Leading Your Church in Church Planting: Part 4-Avoiding the Nestea Plunge 1

I am going back to my series today on Leading Your Church in Church Planting.  While I have additional posts coming on Cape Town 2010, I felt that I needed to return to the present series.  You can find parts 1-3 listed below:

Part 3: Some Resources to Get You Started

Part 2: 7 Reasons for Leading Your Church in Church Planting

Part 1: The Other Wing of the Airplane

As I mentioned in the first part of this series, my challenge to pastors is:  “Lead your church to be involved in church planting by sending out missionary teams to do evangelism that results in new churches.”

While such is still my challenge, I recognize that for most churches and pastors this notion of church planting is a strange concept.  Part of this unfamiliarity is derived from our present North American atmosphere that is not saturated with a healthy missiology.  For instance, most of the examples of “healthy” and “effective” church planting today (I’ll save my comments on how we are defining “healthy” and “effective” for a future post.) use methodologies that are extremely expensive and not reproducible by the common believer called by God to serve as a missionary in North America.  As a result of being exposed to such methodological mania, most pastors begin to think, “If that is church planting, then there is no way we can do that.”

And they are usually right.

So, in light of the thought that exists in the minds of many churches today–that church planting is just too complicated and too expensive–I want to encourage you to begin by leading your church into some small level of commitment in church planting.  As churches begin to understand the biblical expression and healthy missiological principles, they will hopefully develop a much better picture of this great ministry and engage at a deeper level.

Do you remember the late 70’s early 80’s commercials that revealed the “Nestea Plunge”?  Some of you do. And for those of you who were only in the heart of God at that time, HERE is a clip for you.

When it comes to leading your church in church planting, I greatly fear that some leaders and churches feel that in order to be involved they must take the “Nestea Plunge,” falling without restraint, wisdom, or direction into this ministry.  That involvement is an all-or-nothing type of ministry.   Such thoughts are overwhelming–and should be.

While I believe that any level of involvement in church planting is better than no involvement, a church does not have to jump into the deep end of the pool (to use another aqueous analogy).  Most pastors are wise to lead their churches into unfamiliar territory at a steady pace.  So, feel free to enter in at the shallow side of the pool.

While the following is not an exhaustive list of commitment levels, it does help you to think about the possibilities of involvement for you and your church (in the beginning, of course).

• Prayer Support. Consider devoting a portion of the Sunday morning worship time (every week) to pray for specific church planting teams.  A Wednesday night prayer meeting could also be focused on praying for known teams in North America.  Lead your church to prayer walk a community in which a team is working.  Lead your church to have prayer meetings in the homes of church planters and pray for their ministries.  Allow church planting teams to recruit prayer warriors from your congregation to pray for their work.
• Encouragement and a Body of Identity. As much as possible, missionaries need to be a part of the on-going fellowship of established churches.  Lead your church to offer encouragement and fellowship to church planting teams.  They need a body that will embrace them and love them, for it is likely that church planters in your community are miles away from their home churches and family members.  Consider giving church planting families gift cards to restaurants or supermarkets.  Lead your church to be that local church with whom missionaries can identify as their family.
• Pastoral Mentoring and Accountability. “Who pastors the missionaries?”  We usually do not think about this question.  Consider providing your pastoral services to such church planting teams in your area.  They need people with whom they can share concerns.  Help mentor and provide accountability for them.
• Provide Training. While you may not be able to provide church planters training in church planting skills (maybe you can?), your church can assist in providing training in other areas.  Or, consider providing the costs for the missionary teams to attend a church planting training event.
• Give Them the Platform. Invite local missionaries to give a testimony about their church planting work in your area.  Give them five minutes on a Sunday morning to share about church planting.  Allow a church planter to preach for you, when you are present (and not on vacation 🙂 ).  This shows your support to the ministry of church planting.
• Provide Resources and Financial Support.  Okay, I finally said it.  Yes, consider giving money to assist them in Great Commission work.  The lack of money (personal finances) is the most common concern on the minds of most church planters serving in the United States and Canada today.  Or, consider leading your church to assist in other areas.  You may be able to allow a church planting team to use your photocopier, office space, administrative assistants, van, or building.  Your church may be able to provide Bibles, food and other supplies for outreach events, or people to assist in ministry activities.

These are just a few ideas to get you started in moving your church from the shallow end of the church planting pool to the deep end, eventually sending out your own missionary teams to plant churches in your community, region, and throughout the world.