Don't Waste Your Coronavirus, Part 3: Field Trips & Zoom

 Week 1 of Shelter in PlaceDepending on how you count, here in Silicon Valley we're on day 4 or 5 of "Shelter in Place" orders due to the coronavirus pandemic. These orders that were issued for 7 counties in the Bay Area (impacting about 8 million people) on Monday were, last night, issued for the entire state of California (40 million people). Today the same order, though called by a different name, was issued for the entire state of New York (19 million people). As I write this New York has the highest count of diagnosed coronavirus cases in the nation: 4,400. Experts believe the number of diagnosed COVID-19 cases and COVID-19 deaths will dramatically increase in the coming weeks, both in hot spot regions and throughout the entire country. Right now Santa Clara County (where I live) has 196 confirmed cases and 8 deaths. By the time you click that link the numbers will be higher.Adjustment and Creative LeadershipThe entire world is adjusting to slow the spread of this dangerous virus. My urge to you has been that we don't waste this coronavirus moment, that we steward this difficult and unique time with creative leadership. Our staff team at Garden City Church has spent the last week and a half creatively scrambling to figure out how to care for and lead our church when we can't do most of what we usually do: gather in person for a Sunday worship service, gather in person for mid-week Life Groups, gather in person for events or training, gather in person for staff meetings or elder board meetings, gather in person to eat a meal together or give a hug, gather in person for a meet up at a local business, etc. Simultaneously, on the home front, our 3 sons' schools suddenly closed for 3 weeks (offering no online continuation of courses) and my wife has found herself abruptly thrust into becoming a homeschool mom. I'm so proud of her. She's put together a creative and stimulating schedule for educating our boys.Field Trips and Zoom Because I've been so busy with work in this crazy transition of becoming a church that can't physically gather, I've not been involved in our new normal of homeschooling. Until yesterday. Yesterday I decided that I'm officially in charge of field trips. I'm field trip dad. My role is to educate my boys by taking them on enriching, fun field trips that teach them more about God, our world, work, economics, and leadership. These field trips also give my wife a break.Yesterday's field trip started with gassing up the car and giving my sons various math problems about price per gallon, miles per hour, and allocation of scarce resources. We then spent hours at the beach (with 6 feet of social distancing) learning about the size of God and the value of play. For today's field trip I took my sons on a 1.5 mile walk from our house to the headquarters of Zoom, the videoconferencing service that it seems everyone in the world has become intimately familiar with (have you been using Zoom this week?). During our walk to Zoom and our time standing in front of Zoom's empty headquarters, I taught my sons about Zoom's stock price: its 52 week low of $59, its current price of $130, the current demand for Zoom's service, and how investors forecast future value. We also talked about entrepreneurship—about having an idea and starting something out of nothing that brings value to the world.My boys aren't in school right now, but they are learning a lot and we're having fun by getting creative with our coronavirus moment. Consider, while you still can (restrictions may tighten), making the best of this strange time by creating field trips.The FutureThere are many more articles I look forward to writing in this series, such as: how I'm leading my family with apocalyptic movies (maybe a bad move, but so far it's been fruitful), ways we're deepening community in our neighborhood, how our church is serving our city, how local businesses are creatively adapting, why to create an at-home gym, how to make new friends during social distancing, etc. But for now, I offer a few predictions on the future. I hope most of these are wrong and some of these are right. Take these with a grain of salt, I'm just a pastor trying tentative guesses based on the data I read and the feeling in my gut:• Disruption to our lives will last much longer than most of us are thinking.• Bay Area Shelter in Place orders will extend longer than 3 weeks.• The entire school year will be canceled K-12 in California.• Shelter in Place orders will soon extend to our entire nation.• Restrictions in the Bay Area will further tighten for a period of time.*Even if I'm wrong on these scary possibilities, there's a strong case to be made that the fear out there in America is probably really good right now. It should result in slowing the spread of the virus and therefore speeding the recovery of our economy. • Small businesses will need all the help we can give them.• It won't be until late May or early June that our church can gather again on Sundays.• We'll now have our pre-coronavirus and post-coronavirus lives. Individuals, organizations, churches, cities, economies, and countries will emerge from this event different. We won't be the same. We all must choose and take ownership for how we will emerge from this.• The people and organizations that will thrive during and after this time will be those who creatively adapt, lead, serve, connect, and innovate.• Many new businesses, products, ministries, relationships, and alliances will be started from this highly disruptive and creative time.• Fortunes will be lost, kept, and made by choices made during this time. It's a scary time and an opportune time to be an investor. So much depends on your time horizon. [mc4wp_form id="9268”]