Behold, I am doing a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it? I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert.
_{— Isaiah 43:19}

In part 1, I wrote about settlers and pioneers. The Church is meant to be solid, trusted, and stable, like settlers. Her leaders have faithfully stewarded what they’ve been given for day-to-day ministry, yet many are finding it hard to invest in the slow, deep work that meaningful change requires. In times like these, when new ground needs to be broken, we need pioneers.

Which brings me to where I sense our ministry is being invited in this moment. What if we were made to serve the Church in this area? What if forcing the Church to innovate on her own was actually bad stewardship? What if, even though she's being called into it, she wasn't made to do it alone? Many leaders and pastors are alone in carrying that weight. In my experience they often long for room to wonder and dream again. Now, don't get me wrong: I don't think we're a silver bullet, or here to solve all of the Church's problems. But I do see an opportunity to respond faithfully to a call to meet a need, one that's presenting itself most clearly right here in the Vancouver area.

I recently sat down with a friend who named two of the biggest needs the Church has when it comes to new initiatives: the deployment of capital and the deployment of talent (specifically, the talent to realize the vision behind them). As we talked, we saw that sometimes the vision itself also needs to be enriched, invited into a bigger imagination instead of held back by a previous understanding of its constraints.

I asked this friend (who has deep experience deploying both capital and talent) to weigh in on a working theory I'd been sensing: that donors who would love to fund new initiatives in the Church may hesitate, unsure how well those funds would be stewarded. Not because the Church is bad at stewardship, but because most ministries and local churches simply lack experience facilitating innovation, especially at any kind of scale. The answer was a resounding yes: this is a common concern.

A few days later, we were meeting with the pastors of a local church. Near the end, they prayed for us in this season of organizational transition. One of them, with no knowledge of my working theory, prayed it almost word for word: "Lord, there are donors out there who may not trust the local Church with their funds in innovation. I pray that you connect those donors with Glass Canvas Ministries."

My interpretation is that the whisper I heard wasn't my own idea, and it wasn't just for me to hear. I receive it as an affirmation of calling. In response, I say, "Here I am, Lord. Send me (us)."

Our team has spent more than 15 years helping churches and ministries build new things, and has weathered many transitions in our own organization. Along the way, we've learned a few things about navigating change. We've come to see that healthy change needs prudence and patience just as much as boldness. New ideas rarely take root without someone walking alongside in the ups and downs. And even with an amazing idea, the vision usually needs to be nurtured, and to grow even bigger and deeper, before it can become real. But what really sets us apart is how we see innovation itself: as an act of stewardship. It's being faithful with what God has already placed in a person, a church, or a vision, and with every resource entrusted to us along the way. We're not in pursuit of novelty; we are seeking pathways to sustainable and lasting fruit.

Our desire in this season is to come alongside generous partners who want to help the Church build, iterate, and re-think. In practice, that looks like forming disciples who know how to walk with people over time, helping leaders discern and shape the vision God has placed in them, and helping new initiatives move from idea to reality. And it means deploying talent, starting with the deep giftedness I see in my own teammates.

There's something unique about this team that's hard to properly explain. Each person carries rare gifts, a deep heart, and immense talent. But even compared to other teams I've observed or been part of, something unusual happens when we're together. Yes, each of us brings our distinct vocation, and when those are expressed together, there's a real potency. Our values, a fierce commitment to depth, and the way we disciple one another have formed us into a real community. We come from different Christian traditions, held together by a shared devotion to Jesus, and we've watched the Holy Spirit move among us in ways none of us could manage alone.

But the talent we hope to deploy isn't only our own. I believe we can be a vehicle for so much of the talent already present in the Church. Among those with gifts to offer, I see two kinds of people, and the current model in the Church carries real risks for both, often limiting how freely people feel they can give of themselves.

The first are people with real potential, often younger and less experienced, eager to cut their teeth. They're a gift, but many churches simply don't have the capacity or experience to mentor them and pour into them well. Walking with people like this is at the heart of our ministry.

The second are people with proven gifting, deeply experienced and highly skilled, but wary that their church just won't know what to do with them. Often, they've been put in a box that doesn't honour the depth of what they have to offer.

For some time now, I've been nurturing a vision of our ministry as a vocation garden: a place where anyone with gifts to offer, whether raw potential or proven experience, can be planted, tended, and activated on mission.

In all of this, I see the real burden that change inherently places on many people. I know I'm a bit of an oddball in how much I appreciate it, even by pioneer standards. So I commit to walking patiently with people and accompanying them through the challenges of navigating change. When they say yes to the call into the unknown, and invite us to join them in it, we'll prayerfully discern fit together and, if we're called, offer our team's presence in that space as a gift, one that would otherwise be out of reach: free, with no strings attached and no expectations in return.

For over 15 years, we offered our gifts to the Church for a fee. But charging for our time put a price on love and kept us from the ministries that couldn't afford us. Sometimes we overstayed our welcome in the work, because we genuinely wanted to help and keep offering value, and because churches and ministries were willing to keep paying. So we've laid the old model down.

Giving freely of ourselves has given us a new kind of freedom: to see that we were always made to be pioneers. Our role is to help settlers get established and set up for success, then gradually step back, still close by if and when they need us. Instead of billing for our presence, we're inviting those who believe in this work to help carry it, so it can reach ministries of every size, from a Tuesday-night community group to a large national ministry.

Over and over, I see signs of a movement of the Spirit. I believe God is doing a new thing and inviting us into it. If you have a desire to help the Church pioneer into new territory, in any way, I'd love to chat.