The recent survey of Australian denominational church plant leaders provided some insightful information with four key insights being:

1. By far, the number one impediment to the planting of more churches is the lack of potential church planters. Correspondingly, the issue that would most help in planting more churches is having more church planters! Jesus indicated that this would be the problem that we faced when he said that the problem isn’t in the harvest, it’s in raising more workers to send into the harvest! (Luke 10:2). To raise more church planters, two steps that need to be taken are:

• churches becoming more effective at not just gathering attendees but making disciples,
• having more leadership pipelines that will equip people to be church planters.

2. The denominations that are planting the most churches generally have someone whose major responsibility is to drive church planting within their denomination or region. This may include casting the vision to plant, identifying prospective planters, developing preferred church plant models, helping to arrange financial assistance, assisting with locations and arranging assessing, equipping and coaching of planters.

3. There is no one model of church planting that is the best in all circumstances. Rather a variety of models are needed with different styles in different contexts.

4. Multiplication Ministries that help assess, equip and coach church planters are under utilised by some denominations. They offer expertise and experience that is in some situations absent and can provide a valuable service to assist in the raising of leaders and teams and the planting of new churches.

For more information about the current state of church planting in Australia, you can download the Exponential Australia 2025  Church Planting Report and Infographic.

Tim O’Neill

Executive Director, Exponential Australia