I recently wrote in response to John Benton’s rather premature funeral service for the local church. I just spotted that Jonathan Carswell, CEO of 10 of Those shared John’s original article with this comment.
Imagine reading Jonathan’s comments as a church planter labouring away perhaps on a council estate in the West Midlands or a Scottish Scheme, maybe working in a rural village. It’s going to be rather discouraging.
Perhaps though, Jonathan comments with good cause. There have been those who have given church planting s bad name. It’s fair to say that people can plant out of all kinds of motives and can do so in incredibly unhelpful ways. I’m aware of new churches branded as “plants” which were in fact the results of schism. I’m also only too aware of particular movements stepping thoughtlessly into areas with little concern about what else is happening in terms of Christian witness in a place. I even remember talking to a person who had just opened his church in a hotel just up the road from us and asking him why he’d plumped for there when there were areas with no viable witness at all. His response was that if you wanted to sell apples, you went where there were lots of fruit stalls because that indicated a ready market. He’d counted the number of churches on our high street and decided this was a place with a lot of demand.
I also think that at times, our approach as evangelicals to church planting over the past 20-30 years which has been about playing it safe, has relied on larger churches sending out 30-50 to start something new and this has resulted in concentrations of churches, often at risk of cloning the mother church in the more prosperous parts of the city.
However, whilst that’s been a challenge, I think it’s something that most involved in church planting are very well aware of. It’s also not something that has been the cause of the demise of the local church. I’ve watched a number of churches sadly close their doors over the years, here in Birmingham and back in my home city, Bradford and I know of churches very close to closing now. I am fairly confident in saying that those closures were not down to the planting of new churches.
Furthermore, whilst there can be the risk of “brand” priority, I’d say that generally speaking that’s unfair to the priorities of the churches that have been planted and the people who have joined them. In Birmingham, there are primarily four sources of church planting.
- Conservative Evangelical churches associated with the FIEC (in other cities like Sheffield and London you’ll also see conservative evangelical Anglicans planting churches).
- Reformed Charismatics associated particularly with New Frontiers
- Charismatic Anglicans linked with HTB
- African charismatic/Pentecostal movements.
Now, in each of those cases, I guess we could argue that people were planting in line with their preferences, however, I would argue that this also risk playing down the value of the specific concerns.
Is it wrong to be concerned about seeing people fed well with God’s Word, the need for evangelism and Gospel proclamation and the active work of the Holy Spirit? If there is little to no evidence of churches doing those things, then is it wrong to seek to plant churches that do in an area? What about where you’ve experienced racial discrimination and been unable to join in local churches and this has gone on for so long that you’ve had to start your own places of worship? What if in that last situation you have a growing desire for your churches to reach across cultures? Is it wrong to be planting churches in those contexts.
What about all of those local Baptist, independent, congregational churches around the country today whether large and thriving, doing okay or small and struggling? Were the founding leaders of those churches wrong to plant them? Take the church where I became a Christian in Bradford. It was planted into a tough inner city context from a prosperous Methodist church. When the founders wanted a place where working class people would feel welcome, where there would be Gospel preaching and lively contemporary Gospel music for its time (late 1800s), were they being consumerists? Were they to blame for that old Methodist church closing and being turned into a night club?
Furthermore, the focus right now, in most places where there are church planting movements is on encouraging churches in areas where there is little or no Gospel witness. This is sometimes by planting new churches but also, where possible it’s about seeking to support local churches with revitalisation. I’ve personally been involved in several such attempts during my time here in the West Midlands. However, so far, out of those I’ve been involved with, only one has show signs of bearing fruit. There have been real challenges and obstacles to revitalisation in others.
As someone committed to church planting and part of a specific planting movement here in the West Midlands, I can assure you that it is no light matter for us when we see a church close. It’s a cause of sadness. Our desire is to see many churches bringing light into local communities
If you’ve got questions, challenges or concerns about church planting, please get in touch and I’d be happy to talk things through.
If you would like to know more about how you can be part of a church plant, I’d love to hear from you.
If you are interested in getting involved in supporting an existing but struggling local church continue to be a witness then please get in touch as well because I’d be overjoyed to connect you with such a church.
Faithroots 