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Essential Principles for Church Planting · Reformed Thinking

• 0:00
  Welcome to reformed thinking. Good to be here.
• 0:02
  I'm really glad we're getting into this today.
• 0:04
  We're we're opening up a topic that I think for a lot of people
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  just gets kind of pushed to the side, you know, church planting
• 0:13
  missions. It's for the specialists, the
• 0:16
  people who come back from overseas with with slides and
• 0:19
  interesting stories. Right, the cargo pants brigade.
• 0:22
  But today we're doing a deep dive.
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  We are really looking at the the theological nuts and bolts of
• 0:29
  the Great Commission. And it's so good that we are.
• 0:31
  You're right about that specialist label.
• 0:33
  It's a It's a dangerous way to compartmentalize the faith.
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  How so? Well, we start to think of
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  missions or, you know, planting new churches as this, this
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  extracurricular thing, something for the Super spiritual, totally
• 0:46
  separate from the normal life of the church.
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  But if we're really standing on a Reformed worldview and
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  specifically looking at the Bible through the lens of, say,
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  the Westminster Confession. Which we are.
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  Which we are. Then we have to see that
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  gathering the elect, you know, forming them into local
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  congregations, that's not some side project.
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  It's the primary work of God in this age.
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  It's central. Absolutely.
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  And to guide us through this, we're not just spitballing here.
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  We are digging into a really substantial text today.
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  It's called biblical missions, Principles, priorities and
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  practices. A great book.
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  A great book, and specifically we're doing our deep dive into
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  a, well, a real powerhouse of a chapter by Carl A Hargrove.
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  It's titled Essential Principles for Church Planting.
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  And we're pairing that with another piece, right you?
• 1:34
  Are to make sure we get the full picture, we're also pulling in a
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  short insert from John MacArthur.
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  His piece is called Doing the Work of an Evangelist.
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  And this is such needed material because what Hargrove is doing
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  here is he's basically stripping away all the modern noise.
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  The noise, yeah. We're living in this era where
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  church planting strategies, I mean, they look a lot like
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  Silicon Valley startup plans. Right marketing funnels,
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  demographic targeting. That's exactly sociological
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  trends. Yeah.
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  It's all very clever, very businesslike, but the whole
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  point of our conversation today is to look at what's strictly
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  biblical. We want to get to what is
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  necessary, not just what's, you know, fashionable at the moment.
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  So let's just get straight to the hook.
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  I think for a lot of us listening, church planting
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  sounds like, OK, that's something I might give money to.
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  It's not something I need to understand the theology of.
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  But Hargrove, he just challenges that idea right out of the gate.
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  He basically argues that if God is going to be honored, if
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  leaders are going to be raised up, then these principles he's
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  about to lay out, they aren't. They're not optional.
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  That's the whole point. He calls them essential.
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  That's not an accident. Essential.
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  He makes his point that there's no legitimate reason, none, for
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  a local church not to be involved in this work.
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  You're either planting or you are actively supporting those
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  who do. It's not a suggestion.
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  It's the it's the very heartbeat of being obedient to Acts 1.8.
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  So. If a church isn't reproducing.
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  It's stagnating. We have to see this as the
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  organic, natural result of healthy theology, not as a
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  another program to add to the church calendar.
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  OK, let's get into it then. Hargrove gives us nine of these
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  essential principles. We're going to walk through
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  them, and I want to start with the very first one, because it
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  really does set the stage for all the others.
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  It does principle #1A high view of God.
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  Now, in our circles, that phrase gets used a lot all the time.
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  Oh, we have a high view of God. It's almost like a secret
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  handshake. But what does that actually
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  mean? What does it look like in the,
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  you know, the real world grit of planting a church?
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  It's about moving it from just being a theological slogan to
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  being the the supreme motivation, OK?
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  Hargrove argues that every single part of the ministry is
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  and has to be completely beholden to proclaiming the
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  greatness of God's character. So the starting point matters.
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  The starting point determines the whole trajectory.
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  I mean, think about it. If your starting point is
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  anthropological, if you start by asking what do the people in
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  this neighborhood want? What are their felt needs?
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  What kind of music will attract? Them you're starting with the
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  consumer. You're starting with man and you
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  have immediately started on a man centered footing.
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  You are building on sand. At that point it doesn't matter
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  how good the structure look. And if you start with the
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  consumer, you're going to end up with a product.
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  You're not going to end up with the church.
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  Precisely. But flip that.
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  If your starting point is a high view of God and specifically
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  presenting him as a God of holiness, of righteousness, and
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  of justice, that changes everything.
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  It changes how you operate from day one.
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  How so? Well, it implies that God is the
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  head of the church. Ephesians 1.22.
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  This church belongs to him. Not to us, not to the planter.
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  Not to the people. It exists for His glory, Not for
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  the audience's comfort or entertainment.
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  And that shift in perspective, it's it's radical in today's
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  climate. It changes the preaching.
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  It changes the worship. It changes how you counsel
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  someone who comes to you with a problem.
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  An effect on the people, the people sitting in the folding
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  chairs in that new plant, that must be huge.
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  It is. Hargrove says that this high
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  view of God is what motivates the congregation toward
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  practical holiness. It actually changes how they
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  live their lives Monday through Saturday.
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  It has to If the God you worship on Sunday is weighty, majestic
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  and holy, the lives of the people will start to reflect
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  that weightiness. And if he's not?
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  Well, the reverse is true, too, Yeah, and Hargrove makes this
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  very sharp distinction. Without it, ministry will
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  inevitably always drift into just comforting sinful people in
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  their sin. That's a strong statement.
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  It's a very strong statement. If you don't have a high hue of
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  God, your goal subtly shifts it because about making people feel
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  comfortable in their current state rather than exalting a
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  holy God who calls them to be holy.
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  So you end up with what, a therapy center?
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  You end up with a therapy center, not a church.
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  Yeah, and we have to be clear. A therapy center, however
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  helpful it might seem, cannot save souls.
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  Only a direct confrontation with the awesome holiness of God can
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  drive a Sinner to the cross of Christ.
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  It seems like this also has a protective function for the
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  planter himself, doesn't it? I found that part of his
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  argument really insightful, just thinking about the psychology of
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  being a leader. Oh, absolutely.
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  If you have a high view of God, you are in a sense inoculated
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  against the fear of man. That is a massive protection.
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  Yeah. Just think of the temptation for
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  any preacher, but especially a church planter.
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  Yeah. You are desperately trying to
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  gather a critical mass of people.
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  You want them to like you. You want them to come back next
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  week. You need their tithe to pay the
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  rent on the Community Center you're meeting in.
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  The pressure is immense. The pressure is to please the
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  crowd, but a high view of God forces you.
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  It compels you to address sin faithfully.
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  Hargrove has this great line where he says we must use the
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  language of Scripture, not the accommodating vocabulary of the
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  culture. That is a hard thing to do
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  today, the pressure to soften the biblical language to sort
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  of, you know, smooth out the rough edges of the gospel.
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  It's everywhere. It's everywhere, but if the
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  planter is truly captivated by the excellencies of Christ, he
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  isn't looking for his validation from the audience.
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  He's not looking at the numbers. He's.
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  Sustained by the Word himself, he fears God far more than he
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  fears an empty room. And here's the thing.
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  That kind of boldness, that's actually what attracts the
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  elect. They aren't looking for a soft
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  message, they're starving for the truth.
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  Which is the perfect segue into principle #2A high view of
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  Scripture. The other side of the same coin.
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  Right. And Hargrove, I mean, he doesn't
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  pull any punches here. He says that church planting
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  that is not ordered by Scripture isn't just extra biblical, it is
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  unbiblical. That is a distinction with a
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  massive difference. We have to pause on that.
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  Break that down. Extra Biblical implies something
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  is just extra, maybe neutral. You know, like using a
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  microphone or meeting in school gym or having coffee in the
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  lobby. The Bible doesn't command those
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  things, but they don't violate scripture.
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  OK, but unbiblical means it's contrary to the nature of God's
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  revealed work. It's working against the grain
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  of what God is doing. He says that numerical growth
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  means absolutely nothing if the basis for it isn't the divinely
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  inspired Word of God. You can get a crowd with a
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  circus. You can get a crowd with a
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  circus, but you cannot build a church without the Bible.
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  He uses this powerful image of the sword of the Spirit.
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  He says it's the only weapon the planter actually has.
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  It is. It's the only offensive weapon
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  in the full armor of God listed in Ephesians 6, and you have to
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  think about the context of a church plant.
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  You were literally entering a spiritual battle.
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  You're on enemy territory. You're going into a community
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  that, by definition, is held captive by the enemy.
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  You will encounter opposition. It's not a maybe, it's a
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  certainty. And if you drop your sword to
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  pick up a clever marketing plan, you are unarmed.
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  You might look busy. You might be engaging, you might
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  be witty, you might be relevant, but you have no capability to
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  Pierce the human heart. The Holy Spirit works through
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  the Word, not through our cleverness.
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  He gives a real world example of this that I thought was just
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  fantastic. There was a church plant in
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  Inglewood, CA and their motto, their tagline was simply this,
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  where the Bible is the authority.
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  It sounds so simple, right? Almost generic, but you have to
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  understand the context in that specific community.
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  That was a radical statement. Why?
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  Because it was a stark contrast to some of the other local
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  norms. Maybe you had churches where the
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  pastor himself, his personality was the charismatic authority.
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  Or where people were claiming to get private revelations from
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  God. Right.
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  And this motto just drew a clear line in the sand.
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  It said we are not the authority here.
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  The pastor is not the authority. Our feelings are not the
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  authority. This book, this text, is the
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  authority. It tells a person walking in the
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  door for the first time exactly what they're getting into.
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  It tells them we are all going to submit to this book together,
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  especially when it's hard, especially when it confronts us.
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  Now, Hargrove does point out that the Bible doesn't have a
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  specific verse for every single decision you have to make.
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  Of course not. You know, what color should we
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  paint the nursery or what time should the service start?
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  But he says its principles are sufficient.
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  And that's the doctrine of sufficiency.
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  It's something we say we believe, but do we really
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  practice it? Do we live like it's true?
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  A church planter must live as if God's Word is absolutely
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  sufficient for life and godliness.
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  Because, as Hargrove states, it is.
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  It's the spiritual compass. If you lose that, you've lost
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  the church before you even open the doors.
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  You're just running a social club.
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  A social club with some religious overtones, nothing
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  more. OK, so we have this theological
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  bedrock, a high view of God, a high view of Scripture.
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  Now let's shift gears and talk about the man himself.
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  Principle number 3A Qualified leader.
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  This is where it gets really practical.
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  And I think this is where a lot of modern thinking goes off the
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  rails, because the assumption is that if you're just willing to
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  go well, you must be qualified. Yes, the old fog.
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  A mirror test. If you're breathing and you're
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  willing, here's your plane ticket and a check.
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  And Hargrove just shuts that down.
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  He shuts it down completely. He makes this crucial, crucial
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  distinction. Not every missionary is a church
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  planter, OK? Just like not every pastor is
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  gifted to be a lead pastor. The roles are different.
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  The gifting is different. So what are the qualifications
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  then? Is it about being a charismatic
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  visionary? You know, the kind of guy who
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  can naturally attract a following?
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  That seems to be the default type we look for in a planter.
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  No, and that's exactly where that secular startup mentality
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  creeps in. Again, we look for the
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  entrepreneur, the CEO type, the guy with the IT factor.
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  But Hargrove points us somewhere else.
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  He points us right back to the Bible, to verse Timothy 3 and
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  Titus One. The primary qualification for a
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  church planter is that he must be a biblically qualified elder.
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  Period. So character over charisma.
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  Character is paramount. If he cannot manage his own
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  household, Paul asks, how can he possibly take care of God's
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  church? We are looking for holiness, not
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  hype. He does list things like being a
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  self starter or you know, having a vision, but he's careful to
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  classify those as secondary. They're secondary attributes and
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  they are helpful. Certainly you need some internal
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  drive to plant a church. It's lonely, it's difficult
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  work. But without the spiritual
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  qualifications, being sober minded, hospitable, able to
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  teach, not a lover of money, those natural talents will
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  actually become liabilities. How so?
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  A charismatic leader who lacks godly character will eventually
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  implode the church he builds. His talent will just help him
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  build a bigger mess. He needs to be, as Hargrove puts
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  it, called from above and from among.
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  I really like that phrasing from above and from among.
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  Can you break that down for us? From above is that internal
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  call. It's the divine compulsion.
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  It's what we see in the Apostle Paul when he says woe to me if I
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  do not preach the gospel. It's a fire in his bones.
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  OK, that's the divine part. But from among is the external
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  validation. It's his peers, his own church
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  leaders, observing his life and his gifting overtime and saying
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  yes, we see it. God has set this man apart for
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  this work. So it's not a solo decision.
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  Never. And Hargrove warns about the
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  danger of skipping this vetting process.
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  You don't just let a man run off and plant a church because he
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  has a good idea, or maybe because he's just frustrated
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  with his current church situation.
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  He needs to be tested. He needs to be affirmed.
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  Because he's taking on the responsibility for the father's
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  house. That's a heavy heavyweight.
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  It's the care of immortal souls first, Peter 5.2 says.
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  Shepherd the flock of God that is among you.
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  If a man hasn't proven he could do that faithfully in an
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  established church, it is dangerous or even say negligent
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  to let him try to do it in the wild, so to speak.
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  If he can't shepherd the sheep that are already safe in the
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  fold, he is certainly not ready to go out and find the lost
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  ones. Now, you mentioned vision a
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  minute ago, and principle #4 is a biblical burden.
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  It's interesting because Horgrove seems to be reclaiming
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  the word vision here. He is, and it's so necessary.
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  Vision has become such a corporate buzzword.
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  Right. It's about 5 year plans and
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  growth targets. Ethereal aspirations.
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  Quarterly goals. But Hargrove defines biblical
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  vision as a burden. That's a different word
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  entirely. It's a deep, sometimes agonizing
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  passion for a specific people group in a specific place.
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  It's not just a good idea, it's a weight on your soul.
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  He connects this to Romans 15, doesn't he?
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  He does Paul's ambition to preach the gospel where Christ
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  has not yet been named. But look at the historical
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  examples he brings up. This isn't about some strategic
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  demographic study where you find a suburb with a high median
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  income and a low density of churches.
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  This is John Knox on his knees crying out.
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  Give me Scotland or I die. That's just, that's so intense.
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  It's a visceral life or death plea to God.
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  It is. Or think of William Carey with
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  India, Hudson Taylor with inland China, David Brainerd literally
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  coughing up blood in the snow because he had such a burden for
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  the Native Americans. These men weren't just
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  fulfilling an administrative directive.
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  Not at all. They weren't employees of a
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  mission board, just ticking a box on a strategic plan.
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  They had a fire in their bones for a specific people.
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  They were consumed by it. And Paul himself, I mean, we
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  read in Romans 9, he said he would be willing to be accursed
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  to be cut off from Christ for the sake of his brothers, the
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  Israelites. It's a statement that's hard to
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  even comprehend. That is the level of burden that
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  Hargrove is talking about. And here's the insight from this
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  chapter that I think every missions committee and every
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  potential planter needs to hear. A man shouldn't need to be
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  convinced to go. Say more about that.
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  If you have to talk a man into planting a church, he is
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  probably not the man for the job.
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  Now, he might need encouragement.
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  Of course the task is daunting, but the burden itself, that has
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  to reside within him already. If you have to manufacture the
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  fire, it's going to go out the first time a real rainstorm
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  hits. So we have the theology, we have
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  the man. Let's talk now about the
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  Structure principle #5 is about establishing core values.
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  This is what helps a new church avoid drifting off course.
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  Hargrove calls core values biblical anchors.
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  Biblical anchors. I like that.
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  It's the act of articulating upfront what is of first
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  importance to you as a body so that when the cultural pressure
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  comes to change or compromise, you know what you are anchored
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  to. The text gives a whole list of
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  specific examples, and I think it's worth walking through a few
• 16:31
  of these because they paint a really clear picture of what a
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  healthy biblically based plant looks like versus just a generic
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  religious gathering. We've already talked about the
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  word being the sole authority. Right.
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  That's number one. Then he lists prayer as the
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  visible engine of the church. The visible engine, so not just
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  something you do before the meeting to, you know, bless the
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  plans you already made. No, it's the actual engine
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  driving the ministry. Then he talks about worship that
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  engages both the mind and the heart, which avoids the two
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  extremes you often see. Dry intellectualism on one side.
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  And mindless emotionalism, on the other.
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  It's a balance that, frankly, reformed theology is uniquely
• 17:09
  equipped to maintain. He also mentions Christ centered
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  relationships, which is basically saying, you know,
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  small groups or fellowship that goes deeper than just hi, how
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  are you on a Sunday morning? And then one that's often very
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  countercultural, affirming biblical roles in the family and
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  the church. Yeah.
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  That's a big one. In a world that is deeply
• 17:29
  confused about gender and authority, a biblical church
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  plan has to say upfront, we believe in God's good design for
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  the family and we believe in qualified male eldership and of
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  course, the value of equipping leaders.
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  You have to be thinking about building the next generation of
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  leadership from day one. So by putting these things down
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  on paper, by articulating them, the church plant is basically
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  saying to the community, this is who we are.
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  These truths are precious to us. Precisely.
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  It clarifies the church's identity.
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  You're not just a generic gathering place for spiritual
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  people. You are a people formed and
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  shaped by these specific biblical convictions.
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  And it acts as a filter. A filter?
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  Sure, it might repel some people, but it will attract the
• 18:12
  right people, the people who actually want to submit their
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  lives to scripture. And those are the people you can
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  build the lasting church with. OK, that leads right into
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  principle number six, which is another one that pushes back
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  against that superhero pastor mentality, he says.
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  You need a core team. The lone wolf does not plant a
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  biblical church. That's the bottom line here.
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  It's a recipe for burnout, for moral failure, and for a church
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  built on one man's personality. But wait a minute, didn't Paul?
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  I mean, we always talk about Paul planted this church or Paul
• 18:43
  went there. It sounds like he was alone.
• 18:45
  That is such a common misconception.
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  We say I'm going to be like Paul, and what we mean is I'm
• 18:49
  going to go do this all by myself.
• 18:51
  But that's not what he did. Not at all.
• 18:53
  Just read the book of Acts. Paul was with Barnabas, then he
• 18:56
  was with Timothy and Luke and Silas and Aristarchus.
• 18:59
  The list just goes on and on. He almost never traveled or
• 19:02
  ministered alone. And Jesus himself sent them out
• 19:05
  two by two. Jesus commissioned A-Team.
• 19:08
  The church in Jerusalem is pastored by a team of apostles
• 19:10
  and elders. The biblical model is plurality,
• 19:13
  always plurality. It's a safeguard for the
• 19:15
  doctrine and for the men himself.
• 19:17
  So what are the practical benefits of having a team?
• 19:20
  I mean, aside from just having someone to help you set up the
• 19:22
  chairs. Oh, it's about spiritual
• 19:24
  survival and the health of the church.
• 19:26
  First, accountability is huge. If you're all alone, your own
• 19:30
  blind spots can kill the ministry before it even gets
• 19:32
  going. Second, you need mutual
• 19:35
  encouragement. Think about Acts 16.
• 19:37
  Paul and Silas are in prison in the stocks, and what are they
• 19:41
  doing? They're singing hymns together.
• 19:43
  Now imagine being in that prison all alone.
• 19:46
  The despair would be crushing. But together they turn a dark
• 19:49
  dungeon into a sanctuary. That's a great picture.
• 19:52
  And then there's the diversity of spiritual gifts.
• 19:54
  No one man has all the gifts that are needed to shepherd a
• 19:57
  flock perfectly. A-Team reflects the body of
• 20:00
  Christ in a way that a single individual never can.
• 20:03
  And Hargrove makes the point that even after Paul left the
• 20:05
  city, he maintained these deep and abiding relationships with
• 20:09
  the teams he left behind. Romans 16 is basically just a
• 20:13
  long list of shout outs to his Co laborers.
• 20:16
  It shows that ministry is relational at its core, not just
• 20:19
  functional. You aren't just using people to
• 20:22
  get a job done. You are laboring side by side in
• 20:25
  the gospel that brotherhood is what sustains you when the work
• 20:28
  gets hard. OK, so this brings us to what
• 20:30
  you called Segment 4. And this is where, as you said,
• 20:33
  things get a little spicy. Principle #7 an Indigenous end
• 20:37
  goal. This is a critical mythological
• 20:39
  principle that has, I think, been forgotten by many in the
• 20:42
  West. A mature church is an indigenous
• 20:45
  LED church. Meaning local leaders.
• 20:48
  Local leaders, The goal of the missionary or the church planter
• 20:51
  is to work himself out of a job. So he needs to be planning his
• 20:54
  exit from day one. He eventually has to hand over
• 20:56
  the keys. He has to.
• 20:58
  If the church remains dependent on the outsider, the American
• 21:01
  missionary, the planter from the big city, it's not a healthy,
• 21:04
  mature church. It needs to become self
• 21:07
  governing, self propagating and self supporting.
• 21:09
  And if it doesn't, If it always relies on funding from America
• 21:13
  or a pastor who flies in once a month?
• 21:15
  Then it's not a church yet it's still a mission station.
• 21:18
  Now, Hargrove uses this very principle to offer a pretty
• 21:22
  stinging critique of a very popular modern church model.
• 21:25
  He does. The multi site megachurch.
• 21:28
  Yes he does, and we need to listen very carefully to his
• 21:32
  reasoning here because it's not just about his personal
• 21:34
  preference. His argument is theological.
• 21:37
  He argues that the multi site model is and I'm quoting
• 21:40
  theologically unsound. Whoa, unsound.
• 21:44
  That is a heavy charge to make. What's his reasoning?
• 21:46
  It comes down to the issue of shepherding.
• 21:48
  He goes right back to first Peter 5.
• 21:50
  The elders are called to shepherd the flock that is among
• 21:53
  them. Among them physically present.
• 21:55
  Physically present in a multi site model, especially one where
• 21:58
  you have a video feed of a celebrity preacher from a
• 22:01
  central campus. The primary teaching elder is
• 22:05
  not among the people at the satellite location.
• 22:07
  Right, he's on a screen. He cannot interface with them.
• 22:11
  He isn't available during the week to meet with them.
• 22:14
  He doesn't know their names. He doesn't know their struggles.
• 22:16
  He doesn't know their particular sins.
• 22:18
  So it completely disconnects the act of teaching from the act of
• 22:21
  shepherding. You get the content, but you
• 22:23
  don't get the personal care. Precisely.
• 22:25
  It creates a consumer dynamic. You come to watch a gifted
• 22:28
  content provider, not to be shepherded by a man who knows
• 22:32
  your soul and is biblically accountable for it, Hargrove
• 22:35
  says. This place is an extreme strain
• 22:37
  on the local church fellowship because the teaching authorities
• 22:40
  dislocated from the physical body.
• 22:43
  It turns the church into an audience rather than a flock.
• 22:46
  And he contrasts this with what he calls the Ephesus model.
• 22:49
  He breaks it down into 8 steps from Acts 19 and 20.
• 22:52
  Yes, it starts with the initial audience contacted and it moves
• 22:55
  all the way through to leadership, consecrated and
• 22:58
  relationships continued. And the key step in that whole
• 23:01
  process is leadership. Consecrated Paul appointed
• 23:04
  elders and Ephesus local men from that congregation, and then
• 23:07
  he commended them to God and the word of his grace.
• 23:10
  He didn't set up a video link back to Jerusalem or Antioch.
• 23:13
  No, he established them as a self governing, autonomous body.
• 23:19
  He trusted the Holy Spirit to work in and through them.
• 23:22
  He also mentions that external help is fine at the beginning.
• 23:25
  He uses the example of the offering for the Jerusalem
• 23:28
  Saints, but it shouldn't stifle the Church's future
• 23:31
  independence. Right.
• 23:32
  I mean, a child needs support from its parents, but if you're
• 23:35
  still fully supporting your child when they're 40 years old,
• 23:37
  something has gone very wrong. Good analogy.
• 23:40
  The same principle applies to church planting.
• 23:43
  Failing to prepare for the missionaries departure is a
• 23:46
  fundamental failure in the planting process itself.
• 23:49
  If the planter leaves and the church collapses, he didn't
• 23:52
  actually plant a church, he just gathered a crowd around his own
• 23:55
  personality. OK, let's move on to principle
• 23:58
  #8 cross cultural adaptation. This seems obvious if you're,
• 24:01
  you know, going to a different country, but Hargrove brings
• 24:04
  some nuance to this. He does, he just acknowledges
• 24:08
  the reality that the church is by its very nature diverse and
• 24:12
  so planters are almost always crossing some kind of cultural
• 24:16
  boundary, whether that's a national border or just a socio
• 24:20
  economic line in the same city. The gospel is for every tribe,
• 24:24
  tongue, and nation. The real challenge is the
• 24:26
  balance, isn't it? Figuring out how to adapt to the
• 24:29
  culture without selling out the doctrine.
• 24:32
  That is the tightrope you have to walk.
• 24:34
  You have to adapt to the local language, the social nuances,
• 24:36
  the family values. But you cannot under any
• 24:40
  circumstances compromise biblical convictions.
• 24:43
  You can change the container, but you must not change the
• 24:46
  contents. He gives a really specific
• 24:48
  example from a ministry called Grace Advance to illustrate
• 24:51
  this. Yeah, it's a great illustration.
• 24:52
  He paints this picture of a man who was born and raised in rural
• 24:55
  Wisconsin. Right then, this man gets his
• 24:57
  theological training in metropolitan Los Angeles.
• 25:00
  A totally different world. Fast-paced, incredibly diverse
• 25:03
  traffic everywhere. And then he goes to plan a
• 25:07
  church in Kenya where he has to work with both Swahili and
• 25:10
  English speakers. That is a lot of cultural
• 25:13
  jumping. I mean that is massive culture
• 25:15
  shock just waiting to happen. It is, and Hargrove's point is
• 25:19
  that cultural adjustability is a real, measurable trait that is
• 25:23
  needed for success. This man has to learn how to
• 25:26
  interact socially in Kenya, which is completely different
• 25:30
  from how people interact in Wisconsin.
• 25:32
  He needs to understand their religious vocabulary, but this
• 25:36
  is the absolute key. He must fiercely maintain his
• 25:39
  doctrinal convictions. So he doesn't change his
• 25:41
  theology of God or his understanding of salvation to
• 25:44
  fit the Kenyan context. Not one bit, but he does change
• 25:48
  his mode of communication and his style of life to connect
• 25:51
  with the people he's trying to reach.
• 25:52
  So he's not a colonialist who's trying to turn Kenyans into
• 25:56
  people from Wisconsin, right? But he's also not a synchronist
• 25:59
  who's trying to mix the Bible with local Pagan beliefs.
• 26:02
  Exactly. He is bringing the unchanging
• 26:04
  gospel into a changing context. If he is rigid on the cultural
• 26:08
  stuff, he will be seen as irrelevant.
• 26:11
  If he is fluid on the doctrinal stuff, he is a heretic.
• 26:14
  He has to be fluid on culture and rigid on doctrine, and that
• 26:18
  requires a ton of humility and discernment.
• 26:20
  And that brings us to the final principle #9 and I love that he
• 26:24
  puts this one at the end. Fervent prayer.
• 26:27
  He says it's listed last, not because it's the least, but
• 26:30
  because it is the spiritual anchor that holds everything
• 26:32
  else together. It really bookends the whole
• 26:34
  list with the first principle, the high view of God.
• 26:37
  The argument he makes here is pretty convicting.
• 26:39
  He says that ministry without prayer is ministry that relies
• 26:43
  on human methodology and human talent.
• 26:46
  And if you are relying on your own methodology and your own
• 26:48
  talent, you are directly undermining principle number
• 26:51
  one. You are in effect saying I can
• 26:54
  do this. Prayer is a declared dependence
• 26:57
  on God. It is the constant admission I
• 26:59
  cannot do this. It is the very breath of the
• 27:02
  humble church planter. It's the acknowledgement that
• 27:04
  conversion is a supernatural miracle that only God can
• 27:08
  perform. He walks through the biblical
• 27:10
  examples, the early church in Acts 6 devoting themselves to
• 27:13
  prayer and the ministry of the Word, Jesus praying until his
• 27:18
  final breath on the cross and Paul's letters.
• 27:22
  I mean, they are just saturated with prayer.
• 27:24
  It's. Constant Paul's always praying
• 27:26
  for open doors, for the gospel, for the spiritual growth of the
• 27:30
  believers, for unity in the churches.
• 27:32
  And Hargrove makes the point that is the apostle Paul, the
• 27:35
  greatest theologian and missionary, whoever lived, if he
• 27:38
  needed that much prayer, how much more does the contemporary
• 27:42
  church planter? We often think we're too busy to
• 27:44
  pray. Which is the ultimate form of
• 27:46
  arrogance, isn't? It he actually gives a very
• 27:48
  specific list of things that a church plant should be praying
• 27:51
  for. I want to read a few of these
• 27:53
  because they are so grounded and practical.
• 27:55
  First, pray for a church that is gossip free.
• 27:58
  That is a prayer for unity, and let me tell you, gossip kills
• 28:01
  young churches faster than heresy ever will.
• 28:04
  Pray for a church that is financially responsible.
• 28:06
  A prayer for good stewardship. You want the church to have a
• 28:09
  good reputation in the community for integrity.
• 28:12
  And then hospitable, morally pure, and doctrinally sound.
• 28:16
  It's a comprehensive list of what a healthy church looks
• 28:19
  like. And here's the comment in the
• 28:21
  text that just hit so hard. If a man cannot commit to this
• 28:26
  level of constant, fervent prayer, he is likely unsuited
• 28:29
  for leadership. Because prayer is the great
• 28:32
  reminder that success in ministry is dependent on the
• 28:35
  intervening grace of God, not on your clever five step strategy.
• 28:40
  A prayerless planter is a dangerous man because he is
• 28:42
  operating entirely in his own strength.
• 28:45
  That is a powerful place to land on those 9 principles, but we're
• 28:48
  not quite done. We also wanted to look at this
• 28:51
  insert from John MacArthur doing the work of an evangelist,
• 28:53
  right? This brings a slightly different
• 28:55
  but related angle to the whole conversation.
• 28:57
  It does. This piece is based on Paul's
• 29:00
  charge to his protege Timothy in Second Timothy 4.5 and the
• 29:04
  context is really fascinating because Timothy wasn't a
• 29:06
  missionary in the way we usually think of 1.
• 29:08
  He wasn't traveling to new lands.
• 29:09
  He was a pastor in an established church in Ephesus.
• 29:12
  Exactly. He's a pastor, yet Paul commands
• 29:14
  him do the work of an evangelist.
• 29:16
  Which is interesting because we often see evangelism as the job
• 29:19
  of the specialist, right? The gifted extrovert with the
• 29:22
  Evangelist title. And MacArthur points out that
• 29:24
  Paul makes it a primary duty of the pastor, and he admits it's
• 29:29
  hard work. True evangelism is polarizing.
• 29:32
  It confronts sin. It offends people.
• 29:35
  It invites conflict. He talks about the great
• 29:38
  temptation to just tickle ears. That's the alternative to real
• 29:42
  evangelism, isn't it? If you don't want to confront
• 29:44
  sin, you just tell people what they want to hear.
• 29:47
  You avoid hostility. You make sure people like you.
• 29:49
  You secure your job security. But Paul tells Timothy to endure
• 29:53
  hardship. He does.
• 29:55
  The faithful pastor must also be an evangelist, even if it's not
• 29:58
  his primary spiritual gift. He has to lead his people in
• 30:02
  spreading the gospel. He sets the pace for the entire
• 30:05
  congregation. MacArthur shares his own
• 30:07
  personal strategy from when he first came to Grace Community
• 30:09
  Church many years ago. He had three main objectives.
• 30:12
  A very simple list. What were they?
• 30:14
  Number one, preach the Scriptures.
• 30:17
  That was the bedrock, consistent, expository preaching
• 30:20
  week in and week out #2 train leaders.
• 30:24
  That's right out of seven Timothy 2.2 in trusting the
• 30:27
  truth to faithful men who will be able to teach others also and
• 30:30
  #3 spread the truth, which is to say, evangelize.
• 30:34
  It's a remarkably simple list. Preach.
• 30:36
  Train. Evangelize.
• 30:38
  It is no gimmicks, no fancy programs, no laser shows.
• 30:42
  And he makes the point that doing the work of an evangelist
• 30:45
  has no geographic limits. For Grace Church, that meant
• 30:48
  reaching the world around them. It meant intentionally looking
• 30:50
  outside the four walls of their own sanctuary.
• 30:53
  And now, looking back after 50 years of ministry, he says the
• 30:56
  fruit has been greater than he ever could have imagined.
• 30:58
  And that's the testimony of simple faithfulness, isn't it?
• 31:00
  He concludes by saying that success in God's economy isn't
• 31:03
  defined by our cleverness or our eloquence.
• 31:06
  It's defined by fidelity to the Word and by endurance.
• 31:09
  We do our part, we plant, we water, but we must rest in the
• 31:12
  sovereignty of God, who is the one who gives the increase.
• 31:14
  So let's try to bring this all together.
• 31:17
  We've just walked through 9 essential principles from
• 31:19
  Hargrove, starting with that high view of God all the way
• 31:23
  down to the practical grit of cross, cultural adaptation and
• 31:27
  prayer. And then we've seen MacArthur's
• 31:30
  mandate for evangelism. What's the big take away here?
• 31:33
  I think if we synthesize all of this, what we're really seeing
• 31:37
  is a major corrective. Hargrove and MacArthur are
• 31:41
  offering a necessary corrective to the sociologically driven
• 31:45
  church growth models that have become so popular, especially in
• 31:48
  the West. They're saying stop looking at
• 31:50
  the market research. And start looking at the text.
• 31:52
  It's a call back to biblical first principles.
• 31:54
  It's almost freeing in a way. It takes the pressure off the
• 31:58
  church planter to be some kind of marketing genius or
• 32:01
  charismatic CEO. And it puts the pressure right
• 32:03
  back where it belongs, on his knees, in prayer and in the
• 32:06
  pages of the Word. It restores the dignity of the
• 32:08
  work. It does.
• 32:09
  It reminds us that this is God's work and it must be done God's
• 32:12
  way. Now here's where this gets
• 32:14
  really interesting for you, the person listening to this.
• 32:16
  We talked about that critique of the multi site model and the
• 32:20
  strong focus on indigenous leadership.
• 32:22
  Yes. So here is a provocative thought
• 32:24
  to leave you with If a church plant never becomes self
• 32:28
  governing, if it relies entirely and perpetually on a central
• 32:33
  celebrity video feed or on outside funding from another
• 32:37
  church, is it actually a church or is it just a colony?
• 32:41
  That is the question, isn't it? A colony exists to serve the
• 32:44
  empire. A church exists to serve the
• 32:46
  Lord Jesus Christ. If that local assembly cannot
• 32:50
  stand on its own 2 feet under the authority of Christ and its
• 32:53
  own local elders, we have to ask the hard question, Have we
• 32:57
  really planted a church or have we just opened a franchise?
• 33:00
  That is something to chew on, and I would really encourage you
• 33:03
  as you think about this to evaluate your own local assembly
• 33:06
  against these 9 principles. Not to be critical just for the
• 33:09
  sake of it, but to see where the foundations are strong and maybe
• 33:12
  where they might need some shoring up.
• 33:13
  It's a healthy exercise for any Christian in any congregation.
• 33:17
  Thank you for joining us on this deep dive.
• 33:19
  This has been reform thinking.