The Australian church is full of churches struggling to pay their ministers and fill their buildings, so why all the discussion about church planting? Surely, we should be seeking to build up our current churches before trying to launch new ones. We hear comments like this all the time, but church planting benefits both new and existing churches, here’s why!

1. Church planting is about faithfulness to Jesus’ commandments

We are called to the Great Commandment (Mark 12:29-31), the New Commandment (John 13:34-35) and the Great Commission (Matt 28:18-20). This means we are called to love God with all we are, to love our neighbours, to love other believers, and to make disciples of all peoples, baptising and teaching them to obey all that Jesus commanded us to. Jesus’ said that people would know Him by the way his followers loved one another. The call to baptism is a call to enter and become part of Christian community. We are called to be build communities that live out that love in a way that the world can see and respond to. Acts 1:8 calls Jesus’ followers to take this message to the ends of the earth. There is a call for the church to be an outward focused, movement of communities continuing to reach different places and people groups in order to fulfill the commands of Jesus. Church planting is one way we can faithfully respond to this call.

2. New churches reach new people.

This is true for emerging generations, new migrant groups, or even new people moving into existing areas. Churches develop habits and patterns of worship and gathering that predominately reach those they are already reaching. As suburbs undergo change and new groups emerge, whether they are a new generation graduating high school, or a new migrant group entering the area, there needs to be an approach that make the gospel accessible for these people. Lesslie Newbigin once wrote this:

Separation there must be – for the sake of mission. The white middle-class suburban congregations of Birmingham, however devoted they might be, cannot and could not function as sign, foretaste and instrument of God’s purpose or blessing for the immigrants or for the shop-floor workers on the Leyland assembly lines. There have to be communities where these and others can hear and see in terms of their own culture the words and the signs of the Gospel.[1]

New churches allow these new communities to see and hear the gospel in a way they can understand and respond to. Australia needs an ecosystem of church expressions that work in partnership together to provide an effective gospel witness to every people group in Australian society.

3. Lessons from church planting grow the collective wisdom of the church

Church planting is often an experiment in following God into new spaces. Leaders often need deeper understandings of culture and must experiment with new ways of engaging in discipleship and mission. In this way, new churches promote new thinking and innovation from which the broader church can learn. When a new church plant effectively makes disciples of a migrant people group, existing churches can learn from their experience and implement similar methodologies. Not only do we develop new learning form church plants, but they also challenge our current assumptions about the ways we engage as “church” together. Some of these challenges are easy for the existing church to hear, some are more challenging, some perhaps are a step too far and cause us to recalibrate appropriately. The process of church planting makes space for the learning and growth the Australian church will need if we are going to continue to be an effective witness to Australian society.

If you want to talk more about church planting in your context, contact Exponential and we will connect you with people who can help you discern your next steps.

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[1] Lesslie Newbigin, ‘What is “a local church truly united”?’, The Ecumenical Review 29, no. 2 (1977): 122-123.