Old Paradigms for A New World: Lessons from the World of Church Planting

Church Planting is an ever-changing landscape and with such varying terrain, there is a constant need for assessment and adjustment.  We hear much today about the need for the development and deployment of church planters. The real question, however, is how will the church do this?  In order to plant new churches at the rate needed to reach the lost and dying world around us, we must be open to reassessing older paradigms as potential models for church planting in our own time.

The statistical realities are rather shocking:

-In North America today, there are 259 million people who do not know Jesus.

-Every week, approximately 17 SBC churches in North America close their doors.

-850 to 900 SBC churches die every year.

-NAMB has stressed the fact that Southern Baptists must plant 1350 churches a year to even have a net gain of 500.[1]

Statistics like these have driven churches and denominations across the country to set some rather staggering goals for planting churches in the next few years. I’m so thankful that Southern Baptists are taking serious the need for feeder systems that access, train, and send planters in a more efficient and effective way. However, after developing a process for such development and deployment in our own local context our congregation has discovered a painful truth.

Multiplying has been the focus of North Wake Church for many years; multiplying disciples, pastors, church planters, and missionaries to be sent all over the world.  But, no matter how intentional a church may be in the multiplication of disciples, there will always be a practical limitation; A true multiplying church can raise more leaders than they can fund! If our funding paradigm stays the same we can only plant two new churches every 4 to 6 yrs and that timetable is only possible through the maximizing of many strategic partnerships. Much can be done through restructuring denominational funding, but there is no way we can multiply at the needed rate with the current paradigms.

What will we do? How can we continue to access, train and send leaders? And, how can the church get them on the field in a more efficient, successful, and sustainable manner?  I believe the answer is to consider funding paradigms with historic and biblical precedence, which will also strengthen the standards, and expectations we have set for our planters while meaningfully placing them in the communities they are setting out to reach.

You can’t write about church planting and not look at the Apostle Paul as your prototype.  No matter what you argue in the area of church planting, even competing views, all use Paul to prove their point.  While I think Paul and his tent-making is more descriptive than prescriptive, his way of life seems to merit consideration as a model given the dual realities of a slowing world economy and the need for gospel centered churches to be planted at a rapid pace.

In 1 Corinthians 9 Paul makes a clear case for the apostle’s right to earn a living from the preaching of the gospel.  As such, he and Barnabas had the same right (1Cor 9:4-14). However, though it was his right Paul refuses such financial support. Why? For the sake of the gospel. Paul desired to set aside his right “rather than put an obstacle in the way of the Gospel of Christ” (1Cor 9:12). However, Paul did not always refuse his right for support.  It seems that he accepted funding from the Macedonian Christians (2 Cor 11:9) and he was thankful for the support of the Philippian church (Phil 4:10-20).  His refusal to receive funds, however, was contextually motivated fearing that he might put “obstacles” in the way of the Gospel.

I wonder if our paradigms for funding, no matter how well intended, have become “obstacles” rather than pathways for the Gospel.  If the only way to fund a church plant is to raise hundreds of thousands of dollars and be completely dependent on other partners, what happens when the funding streams run dry?  Is that the end of the church planter’s calling?  Does he pack up his family and go home?

I am not arguing for a complete abandonment of financial collaboration from multiple partners, just a re-evaluation of our approaches to funding, and an adjustment that would lead us to a strategic implementation of bi-vocational church planting.

Bi-vocational Church Planting does not merely have practical motivations. I in fact, am convinced it is highly missional. In a world much like ancient Corinth, it is vital not to be lumped into to countless peddlers of the word of God (2 Cor 2:17) who prey on others (2 Cor.11:20). We must desire to be a redemptive force in the communities in which we plant; suffering, working, living, laughing, and crying among those we have been called to reach.  The purpose of Gospel ministry is not the gathering of great numbers of already convinced or disgruntled people—it is about penetrating a lost and dying world by living out the gospel within it.

The church is sent to reach the lost with the good news of Christ, gather them to one another as the church, equip her, and send her out on mission.  Is there any better way than dropping into a new community and engaging it in some form of business or trade?  Could we be missing a huge opportunity for the gospel by not developing a viable and sustainable reason to be in the community?  While there are many ways to plant a church, living missionally and intentionally in a community seems to be vital to all strategies.

Regardless of the method or model, all church planting conversations eventually turn toward funding.  What I want to say is that something has to change.  We have wasted too much money over the years in the name of church planting, and many planters have come off the field because their funding paradigms were short sighted.  A financial obstacle does not necessarily mean that the gospel vision and mission were off base; maybe the error was assuming that the 2 years and $200,000 would get the job done.

Where are the men and women who have the gospel resolve of Paul? Where are the men that will train like John G. Paton in Theology and Medicine?  Where are those that will move into a community and do whatever it takes to bring the gospel to bear on the people who live there? The long view, I believe, is this: there are times when it maybe proper to seek full funding from multiple sources, but in the present cultural climate it seems necessary to be more self-sustaining in order to further the Gospel. We need a more Paul like contextual understanding, resolve, and work ethic (1 Cor.15:10-11)—if we truly want to  live out the Great Commission in the cities and communities where God has determined we live (Matthew 28:18-20, Acts 17:26). We must be open to considering once again the practical and missional value of the bi-vocational approach.

© Dr. Jeff Doyle, North Wake Church, 2013

Jeff Doyle has been married to his wife, Sandrine, for 16 years, they have three sons, Caleb (10), Nathan (8), and Joshua (6).  He has been in pastoral ministry for 18 years, 15 of which have been at North Wake Church in Wake Forest, NC where he serves as the leadership pastor.