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Church Planting: Hostile Take Over?
I got very excited when I read these words in a post titled, On Planting Churches That Do Not Cannibalize: The Luke 10 Project, by David Fitch:
Let’s stop funding church plants (has anyone noticed it ain’t working?) and fund missionaries here in North America. We need to seed fresh expressions of the gospel that engage those outside the faith with the gospel and create the space for God work to bring people to Himself.
However, my enthusiasm faded when I read the details of Fitch’s “Luke 10 Project.” The basic idea is to find 3 individuals or couples, who would commit to moving into a neighborhood together, commit to that place, learn about the context, then start discipleship groups, do life with their neighbors and gather the community. I love the commitment to place, I love the emphasis on learning and doing life together in a specific neighborhood and have no issue with discipleship and gatherings. My issue is with over emphasizing “relocation” and under emphasizing “indigenous leadership development.”
There is an assumption that the Body of Christ is absent, and therefore we have to “take Jesus to people.” In other words, the basic assumption is that the “glass is half empty.” The community is lacking something and that something is “the Jesus we have.” The one tweak I would strongly suggest to the Luke 10 Project is that these “missionaries” learn to build on what God is already doing – they learn to see the “glass as half-full.”
In our Community Development work, I have found that some of the most effective “missionaries” are already in the neighborhood. Rather than investing in training, equipping, and sending outsiders in, I would love for missionary/church planter types to invest in building up what is already there, in unleashing the Spirit that is already present.
My friend Reggie Galloway, an indigenous leader from Long Beach California, articulates how this mindset is seen as arrogance by those who are already ministering in the community in their own way.
So my suggestion is that no “missionary” be sent into a community until there is an indigenous leader whom they can walk alongside. At Embrace Richmond, we call these “indigenous leaders” our “street saints.” It has been part of the DNA of Embrace Richmond since day one and I can’t imagine trying to do this work without the guidance, wisdom and skills of our neighborhood residents who are the true leaders.
What would it look like if the “missionaries” who were sent in from the outside, actually had a goal of building sustainable ministry by “equipping the saints for works of service” - the saints who already live in that community?
I have actually seen this model work, not only in the work Embrace is doing, but in a more mature form in the groups I visited in California and wrote about last month. One of these groups was Kingdom Causes Long Beach and that is where I met Reggie. Reggie would continue to love his neighbors with the love of Christ with our without the help of Kingdom Causes. All Kingdom Causes did was unleash Reggie to do what God was calling him to do. They gave him the authority, training, encouragement and support he needs to be far more impactful than he could be on his own. They taught Reggie to see “the glass as half-full” and helped him to focus on Kingdom Building over Church Building.
I am not suggesting that “relocation” is a bad thing but I am suggesting “relocation” without appreciation of the gifts and calling of the spiritual leaders that are already there is harmful to the community and counter-productive to the cause of Kingdom Building. We need to walk humbly as we love kindness and do justice.
I agree with you, Wendy. Why build a new house when you can fix up the one you live in already. There are organizations and people and structures at work “next door”. We just need to support them. If we do relocate, it should be by God’s call. But God does call ALL of us to work where we are right now.
Amen!
Hi Wendy, I read Reggie’s story. I was impressed with the piece, “He would like to make neighborhoods into communities, where neighbors interact and love one another. He hopes to bring back the kind of comfort, confidence, and trust into the neighborhood and community”. I lived in some of these neighborhoods at one time and now I look forward to working alongside the leaders of these communities to bring forth the Real God kind od Church; a “chruch without walls” Loving what God is doing in Southside, Cassandra
Hey Wendy,
I agree with you… and I don’t. On the one hand, I think the primary leadership should come from within the community. However, I’ve also seen an over-emphasis on this produce a kind of ghetto-ism. Further, some times it does take an outside missionary to help produce indigenous leadership- sometimes. And finally, even with local leadership, the idea of subsidies to help them be more engaged in service in the community is still valid. It is this final piece that I want to see happen most of all.
That being said, surely Embrace was somewhat of an outside initiative at one time and on some level, no? Must be either/or?
Jamie,
We are on the same page. It often takes an outside catalyst and outside resources. But, it is not about the outsider doing their thing but the outsider unleashing the saints no one else sees. We often enter the mission field with the goal of getting “them” to join us on our mission instead of joining God in what is already there just unseen.
I also agree stipends are helpful. We are working on a way of doing this that may help you. I am far more effective at finding my urban street saints than funding myself and my staff. Would love to skype about this at some point.
I love what you are doing. My comment was not a criticism just a suggestion.
Thanks Wendy. We are, indeed, on the same page.
Hey Wendy,
My Reggie’s name is Ron. He is an ex-churched pastor, prison and hospital chaplain. A guy who is a God-formed pastor that realized that the title and position were the biggest hindrances to using his gifting. He has taught me how to not only articulate my faith but manifest it as well.
The best part is, he lives 3 houses up my alley.
My Reggie is named Charles. He was an addict for 33 years and experienced a radical conversion through the church of AA. He does not go around shouting about Jesus, he simple lives like Jesus in an authentic way. He taught me more about that than seminary did.
Charles has replicated him self in others though relentless discipleship, but he never quotes the bible. He just lives it.
Hi Jamie & Wendy…commenting on your dual comments…
I’d say David Fitch’s post was a carefully written publication of a new initiative which is already being organized – and that what both of you bring to light about what he’s left out is not that he forgot it or didn’t stress it, but that it isn’t there. He has a very clear plan, send three people/couples in to a place and bring something there. I love much of his plan, but I think you’re correctives are not a casual addition, but a core sore-ly missing and needed. Listen up David.
I’ve seen lots of these new proposals, all good, and you don’t leave out a piece this big by accident. I believe the whole idea should be rethought, with a process of “spying out the land” in advance in which local contacts are sought and developed until you can find that local willing to sponsor the new team into the area – this way you’ll only need two people/couple’s, so that side gets easier, and the whole thing is off to a much stronger start. – Or – rather than spying out the land, let locals be the source of each new project, let the local person be the foundation and then find the other two to go join them, then you really have an easier start.
I moved to NYC to be an artist in the 90’s. After becoming ensconced in the arts community and truly being a local, I eventually evolved into becoming a starter of communities of faith – about the time that side of my life was taking off, a big denomination decided to spend 12 million dollars to plant a bunch of churches in Manhattan in the cultural creative community…I can’t tell you how annoying it was (and hugely ineffective when the money runs out) to see them ship in whole church planting teams (mostly from the South) of cool young Christian Seminary graduates with hip clothes and not a clue about “secular” art or the life of struggling artists beyond what they’d read in Relevance Magazine. Here I was deeply involved in that community in multiple local organic projects by that time for years, one of which was very successful and well known – and how many of them do you think ever came to me to get advice from a veteran on the ground? They didn’t come because that wasn’t part of their take-over plan, just as David’s doesn’t include it now.
Hi Jeff,
I have seen the same thing over and over. Even those who do “scope things out” do it with the motive of taking what they learn and using it to improve “their” plan.
My friend Sammy, who is a senior pastor of a church I work with, told me that one young church planter came to him and said, “I am planting a church down the street. I came to learn all I can about your neighborhood and how I can be successful in what I am doing.”
That is not what I am suggesting. What I am saying is the planter comes into the local setting and says, “I am here to join God in whatever way God guides m. Can you show me what God is doing in your church so I can figure out how my call and your vision can complement one another?”
If there is truly no visible church in the neighborhood, then walk the streets and find out what God is doing in the lives of the neighbors and join in that.
Thanks for your post. Jamie actually knows David and I do not. I really can’t speak to David’s intentions. Maybe he will clarify that for us.
I do however think his shift from planting to missionary sending is a good one. I just posted on that topic, would love to know what you think.
Thanks again for contributing to the conversation.
Jeff, as much as I agree with the level importance you place on this, I don’t think it was as intentional an exclusion as you suggest. I know David personally. I MANY personal correspondences and conversations he has encouraged me to champion leaders within my community and not put too much emphasis on outsiders.
I think what we are seeing in his post is two-fold: First, it is just plain oversight. David is a great thinker, but often misses these points in the context of a blog (that he is far less likely to miss in a more formal context, such as a book or academic paper). Not an excuse, but certainly allows for some grace.
Second, he is writing this proposal mainly over and against the more popular models. Therefore, he is writing it to people who are planning on “going” somewhere. Again, he should have stated it, but I can see where his emphasis and corrective might have distracted him from the detail.
Sorry if it sounds like I am simply being a Fitch apologist, but I think David would affirm this emphasis fully.
Jamie and Jeff,
I think it is fascinating to watch the threads that are coming out of CCDA – John Perkins types intersect with the church planting conversation.
I have been heavily on the Community Development side but I really love the church planting conversation.
Since I swim in the CCD steam it is often heard for me to write to any other stream, even if I agree with them.
I hope David will take the time to write something about this.
It is so cool how all these thoughts are crossing over, swirling together, informing, challenging and hopefully making us all better pastors.
Good observation, Wendy. I really wish there was a CCDA equivalent in Canada. Some of the material is excellent for us, but the contextual differences are just too pronounced to be fully helpful.