| Chapter 2 - The Similarities and Differences between Church Planting Teams and Churches
Introduction
George Patterson has likened a church planting team to a scaffold which surrounds the structure which is being built, the church. Care must be taken to be sure that the scaffolding is in good shape so that the job can be accomplished. But there is a danger of spending so much time and effort on the scaffolding that the job of building the church is missed. Never loose sight of the goal that the scaffold must be dismantled and removed from the building.
Indeed a major problem is that some teams spend so much time among themselves they end up becoming a church themselves instead of a temporary means to plant the church. For instance one team I visited had begun to set up a Sunday school for their kids, have a regular preaching service, had even begun looking for buildings to meet in! They were hoping to invite nationals to visit and use this as a preaching point. I pointed out that beginning with this model, the nationals would not be satisfied until they had something similar which likely would be many years away since the skills of the team were far beyond what new believers would gain, not to mention that homiletic tools like commentaries which the church planters took for granted were not even existent in the Muslim country in which they were working! Not to mention the fact that converts were illegal in that country! After a while they could see that they were setting up a church of which they would have to be a part for the foreseeable future. This may be a way of planting a church, but is not suitable for a church planting team whose authority is temporary, and whose ministry must be itinerant. And such a church is not likely to reproduce at any rate.
When church and team are mixed, purpose, function and lines of authority between church and team often become muddled and confused. The church and the team get in each other's way, or become so antagonistic that they can no longer cooperate. A spirit of co-laboring turns into a spirit of completion. If a team is going to fulfill its mandate, and let the church fulfill hers, the team must carefully distinguish itself from the mandate of the church.
This chapter will try to focus on the similarities and differences between church planting teams and churches. How can teams avoid the pitfall of becoming the church and thus missing their call and end up being in competition with the church?
The functions of a healthy church are laid out in scripture. It is to be winning the lost, adding them into the community through baptism, grounding them in the Faith, discipling them to maturity, disciplining those who turn from the Way, maintaining purity through celebration of the Lords supper, and growing in depth of relationship by following the "one another" commands of the Bible.
The church was never meant to be a nominal, safe club for the saints to escape from an ungodly world. Too many churches in the West have become exactly that, serving up programs such as Sunday School, youth groups, singles ministries etc. None of these are bad in themselves but rather they can drain and divert the church of the energy necessary for the major task which is fulfilling the Great Commission by penetrating, leavening their locality with people living out the gospel in the "real" world. These "energy drains" result in the church becoming a weekly meeting of nominal believers, while committed ones move on - often to para church organizations who have a vision to "do something"!
The church's main purpose for existing should be evangelism and discipleship which leads to further evangelism (Cf. Mt. 24:14 Reproduction!). Our main goal needs to be preparing the world for the second advent of our savior who will come as our reigning King! At that time we will worship him forever and ever. Presently the church has, as part of its task, that of worshipping the King. But we will have eternity to worship. Only now, in this present age, are we able to do the work which will ultimately bring Him back; evangelism and Church planting! Too much emphasis has been placed in recent years on meeting "felt needs" of the saints rather than "equipping the saints for the work of the ministry" (Eph. 4:12). The product of transformational ministry (Chapter 3) should be service to others, not being absorbed with our own quest for well being or self-fulfillment! (Galatians 5:13).
A church which is expending its energy "lifting up their eyes and looking unto the fields which are white already for harvest" is much more likely to be multiplying churches in their immediate vicinity (i.e.. church planting) and sending teams to the uttermost parts of the earth. Every church should have as one of its central goals the reproduction of disciples in ways that will lead to the establishment of new churches. The fact that churches have become ingrown rather than outreaching has led to the proliferation of permanent para-church organizations which enable the churches to continue in their weakened condition of nominal membership and maintenance programs, draining off leadership which could lead them into their true spiritual heritage.
So, we can see that churches need to have a vision for reproduction which will lead to planting new churches. In this they are like Church Planting teams.
Just as there are some ways the church functions like a church planting team, there are also ways in which the team functions like a church. How do the team members get their spiritual needs met where there is no church or the church is very new? Our experience is that is largely through the team! We cannot imagine Paul's team wondering about such a question. "How can we take the Lord's table since there is not church around!?!"
Yet we often find teams which seem unable to imagine how they can walk with the Lord without going to church. To some degree this misunderstanding might arise out of the mistaken concept of church attendance as a basic Christian duty. Being a functioning part of the body is far different from church attendance. Those who are functioning as part of the body will, of course, be assembling with the body if one exists. But attendance at a Sunday meeting does not equal being a contributing part of a Christian community.
If the team is working in an area where there are a number of fairly large churches, team members may be able to attend meetings without disrupting the function of those existing churches. This is also true if a team is in a foreign country trying to plant national churches but has access to an international church. Nevertheless team members must keep as their focus planting a reproducing church, then moving on. Beware at getting sidetracked into becoming integrated into the church in such a way that ministries which should be done by the church members end up being done by team members. At most team members should be equipping the saints to minister! Sometimes it may be better for members of the team to avoid involvement with such local church since motives could be misread, insecurities cause a spirit of competition, or pressure be brought on visiting team members to leave their calling to become a ministering part of the church. I have seen missionaries get so involved with the international church that both the team and the church planting effort are largely neglected.
Because of these dangers, and the fact that the team should be the primary community of transformation for its members (see Chapter 3), many activities which are normally associated with church will often be carried out by the team. Group times of prayer, worship, and the Lord's table may be common. This will especially be true of teams ministering cross culturally in places like where the church does not exist. A life of community worship (often in your own language) may be necessary for the members and the children as well. Even if adults feel they can get along without weekly worship, the families will likely suffer without it. We have found even with church planting in our own culture there are times when, for the growth of the church being planted, the church planter and his family need to be absent from the meetings of the church. At these times we often find that a segment of the team needs to meet for worship and celebration of the Lord's table on regular, if impermanent, basis. This may last for a few weeks or even a few months.
In addition to meeting for worship, individual mentoring, discipling and counseling will occur as younger team members need to be trained by the more seasoned veterans. It is not uncommon for marriage counseling, family counseling and other kinds of discipleship to be occurring with team members on our teams. Church Planters and their families have different of stresses than local church members. Older men and women need to help the younger ones cope with the pressures that accompany the spiritual counter attacks of the enemy which are encountered in church planting. The older ones must also lead in exercising Biblical discipline as a follow through of the teams responsibility toward its members (Cf. I Timothy 1:20, 2 Timothy 4:10).
Practically, on our teams in the USA, the men of our teams usually meet weekly for prayer and reporting. Then, we evaluate what is happening and seek God's mind as to how to proceed more creatively. Sometimes we meet twice each week, once for prayer and the second time for the training. The women will also often meet weekly, although they tend to get together more often and more spontaneously. In addition, there may be times when members meet one on one for personal discipling, counseling, etc. We are quite strict on restricting men to care for men and women to care for women.
On cross cultural teams, team meetings usually include all the members. However, even in these situations, often the men and women will need to meet separately.
However, none of these activities make the team a church. A church is much more than a group that carries out these activities. The expectations for a church are far broader and require greater energy than that of a church planting team. A thorough study of the "one another" verses in the New Testament and related verses is necessary to outline all of God's expectations for the church. If the team becomes a church, it will cease to carry out the calling to which it was called to start reproducing churches and move on!
If the team becomes the church, its focus and purpose will get blurred. As the team becomes permanent rather than transient, it will subvert the call of the local church causing it to stagnate. Worse, the team will develop a competitive spirit with the church. I don't see any evidence in Scripture of apostolic bands permanently staying in one place. God may change the call of a member of the team so that he leaves the team to take up responsibility in local assemblies. When they do so, however, they no longer function in a church planter's call. They are now answering a different call, since the call to church planting is itinerant by nature. One can conjecture from scripture that these kind of things did happen, and we have had that experience on our teams as well.
Thus it is important for a church planter and his family to clearly understand his/her call and the call of the team. It may be appropriate at times to review his/her sense of call as the Lord leads. This should obviously be done seeking confirmation from other members of the team as well as appropriate church leaders, perhaps both of the commissioning church and the one asking him to be elder.
Having stated that many activities of the church may be carried out by the team we might wonder are they any different? The following highlight some of the differences.
The main difference is that a church planting team should have as its goal catalyzing a church planting movement. I Corinthians 3:10 points out that the church planter is laying foundations. The members of the church being planted will be the ones who build upon that foundation, finding ways to penetrate their community with the gospel so as to propagate the evangel through reproducing even newer churches.
Therefore, the teams first priority is to focus on areas where there is no local church and thus no reproductive organism. A secondary priority could be to focus on areas where the local churches are not fulfilling the great commission of making disciples by reproducing new congregations (i.e. there is no church planting movement). In this latter case the goal should be not only starting new churches which will reproduce but also influencing the older ones to do the same. The team may also be called to an area where a church that has a reproductive model needs temporary assistance. In this case the church planting team must take great efforts not to usurp the God given authority of the church and do the work for them, but instead remain behind the scenes as a resource and coach to the leaders. It also needs to avoid getting bogged down in a church that may require so much remedial help that it is unable to reproduce. There are other special people who have the wonderful and difficult call of renewing a church. The teams call is to plant the church!
Another key difference between a church and a team is that a team is itinerant in nature. It plants a reproducing church (or church cluster) and then moves on, leaving the church to reproduce and complete the task of evangelizing the area. The team is called to work in an area on a temporary basis. God has given it authority to plant the church, and then leave lest by remaining they usurp the authority and call of the local church. The church must be entrusted with the task of saturating an entire area for Christ and she will be able to do it far better than a team. For instance the team will often leave large areas of a society unreached. A reproducing church may be begun among say middle class merchants. The church will be responsible for working with the poor and figuring out how to plant churches among them as well as the rich. There may be other hidden peoples in the area which will need to be won to Christ and have transforming communities as well.
The team lays the foundation, gets the ball rolling, and the church builds upon it, completing the task (1 Corinthians 3:10-15). We often use a metaphor of an army invading a land. The church planting team invades the land and leaves behind the church which will have the task of subduing the land while the team moves on to invade new territories for the Kingdom.
It is important to note that saturating the local community by the church may be more difficult than planting the first church (or cluster of reproducing house churches). Church planters usually harvest the first gleanings of a ripe, wild field. The church afterward will have to put effort into tilling the soil and penetrating less receptive elements of the population since their calling is to penetrate deeply into their society. They need to be encouraged in this difficult task so they do not lose heart and settle for maintenance activities. Church planters need to realize that, as difficult as their task is (especially when working among unreceptive peoples), the church they leave behind will be in for greater difficulties. A simple overview of the letters of Paul will reinforce this truth.
A church's task is to penetrate their locality and take all who will come captive for the Lord Jesus Christ. Their evangelistic focus is universal as opposed to the selective focus of the church planting team. The church must try every method to penetrate into every layer of their society.
Further, everyone who responds to the Gospel needs to be given attention and discipled, equipped to engage in the ministry or disciplined out for not harkening to the voice of the shepherd (Cf. Titus 1:10-16). Everyone is called to work on the building, God's church (I Corinthians 3:10-17). Anyone who is a member of God's church should be part of a local church, and the church must have as its goal to include all who are following the Lord Jesus Christ. As the church continues to grow and disciple men and women into the fullness of Christ including developing new elders and deacons, the church will find herself reproducing.
The team's task, however, is to plant a reproducing church. Whereas the church has a responsibility to follow up on all interested persons and find ways to win resistant groups in their locality to the gospel, the team is responsible to follow up only on those people through whom a church will likely be planted. It is easy for the adversary to fill the field with tares. The church planter who tries to nurture every shoot that looks like it might bear fruit will likely become exhausted and end up not planting a church. This is one reason we, as a church planting team, have focused on finding and training men of peace. A man (or woman) of peace is a key person in a distinct social network. In the west such people may be PTA leaders, business owners, head of a block association, etc. When such a one comes to Christ usually others in that social network will come as well and a house church can be started very quickly. Seekers are carefully evaluated as to whether of not they would lead us to a social circle and a man or women of peace around whom a church could form.
Whereas a church must receive whoever will come, a team must be more selective--receiving only those who are called to be church planters. This will doubtlessly involve the scrutiny of new applicants by the team, trying to discern if their vision, gifting, and calling will help the team fulfill their calling (see Chapter 5 for more on Calling). Even after a person has been received by a team, if he shows himself to be detrimental to the task, the team should have no qualms about releasing such a one and remanding him back to his sending church. Of course this should be done prayerfully since God may have another plan in using such a one to bring about growth in maturity of the team (more in Chapter 3: Transformation).
Likewise, simply because a person shows up in the locality in which the team is operating and insists that God sent him does not mean the team has the obligation to receive him nor necessarily to cooperate with him (although cooperation is to be encouraged where it does not compromise the call of the team). The team has received a commission from God to plant a church! It is the team's responsibility to examine the person and determine if indeed he or she is a provision of God to be included in the scaffolding. God may, in his providence, allow many different scaffolds in a single city to bring about his purpose (Cf. Philippians 1:15-18. Here there seems to be tolerance, but limited cooperation.). Once again, the team has the freedom and the responsibility before God to determine membership based their discernment of his/her call from God.
The apostle Paul seems to have had substantial problems with self-proclaimed apostles showing up insisting that God had sent them. Certainly many of them may have been very sincere which only makes them more problematic. Even some who had been with him and were clearly true believers Paul had no qualms about excluding from the team. This was the very reason behind his schism with Barnabus in Act 15 over John-Mark. I have seen many a team neutralized in the field because they have taken on members who grind the church planting effort to a halt by causing dissension trying to get the team to follow other ministries which will not lead to church planting.
Another difference between church and church planting team is the members' involvement with the local church. Team members are usually sent by a local church and thus have some experience with church life. We see this with Paul's team. Paul, Barnabus, Silas, Timothy to mention a few, all came out of local churches. Sending out teams of church planters is the logical extension of the vision of a reproducing church. As it reproduces locally, there will be those who receive a call to go beyond the locality, i.e. become church planters. So normally, church planting teams are produced by churches which are reproducing locally. Just as teams produce churches so churches produce teams. So we see the inherent interdependence and cooperation between the two entities.
But where a local church is beginning, team members need to be careful with their involvement in an emerging assembly. The goal is to have a reproducing church which means that it must have local leadership who can train up new leaders as well (2 Timothy 2:2). Obviously if you have a team of church planters (e.g. three or four couples) working with only two local couples who are beginning to meet as a church, it would not be healthy for the whole church planting team to be involved in such an assembly. If three mature couples from the team get involved, the locals will become passive and not step out to develop their spiritual gifts, especially those in leading and shepherding. Thus the goal of reproduction will be hindered.
It is better for only one of the church planting team couples to meet with the other two couples. The rest of the team carries on as before this new church began meeting. They will continue with a team life which will include worship, prayer, the Lord's table, etc. The couple working with the emerging church may also desire to remain a part of the team corporate worship life.
There are many pitfalls to avoid as we try to keep the call of church and team distinct. However, attaining this goal will allow both church and church planting team to prosper. Failure will result in competition, resentment and inability to reproduce as either the church dominates the team, the team dominates the church, or the team gets absorbed in the church.
1. What is your team life like? What elements of the church do you need to include to meet the spiritual needs of the members of your team? How may that have to change as you plant churches?
2. Are you evaluating your evangelistic contacts to determine whether or not they are leading you to people of peace? Are your converts doing evangelism with their friends and family? How can you better equip them for this ministry without taking over for them?
3. Once the church is planted, in what ways can you assist her in the hard work of evangelizing in such a way that they will reproduce? Where will you have to be careful in order not to rob her of her responsibility and blessing? |