Church Planters

I've been concerned for some time with a problem I've seen now in every place I've ministered for the last 15 years. It is the problem of splitting a church to start a new one. A couple of weeks ago I attended a meeting with the new Executive/Treasurer of the South Carolina Convention, Dr. Jim Austin. The meeting was sort of a listening session; one of several he is having around the state. Church planting became the primary topic of discussion. One church planter shared some of his story. He felt led to start a church in the town he was in. When he told the church he served, he was let go. He just didn't understand why his church was so reluctant to support the church start.

Here's the problem. Established churches are tired of staffers "feeling led" to start a new church and do so by pulling out, going down the street or across town, and taking several members [perhaps several hundred] of the church with them. You can't blame established churches for feeling betrayed by the staffers and the members who leave.

There seems to be two kinds of "church planters" today. There are men who are called by the Lord to start churches. If a man feels led by the Lord to become a church planter, the best thing to do in my opinion is to leave the area in which he is currently ministering and start a new church elsewhere. That man will find support from sister churches. There are other men who become frustrated with the church they are in, wish to see changes, and those changes are coming too slowly. He then leaves, takes people with him, and starts a new church more to his liking. If a man is frustrated with the traditional church he's in, let him be patient for the changes he wants to make or let him go somewhere else and serve a church more in line with his minister philosophy.

Church starts should not be done to the detriment of established churches. A man should not split a church to start a new one. Surely there is a better way.

Just musing.