“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 (ESV)
Reflection
Every leader eventually faces a season when the old way no longer works. Enrollment shifts. An accreditor raises the bar. A ministry outgrows the structures that once served it well. Change arrives whether we invite it or not, and it often feels like wilderness: unfamiliar, uncertain and dry.
Isaiah spoke these words to people in exile, people who could see only what they had lost. God’s invitation was not to cling to the past but to perceive what he was already doing. “Now it springs forth,” he said. The new thing was not merely coming someday. It was already beginning, for those with eyes to see it.
Leading change well starts with perception before strategy. Before you announce the plan, ask where God is already at work: in a faculty member with fresh energy, in a donor who keeps asking good questions, in a struggle that is forcing honest conversation. A pivot is not abandoning the mission. It is following God into the next faithful expression of it.
For your leadership this week
- Write down one area of your organization where the old way is no longer working.
- List three signs that something new may already be springing up.
- Share those signs with your leadership team and ask what they see.
Pivot question
What new thing might God already be doing in your organization that you have not yet perceived?
Prayer
Lord, give me eyes to see the way you are making in this wilderness. Free me from clinging to what was, and give me courage to follow you into what is next. Amen.
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Scripture quotations are from the ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®), © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.