts so bad and I feel so foolish. My bicep has recovered well—I can do everything I did before, but I feel a dull ache in my bicep everyday.• Church life is exciting—we're transforming lives with the gospel. Church life is painful—we're all humans and sinners, I'm human and a sinner. Church life can be Satanic, there are things that happen in a church that you never see coming and that are borderline demonic. I'm on my knees a lot. I cry a lot.• I grow as a listener.• I notice that I yell at my kids more than I used to. At tense moments yelling can feel like the only way to stop the chaos and get the attention of my three young sons. But it's wrong. I work on it. I'm still working on it.• After serving his term as an elder a Garden City elder/friend steps down from eldership, then eventually steps down from being a deacon, then eventually leaves our church and eventually moves to a different city. The whole thing was really painful for this couple, really painful for my wife and me, and disorienting for some in our church. I felt both loss and relief to close this chapter. We don't talk, though our paths may cross again...and they certainly will in heaven.• I often think of how great heaven will be. No church pain in heaven. Jesus is that amazing, he makes everything sad come untrue.• I wrestle with the expectations some people have of me, who they want me to be as a pastor and who I actually am. I think I let a little bit of my heart die, or I shut it down a bit...start unnoticeably living 3/4ths-heartedly instead of wholeheartedly. And, at the same time, where I can agree with people's criticisms I seek to grow and repent and mature and be sanctified. Man, it's like I've been growing up, living my 30th decade, in public. And, wow, I also learn that people can project things on to you that are not really about you.• Rob Georges and I begin preparing 3 good men for eldership at Garden City: Joey Lam, Shea Salinas, and Ronnie Jenkins.

• I continue to have so many ideas all the time (for Garden City's discipleship culture, for writing books, for serving our city, for starting things, etc.), but I don't have the time or energy to develop these ideas.

• I discover, freshly, that when I am weak I am strong. Paul was right.• I pray for revival.

2017

• Jason Jones and I launch Three Sons Club, a fun project I've been thinking about for years.

• My brother goes through a 2nd divorce.

• My grandpa (dad's side) dies. I never really knew him, I don't really feel this death or care. I hope this is okay, I also don't have capacity to feel more death.• I grow my first beard, which is now my "winter thing"...I have a beard on my face for 4 months of the year.

• I get back into skateboarding, it reminds me of childhood. 

• Soul Care continues to help me and Taylor so much, it's like seminary/graduate school/getting counseling 2.0 with a cohort of fellow passionate, but wounded church planters who are trying to figure this whole healthy Christianity/healthy ministry for the long haul thing out. Some of those guys aren't pastors anymore.• I come to deeply, deeply value being still in God's presence (not saying I'm good at this, but I deeply value this). What I want more than anything is to enjoy deep intimacy with God, I know this drives everything else in my life and ministry.• Late at night I'm often weighed down with the weight and anxiety of caring for my family and church well. I know what Paul means in 2 Corinthians 11:28. At the same time, I really enjoy our church.• I pray for revival.

2018

• I start working with Made to Flourish along with my friend Keivan Tehrani, we try to further spread to Silicon Valley pastors a message I'm already passionate about: a pastor's job is to prepare his congregation for Monday, not just Sunday. 

• Those 3 good men I mentioned in 2016 are officially installed on the Garden City Elder Team after a 1.5 year training process.• Global warming is a real thing. Garden City's location gets increasingly hot on Sunday afternoons, and we move to our 3rd (current) location: Crossroads Bible Church, where the temperature is better and we have more space.• We begin to experience our biggest yet wave of transience in the church. Over 100 people move out of Silicon Valley/our church. People move to 5 main places: the Pacific Northwest, Sacramento, Southern California, Austin, Colorado. It really sinks in that Garden City's mission needs to be about discipling well whether they are with us for 30 years or just 3 years, and that people moving away is an opportunity for the gospel to advance in other parts of the world. I often wish I could gather all folks who moved away back into one room for one big Garden City reunion.

• We have to move out of our rental, so we move into our 3rd rental home since starting the church: a super crappy house (it was torn down earlier this year) that we fix up before we move in. We get a good deal on rent. We decide we can't keep doing this and that we've got to find a forever home we can buy, to give our family stability. 

• I turn 40. My wife throws me a big, epic, very special party.

• I write a 10 year vision for my life.

• One of the greatest gifts of my life is the Garden City Elder Team.• I feel like I start getting my heart back, like I'm living and leading wholeheartedly again.• I get better at owning my sin/faults/mistakes.• After just 6 months in our rental home we find out we have to move out because our landlord's timeline for knocking down the home advanced. We look for a home to buy. We end up spending just 9 months total in this rental home = a pregnancy, enough time to get fully pregnant with a new venture.• I hate realizing how semi-addicted I've become to my phone. I wish I controlled it more than I let it control me.• My hair is starting to recede and thin, and a few grey hairs are showing up. Aging. I don't like this, but I guess acceptance is the only path. I often daydream about what my life and ministry could look like in my 70s, I bet I'll be a better pastor then.• I live with so much internal desire to reach people—to reach my city—with the gospel, but constantly feel the gap between what we've been able to actually accomplish and what I want to accomplish. I live in a region of 8 million people who desperately need the good news and abundant life of Jesus, yet only about 5% of these 8 million people are walking with Jesus.• I pray for revival.

2019

• We buy a home in San Jose in the neighborhood we always dreamed of living in back when I used to work at Central Peninsula Church and take exploratory trips to San Jose and dream about planting a church there. We are SO happy. "God did this," we keep repeating. God writes good stories.

• We get the keys on January 15th. My dad (and his new wife) show up. They show up big-time. They show up on January 15th in response to my ask for help with the house, they work hard (my dad is very handy), and they keep showing up. The showing up hasn't stopped. The healing and redemption in this part of my story is really, really rich. It's still in progress, but it's real and rich and an answer to a big prayer. My dad's fingerprints are all over our home. A few years ago I didn't think that was possible. 

• I become a little bit handy, start learning a little bit about how to fix and build stuff. I never wanted to learn this stuff as a kid because I associated it with becoming like my dad and I wanted to go in a different direction. Now, on this side of 40 years-old and family drama, I want to learn this stuff.

• Ben Moore and team release Garden City's first worship album. It's so good. Listen to it. 

• I start writing articles regularly again on my website. My hunger to write longer-form, to write books again, grows.• I draw a plan on the back of a cereal box for the multiplication and stability of Garden City Church, a plan that I believe clarifies all the elders and I have been talking about for years. The elders dig it and we begin to put it in motion.• We decide it's time for Garden City to start meeting on Sunday morning instead of Sunday afternoon. I form a Search Team and we begin looking for a new, stable, flourishing location for our church.• I begin writing a refreshed Discipleship Culture document for our church, revamping a framework I wrote 7 years ago that has sat dormant for a few years.• We install Fred Mok as an elder.• We love our new neighborhood and neighbors. Oh gosh, our street is a dream. We desire to live here the rest of our lives. We're home (at least this-side-of-heaven home).• I pray for revival.• I'm very happily married to Taylor Buzzard, and that means more to me than anything else from this decade. We know and love each other better than we did a decade ago—we are becoming more free, fun, and playful in each other's presence.  I love my sons, we're close. Time with them is going fast, I can't believe I have a 13 year-old who will be out of the home in 5 years. I feel overwhelmed by all I need to teach him, disciple him in, prepare him for. I feel inadequate for this. God's given me two or three handfuls of men who I consider very close friends, men I can go to with my heart and share anything with. Friendship is everything. I'm still excited about Jesus and his church. I more excited and hopeful now over what our BIG God can do than when we started church, but with less idealism, more wisdom, more humility, and a sharper clarity of what matters most in life. Ephesians 3:20 is never not pumping through my blood, I've seen what God can do and I trust and pester and cry out to him to do far more abundantly than I can ask or imagine for his fame and glory in my family, friendships, church, and city.-Family photo in our new home, taken a few months ago (with photos and art from our sabbatical hanging on the wall behind us). Praise God from whom all blessings flow, for his sustaining and redeeming grace this past decade. Onward!