Evangelistic Church Planting
Introduction
Regardless of one’s familiarity with modern church planting, most Christians have assumptions about what church planting is. When someone considers the term “church planting,” they could envision a myriad of different pictures. One might think of a church plant meeting on a Sunday morning at a school and another in a movie theatre. If you bring up church planting to an established church or church pastor, they could react with dread as they consider that some of their members may leave them behind for greener pastures. Each person has a preconceived idea and maybe even a preferred model as to what church planting should look like. Still, as Christopherson and Lake point out, “Those who have serially planted in multiple contexts have discovered that rigidly clinging to our favorite model usually brings depreciating results.”
Evangelistic church planting is the fruit of evangelism coming together to form a local body of believers who glorify God through worship and making disciples of Jesus Christ. On the other hand, Evangelistic church planting operates from an evangelistic perspective rather than serving for the purpose of evangelism. The distinction sees the church established through a movement of evangelism by the power of the Holy Spirit rather than seeing a church established and evangelistic efforts to follow.[1] In other words, as J.D. Payne briefly summarizes, “Biblical church planting is evangelism that results in new churches.”[2] Although church planting takes many forms, evangelistic church planting is the healthiest form because it is missional, biblical, and healthy.
Evangelistic Church Planting Is Missional
Missional is a term used to describe a church that seeks to take the Gospel into a community as they serve their neighbor. It is a term routinely used in conversation against the attractional model that looks to bring people into their midst by meeting felt needs, thereby attracting people to their church. The danger of the attractional model is summarized well by Stetzer and Im, “Some would say that in becoming highly attraction-oriented bodies churches lose their transformational edge.”[3] Wilson observes a similar problem with the attractional church and church planting model. He writes, “The problem is entirely the obscuring of spiritual truth by cultural means. What was once idealized as “church can be the place where one experiences spiritual truth” has become “church is the place where a spiritual product can be.”[4]
Evangelistic church planting is missional church planting as it contextualizes the Gospel without losing its transformational edge. Missional church planting does not seek to dispense spiritual products but seeks to work with the Holy Spirit to take the hope of Christ into the world in an intelligible context. Tim Keller instructs that “Sound contextualization means translating and adapting the communication and ministry of the gospel to a particular culture without compromising the essence and particulars of the gospel itself.”[5] Whereas the attractional church puts the Gospel in the background and places people’s preference at the fore, evangelistic church planting in a missional context sees the Gospel front and center while articulated in a manner understandable to one’s audience. One need look no further than Paul’s audience with the Athenian leaders in Acts 17. Paul addresses their altar to an unknown god and shares that there is but one God who has created all things and forgives sins through the redemption found in Jesus Christ.
As evangelistic church planting is missional church planting, it serves as a laboratory of innovative ministry practices and can aid in the renewal of other churches. As Paas writes, “How can renewal or innovation take place? Only by not concentrating on results but on the arrangement of stimulating processes. ”[6] Established and attractional churches often focus their attention on the results of their ministry. Whether something is effective or not is measured not by faithfulness but by quantifiable numbers. Therefore, large numbers signify a successful and healthy attractional church. However, Paas points out, “smaller communities will have the potential to reflect the communal life of the New Testament church much more naturally than large churches. This is an important consideration: if a church increases in numbers, it may be a wise course to aim for the establishment of a new congregation rather than the expansion of the old one.”[7] Therefore, an evangelistic church can reflect the context of the community more readily and thereby gaining greater credibility with the unreached in the community. This contextualization provides the church at large an opportunity to observe and learn how to best reach communities from new churches. The evangelistic church plant can try new things and reach new people untethered by the way an established church has always done. These pioneers of progress see the mission of God as profoundly formative and dictating their priorities.
Evangelistic Church Planting Is Biblical
Evangelistic church planting is rooted in the essential rhythms of the early church. One can look to Paul and Barnabas as they embark on their first missionary journey in Acts 13 and 14. In commenting on Acts 13, Darrell Bock observes, “In modern terms, a church plant has taken up the call.”[8] This band of missionaries went from town to town and city to city, proclaiming the Gospel in the synagogues, teaching in homes, gaining an audience with civic officials, and returning to establish elders in the church. Alawode observes that Paul would go to receptive people, strategic towns, utilizing believers’ homes, and contextualizing the Gospel.[9] Schnabel comments on the appointing of elders, “They appoints elders “in each congregation” (κατʼ ἐκκλησίαν), i.e., each church has its own basic organizational structure of leaders.”[10] All aspects of the local church and evangelistic church planting should be found in Scripture. The church find its call to worship, baptize, the Lord’s Table, church discipline and more from Scripture. Evangelistic church planting is rooted in the Great Commission where Jesus says “you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth (Acts 1:8, English Standard Version).”
Evangelistic Church Planting Is Healthy
Evangelistic church planting embodies the marks of a healthy church when done rightly. If evangelistic church planting is both missional and biblical, how should its health be measured? An evangelistic church plant should use Scripture to define itself to remain biblically faithful. McClendon and Lockhart draw upon Acts 2:42-47 to mark the essentials of a church. The early days of the church instruct the church today on what is most important in faithfully witnessing Christ to the community. The five essentials outlined by McClendon and Lockhart include believing in Jesus, living in community, submitting to God, generosity to others, and pursuing the lost. There is some overlap with Mark Dever’s 9 Marks of A Healthy Church, which include Expositional Preaching, Biblical Theology, The Gospel, A Biblical Understanding of Conversion, A Biblical Understanding of Evangelism, A Biblical Understanding of Church Membership, Biblical Church Discipline, A Concern for Discipleship and Growth, and Biblical Church Leadership. Dever writes of the importance for the church to be shaped by God through Scripture, “We need churches in which the key indicator of success is not evident results but persevering biblical faithfulness.”[11] An evangelistic church plant has the opportunity to inculcate these healthy church principles from the outset as it is not bound by the traditions and culture of an established church that may have lost its evangelistic fervor.
Conclusion
An evangelistic church plant in its simplest form is a biblical church plant. It conforms itself to the Scriptures, evangelizes the lost, establishes leaders, and contextualizes the Gospel so that it is faithful to God’s Word while speaking into the lives of the lost in a meaningful way. Evangelism is not something the church does. It is how the church is formed through faithful Gospel preaching and teaching. Other models and methods of church planting can be excellent and helpful to the Kingdom of God. However, evangelistic church planting is the healthiest form because it is missional, biblical, and healthy. As J.D. Payne writes, “The weight of the biblical evidence is that churches should be birthed from the harvest fields. Biblical church planting is evangelism that results in new churches, not the shifting of sheep around the kingdom.”[12]
Bibliography
Alawode, Akinyemi. “Paul’s Biblical Patterns of Church Planting: An Effective Method to Achieve the Great Commission.” Hervormde Teologiese 76, no. 1 (2020).
Bock, Darrell L. Acts. Baker Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2007.
Christopherson, Jeff, and Mac Lake. Kingdom First. Nashville, TN: B&H Books, 2015.
Dever, Mark. Nine Marks of a Healthy Church. Third Edition. 9Marks. Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2013.
Payne, J. D. Apostolic Church Planting: Birthing New Churches from New Believers. Westmont, IL: IVP Books, 2015.
Keller, Timothy, Daniel Strange, Gabriel Salguero, and Andy Crouch. Loving the City: Doing Balanced, Gospel-Centered Ministry in Your City. Center Church. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2016.
Paas, Stefan. “Church Renewal by Church Planting: The Significance of Church Planting for the Future of Christianity in Europe.” Theology Today 68, no. 4 (January 2012): 467–77.
Stetzer, Ed, and Daniel Im. Planting Missional Churches: Your Guide to Starting Churches That Multiply. Second edition. Nashville, Tennessee: B&H Academic, 2016.
Wilson, Jared C. The Prodigal Church: A Gentle Manifesto against the Status Quo. Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2015.
The Holy Bible: English Standard Version. Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016.
[1] Ibid., 2.
[2] J. D. Payne, Apostolic Church Planting: Birthing New Churches from New Believers (Westmont, IL: IVP Books, 2015).
[3] Ed Stetzer and Daniel Im, Planting Missional Churches: Your Guide to Starting Churches That Multiply, Second edition. (Nashville, Tennessee: B&H Academic, 2016). 16.
[4] Jared C. Wilson, The Prodigal Church: A Gentle Manifesto against the Status Quo (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2015), 110.
[5] Timothy Keller et al., Loving the City: Doing Balanced, Gospel-Centered Ministry in Your City, Center Church (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2016), 26.
[6] Stefan Paas, “Church Renewal by Church Planting: The Significance of Church Planting for the Future of Christianity in Europe,” Theology Today 68, no. 4 (January 2012): 467–77.
[7] Ibid.
[8] Darrell L. Bock, Acts, Baker Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2007), 436.
[9] Akinyemi Alawode, “Paul’s Biblical Patterns of Church Planting: An Effective Method to Achieve the Great Commission.,” Hervormde Teologiese 76, no. 1 (2020).
[10] Eckhard J. Schnabel, Acts, Expanded Digital Edition., Zondervan Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2012), Ac 14:23.
[11] Mark Dever, Nine Marks of a Healthy Church, Third Edition., 9Marks (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2013), 32.
[12] J. D. Payne, Apostolic Church Planting: Birthing New Churches from New Believers (Westmont, IL: IVP Books, 2015).