At the time of writing this blog I am sitting alone in the room where I will speak to several students and adult youth sponsors who are attending the Christ In Youth (CIY) Summer Conference. My topic is “The Ledge” (a discussion on church planting). The title gives a good visual. Standing on the ledge of a tall building… lots of security in the building behind you… a good job in the building behind you… lots of good friends in the building behind you… but you stand on the ledge, about to step out into nothing… because God told you to. He gave the invitation, “Step out here. See what I can do with you in this new world.” I am confident He is just getting started. There is so much more to come.
I thought many of you who read my blog might appreciate some of the things I included in my notes for this CIY class… therefore I will post portions of them in the next few days.
A Personal Introduction
The conception of Oasis Christian Fellowship (southeast Ohio) began in January of 1999. Although I was not thinking specifically about where I would go at that point in time, this is when God began planting the seed of church planting in the hearts of my wife and me. At the time we were living in St. Louis, MO working as a Youth Pastor for growing church, and it was there that God began developing in us a passion for doing church in a different way. “Different” not meaning “better”… but recognizing the rapidly changing culture and the need to contextualize the Gospel. As preparation for the churches we would eventually plant in southeast Ohio, my wife and I moved to Northwest Ohio to work on staff with, then 5-year old church, Oasis Christian Fellowship in Wauseon, OH. While living in Wauseon we had many opportunities to listen to stories about church planting, read and study about church planting, attend church planting conferences, etc… all efforts to prepare us for what was to come. After exactly 2 years, we moved from Wauseon to Athens, OH… and the adventure began!!!
Understanding Principles & Methods
In scripture there are two things we must recognize if we hope to understand it and carry out the mission God has set us on. We must understand the difference between “principle” and “method.” For instance, one general principle of scripture is for every disciple of Jesus to proclaim and demonstrate the love of God and the message of the Gospel everywhere we happen to be. The “method” for carrying out that principle will vary from culture to culture. One of our goals in church planting is to determine the best possible method for carrying out the Gospel commission. One philosophy we have lived by is this: “Go to the people. Live among them. Learn from them. Love them. Start with what they know. Build on what they have.” (Lau Tsu)
Methods are like flavors of ice cream, and the Gospel is like ice cream. All ice cream is GOOD. Few would disagree. However, you may prefer a certain type of ice cream over another. In fact, our tastes may be much different from one another. From culture to culture, city to city, there will always be a great diversity of people, and needs for many different flavors of “ice cream”… AKA “church.”
The Luke 10 Philosophy of Church Planting
Jesus sent out his disciples for the purpose of spreading the good news about the kingdom of God. He gave them some instructions about how and where they should meet when they proclaimed this good news.
He told them, "The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field. Go! I am sending you out like lambs among wolves. Do not take a purse or bag or sandals; and do not greet anyone on the road.
"When you enter a house, first say, 'Peace to this house.' If a man of peace is there, your peace will rest on him; if not, it will return to you. Stay in that house, eating and drinking whatever they give you, for the worker deserves his wages. Do not move around from house to house. (Luke 10:2-7)
If your “house” is a place where people naturally enjoy visiting, gathering, dropping in, etc… then your house is a potential host for a church gathering. Churches most naturally begin in the simplest of circumstances (Acts 16:6-15). What Jesus sent the disciples to do is the very same thing he has commissioned all of us to do. Therefore it is my conviction that every disciple of Jesus has been called to participate in “church planting” in some way. We just have to be renewed in our understanding of church.
“I hope that the church can raise the level of her faith in the power of the Gospel and lower the level of qualifications needed to be a servant of Jesus in this world.” - Neil Cole, “Cultivating a Life For God”
Imagine you are a farmer who has just been given a piece of land to farm. How would you go about beginning to work this land? How would you cultivate the soil in order to see a great harvest? What would be your first priority? To build a barn? Perhaps you would find a great location on the land to put the barn, and begin developing your plans to build it. Or maybe there would already be an existing barn on the land that you could use. If you just had a great barn then the harvest would come to it. Right???
A farmer must begin with SEED, not a barn. He prepares the land, gaining the best understanding possible about his soil. Then he works the land... turning the soil, cultivating it, preparing it for the seed. Then he plants the seed. But how does the growth of the seed take place? How does he make the seed grow?
Very simple. He can’t. All he can do is introduce the elements to release growth (Mark 4:26-29).
How does the church grow? We must back up and begin much, much smaller... with seed.
Five years ago I knew beyond the shadow of a doubt that God was calling me to church planting. It’s my passion. However, as I began to look in scripture for advice about how to plant a church I found not one single verse in the Bible commanding us to plant or multiply churches. There is no precedent for planting churches. The command that God gave us is to make and multiply disciples, not churches (or even small groups). Now obviously the Bible speaks of the church, and God does want to build His kingdom through church planting and multiplication... but His plan is to do so by multiplying disciples. It starts here... at the most basic unit of the church... then it spreads through every pore in the body of Christ.
Any comments? Thoughts you’d like to add so far?
Just thought I'd take a little time to blog from our trip. We are now in St. Louis hanging out with our friends' Jamie and Wendy Lankford. The kids are having a great time with Mason, Isaac, and Caleb. In just a few minutes we will be going to visit some more friends, the Herbergers. Today we went to the Zoo. We love the St. Louis Zoo because admission is FREE. It's a great zoo. The kids had a blast. Tomorrow morning we will arise very early and drive to the Holiday Inn Downtown Chicago, where we will take the train to Wrigley Field and watch the Cubs versus the Cardinals in a big divisional game. We plan to return to southeastern Ohio sometime on Wednesday evening.
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