Two years ago Luke Kennedy with his wife Izumi started Future Church in Brisbane. The fruit has been incredible!

They have used innovative ideas that are easily replicable to engage with large numbers of not yet Christians. And next weekend Future Church will be starting a new weekend service specifically for the Alpha participants. Instead of seeking to integrate these new people into Future Church, they hope the new service will lead to a new church plant.

Having seen some of the amazing story that is developing at Future Church, I interviewed Luke to find out more. Here’s some of the incredible story that I heard.

Originally from Toowoomba in Queensland, Luke and Izumi spent 15 years in ministry in Japan as part of the Lifehouse Church Movement seeing thousands of young people come to faith with 15 churches planted. Luke planted his first church at 21 years of age.

When I asked Luke why he came back to Australia to plant a church, Luke admitted that leaving Japan was hard but that he and Izumi had a fervent belief that God would be moving in Australia and wanted to be part of such a move. So along with Jared Campion, they planted Future Church in February 2023.

How did they end up getting 111 non Christians to do Alpha over recent months?

A key to this was that Future Church developed an intentional process to bring people into spaces where they would connect with people from the church and begin to experience church and the Kingdom of God.

An example of this is the “Barista Basics” program they offered where they promoted the opportunity for people to come and learn how to make coffee. In fact they had so many people coming, they had to pass some of these people to other churches for them to learn to make coffee there. Probably around two thirds of the people coming to Barista Basics had recently come from overseas.

Barista Basics is offered on a Sunday morning before church begins. Learners can come along and be taught how to make coffee, serving coffee to people from the church before church starts. As there is no wall between the cafe and the church, the trainee baristas get to see and experience church in action. Luke estimates that around 50% of the trainee baristas end up coming into the church service.

Offering spaces where community can be formed and experienced is key to the outreach of Future Church. Other community spaces include a Babies Group, a Language Exchange, Basketball and a Run Club.

Luke expressed that the speed with which people attended these spaces and then became connected with the church was far quicker when the spaces were offered on a Sunday rather than a weekday.

Key to reaching people has been using Meetup, an online facility where community activities and events can be offered and people looking for or interested in those activities and events can connect. Future Church is now connecting with approximately one thousand people who have come to their events via Meetup.

Luke believes that Meetup should be in the toolkit of every church planter.

Behind Future Church’s success in connecting with the unchurched I saw intentionality and process. I have no doubt that fervent prayer was also key to reaching out.

Following is an example of the process Future Church has used in bringing people to Alpha:

• Promote an event or activity (like Barista Basics) on Meetup
• Conduct the event or activity, engaging with people who are hungry for connection and community
• Invite attendees to an Alpha Launch Party, promoting the commencement of Alpha the following week.
• Run Alpha
• Start a new weekend service as Alpha finishes for those who attended Alpha
• Transition the new service into a new church plant

Whilst Future Church is enjoying amazing success in reaching the unchurched, it’s not without challenges. When I asked Luke about the challenges, he told me a little of the financial stress that has come as a result of seeking to reach and make disciples from the unchurched, compared to planting a church that is comprised of people used to giving financially to the church.

In establishing the church, Luke and Jared established a business which they have used to fund the premises they use. Luke commented that running a business as well as a church brought a new and additional level of difficulties and that people were much more likely to generously give to commence a church plant than to fund operations two years down the road.

Part of the difficulty I have seen is that for a church plant to be well provisioned financially, a solid core of givers is necessary. We generally expect such givers to come from within the church. Another model is for church platers to look for say 10 people outside of the church they are planting to commit to giving 10% of their income for say 3 years to fund a wage for the church planter. This money should be paid into a separate church bank account so that it doesn’t disappear in funding operating costs. This would then provide the church planter with an income that was the average of the 10 givers.

In spite of the financial stress and the difficulties of running a business and doing ministry that Luke, Izumi and Jared and the team are facing, God is using these people and Future Church to do amazing things. I am sure that there is much that we can learn from what they are doing.

Please pray for their financial needs to be met and this Kingdom initiative to continue to flourish!

Tim O’Neill

National Leader,

Exponential Australia

22 May 2025