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Why We Still Plant Churches: Len Tang on Mission, Formation, and Change · Future Christian

• 0:00
  Loren Richmond Jr (00:42)
• 0:04
  Welcome to the Future Christian Podcast. Today, Loren Richmond Jr. is in conversation with the Reverend Len Tang. Len is the director of the church planting initiative at Fuller Seminary and has planted two churches, Cedar Creek Church in Sherwood, Oregon, and Missio Community Church in Pasadena, California. He received a BS in electrical engineering and computer science from UC Berkeley and an MDiv from Fuller Seminary.
• 0:08
  He is married to Amy and they have three young adult boys, a cat and an electric motorcycle. A reminder before we start today's conversation, please take a moment to subscribe to the podcast, leave a review and share Future Christian with a friend. Connect with Loren, Martha and Future Christian on Instagram. Shoot us an email at lauren at resonatemediapro.com with comments, questions or ideas for future episodes.
• 0:12
  We appreciate your voice and how we faithfully discern the future of the Church.
• 0:16
  Loren Richmond Jr (01:50)
• 0:20
  Hello, welcome to the Future Christian Podcast. My name is Loren Richmond Jr., and I'm pleased to be joined today by the Reverend Len Tang. Hello and welcome to the show.
• 0:24
  Len Tang (02:00)
• 0:28
  Hey, great to be here, Loren. Thanks.
• 0:32
  Loren Richmond Jr (02:02)
• 0:36
  Yeah, thanks for joining. Is there anything else you want our listeners to know about you?
• 0:40
  Len Tang (02:08)
• 0:44
  Well, I suppose a couple of quirks are ⁓ I'm into renewable energy. And so ⁓ my wife drives an EV, Chevy Bolt EV, and I ride an electric motorcycle. And so we love to kind of, and we have solar panels. So we kind of like the idea that our, our transportation is being, ⁓ you know, sourced by the sun.
• 0:48
  Loren Richmond Jr (02:31)
• 0:52
  Yeah, that's awesome. think, I think theoretically, at least like this conversation, at least from, I guess from both of our ends then is theoretically like carbon neutral then, cause I have solar panels going on myself.
• 0:56
  Len Tang (02:44)
• 1:00
  Nice.
• 1:04
  Loren Richmond Jr (02:46)
• 1:08
  So, ⁓ yeah, that's, we're, we're kind of counter-cultural, I guess, this way. mean, ⁓ let's not get into broader conversations about that. ⁓ share if you would about your faith journey, what that looked like in the past and what that looks like today.
• 1:12
  Len Tang (02:51)
• 1:16
  All right, nice.
• 1:20
  Sure. I grew up in a very nominally churchgoing family. We went when I was in elementary school and then stopped. So by the time I was in high school, I was a pretty strong skeptic. I thought of faith as a crutch for either weak or unintelligent people. So I was pretty arrogant in high school. And then I...
• 1:24
  I went to school at UC Berkeley and my first week there I had three encounters with really bold Christians who began to share their faith with me, gave me a Bible, and lo and behold, I was actually pretty captivated by the person of Jesus ⁓ as described in the New Testament. So I was reading the gospels, I was struggling a bit in school, and ⁓ these faithful Christians kept sharing Christ with me.
• 1:28
  Loren Richmond Jr (03:36)
• 1:32
  Wow.
• 1:36
  Hmm.
• 1:40
  Len Tang (03:59)
• 1:44
  And I found that ⁓ I was afraid that I was falling in, I was leaning on this crutch of Christianity ⁓ until kind of God revealed to me that ⁓ I'm a person like us all who needs a crutch, right? That we were made for him. And ⁓ I found that Christ was ⁓ so compelling that I ended up giving my life to him my freshman year.
• 1:48
  Loren Richmond Jr (04:18)
• 1:52
  Hmm.
• 1:56
  Yeah.
• 2:00
  Len Tang (04:29)
• 2:04
  and ⁓ found a great local church and was disciple there and began sharing my faith. So the fact that I was led to Christ by really bold Christians formed me, not only in terms of conversion, but in terms of discipleship and mission. So it was natural for me to turn around and share my faith with others. And that's to a degree even how I later was called into church planting was the desire to.
• 2:08
  share Christ with people ⁓ in the context of the local church.
• 2:12
  Loren Richmond Jr (05:03)
• 2:16
  Yeah. Well, thanks for sharing all that. What are some spiritual practices that you're, you can share that you find meaningful today?
• 2:20
  Len Tang (05:13)
• 2:24
  Yeah, I think that kind of an anchor practice for me, both in general, and then I think in the demands of church planting is the practice of Sabbath. ⁓ I try to take a 24 hour Sabbath for me, that's from Friday night to Saturday night, kind of like the Jewish Sabbath, right? ⁓ And that in particular includes for me,
• 2:28
  Loren Richmond Jr (05:23)
• 2:32
  Hmm.
• 2:36
  Len Tang (05:39)
• 2:40
  walking almost every week at our local botanical garden, which is called the Huntington Library. And I find that just being in nature and experiencing beauty is like deeply renewing. So it's a place where I can I can walk, reflect, pray, I kind of my devotional there. And that just just every week I look forward to that. And so the practice of a 24 hour Sabbath, no matter how crazy a week has been.
• 2:44
  I know that there's an opportunity coming to rest, to be with God, to enjoy beauty. And so that's been like an incredibly life-giving practice for me. ⁓ And I'll mention one other thing that one of my friends and mentors, Tim Mori, who's also a church planter, uses that we don't think of as a spiritual discipline and he really advocates, and I experienced it as well, just physical exercise, kind of as a spiritual discipline. And I find just,
• 2:48
  Loren Richmond Jr (06:26)
• 2:52
  Yeah.
• 2:56
  Yeah, yeah.
• 3:00
  Len Tang (06:37)
• 3:04
  just kind of like recovering the fact that I am an embodied person, right? Like I'm not just a brain on a stick. I actually need to connect with my body and with this physical world. And so exercise really does that. It's renewing for body, mind, and spirit. And so ⁓ I generally work out every day, either a cardio workout or weightlifting or jujitsu, and those are all really
• 3:08
  renewing for me.
• 3:12
  Loren Richmond Jr (07:09)
• 3:16
  Well, this is great. I got to give a shout out to Tim Mori. Had him long time ago, a few years back on the podcast. So give him my best. I really appreciated his book. I can't remember what it was called.
• 3:20
  Len Tang (07:15)
• 3:24
  Did you?
• 3:28
  planting a church without losing your soul? Was that okay? Mm-hmm, mm-hmm, yeah.
• 3:32
  Loren Richmond Jr (07:25)
• 3:36
  Yes, a very apt title, a very apt title. And I hope
• 3:40
  we might get on to some of those themes today. And I think that's such a good word you had even just about Sabbath. I mean, certainly for church planters, but for any pastor, I think really in general, but especially someone who's leading something new.
• 3:44
  Len Tang (07:47)
• 3:48
  Yeah, absolutely.
• 3:52
  Loren Richmond Jr (07:47)
• 3:56
  So
• 4:00
  I want to, I'm, I'm excited to get into this conversation already. If I wasn't already, I definitely am now. So I want to start with sort of a big philosophical question in this, like, why do you believe we should still be planting churches?
• 4:04
  Len Tang (08:07)
• 4:08
  Yeah, let me answer that in a couple of different ways. The first is, I would say like, why do you believe couples should have children? ⁓ I think we were made biologically to, as Genesis says, to go forth and multiply. That every living organism and every human being is born, ⁓ grows up, ⁓ reproduces,
• 4:12
  Loren Richmond Jr (08:17)
• 4:16
  you
• 4:20
  Len Tang (08:36)
• 4:24
  and then dies. And so we believe that that sort of life cycle and my friend Nick Warren has talks about this too, that every church is born, right? Every church was started or planted at some point by someone. It hopefully grows up to maturity, but often we don't normalize reproduction. We don't think that it's normal for a church to birth other churches or other missional expressions.
• 4:28
  Loren Richmond Jr (08:44)
• 4:32
  Yeah.
• 4:36
  Yeah.
• 4:40
  Len Tang (09:04)
• 4:44
  And so how can we, as Nick says, how can we renormalize the reproduction of churches? ⁓ In fact, in nature, nothing just grows bigger and bigger indefinitely. ⁓ It actually reaches an adult size, is in a season of reproduction, which is not its whole life. And then it ultimately dies. So I think we also need to normalizing the dying of churches. Not that we want that, but
• 4:48
  Loren Richmond Jr (09:24)
• 4:52
  Mm-hmm.
• 4:56
  Yeah. Right.
• 5:00
  Len Tang (09:34)
• 5:04
  It you know, every every church is planted and started because ⁓ there's a calling to have a fresh missional expression of a gospel in their context. And that doesn't last forever. And not every church is able to adapt to the new missional or demographic realities of its context. And so it will die. And that's that's while tragic is totally normal. ⁓ Someone once said, and I haven't seen the stats on this, but it kind of makes sense.
• 5:08
  He said like more than 99 % of churches of congregations don't last more than 100 years. And again, don't have any stats on that. I should have. But if even that's remotely true, it kind of reframes it to think our role really is to be parents, to have children and to see them flourish, but not to live forever. And in fact, that's kind of why some of our churches get into trouble.
• 5:12
  Loren Richmond Jr (10:22)
• 5:16
  Yeah.
• 5:20
  Len Tang (10:33)
• 5:24
  is that we think it is our job to live forever. So I think that's kind of a biological framework. And then the other is just kind of the missional idea is that the Missio Dei, the mission of God is always expressing itself like ⁓ David served the needs of God in his generation. And so again, every generation will have ⁓ new challenges that the gospel can address.
• 5:28
  Loren Richmond Jr (10:33)
• 5:32
  Yeah.
• 5:36
  Len Tang (11:04)
• 5:40
  and it will have fresh expressions of that in those new contexts. And the world has never changed, you know, been more fast changing than it is now on every level. And so I think it would be naive to think that we don't need new and fresh expressions in an ever-changing world, whether those are formal churches and congregations, micro-expressions or micro-churches.
• 5:44
  Loren Richmond Jr (11:14)
• 5:48
  Right.
• 5:52
  Len Tang (11:31)
• 5:56
  outreach Bible studies, all the different expressions of mission for God's people.
• 6:00
  Loren Richmond Jr (11:37)
• 6:04
  Yeah. Yeah. Thanks for sharing all that. I can't remember if it was Nick who I had on in the past or the most, one of my most recent guests. I feel like they both made this point, Dwight Shiley. Uh, this idea like the church of Ephesus still not, not around anymore, you know, all these new Testament churches, like as, as important as they were in their context, that they're not around anymore. So yeah, go ahead. Go ahead.
• 6:08
  Len Tang (12:04)
• 6:12
  Right,
• 6:16
  maybe their great-great-great-great grandchildren are present in and through the churches that were birthed out of those churches.
• 6:20
  Loren Richmond Jr (12:10)
• 6:24
  Yeah.
• 6:28
  Yeah. Yeah.
• 6:32
  Well, from philosophical, want to move to practical thinking about, I mean, there's a lot going on right now. We could spend the whole podcast just talking about the cultural context that we're living in. What are some new challenges or maybe even opportunities that are really shifting the landscape of church planning right now?
• 6:36
  Len Tang (12:33)
• 6:40
  Yeah, one of the specific opportunities that's really, I'm personally like really passionate about is the realities that are coming out of global migration. The fact that, you know, tens or hundreds of millions of people are either voluntarily moving to different parts of their own country or different countries. Some of that is forced displacement, you know, due to war or
• 6:44
  Loren Richmond Jr (12:46)
• 6:48
  Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
• 6:52
  Len Tang (13:03)
• 6:56
  being political refugees, ⁓ our country's dealing with that right now, what's gonna be our posture towards refugees? So it's clear that our cities and our country are rapidly diversifying in every way, that every city, every major city now has tons of different immigrant groups and microcultures within it. ⁓ And I kinda see, my friend Daniel Yang has helped me see that,
• 7:00
  Loren Richmond Jr (13:09)
• 7:04
  Yeah.
• 7:08
  Len Tang (13:32)
• 7:12
  God's hand is in the work of global migration. If he's sovereign, these things aren't just an accident, but that part of what it means to join God's mission is that there's all these new mission fields opening up right in our backyards, right, if you're in a fairly large city. And so part of the corresponding challenge is that the first wave of kind of church planting, that kind of modern church planting,
• 7:16
  kind of that happened like in the 70s and 80s. A lot of those were really built around kind of suburban, more wealthy male, often white communities and church planters. And that is not at all the reality that we face today. In 20 years, now less than 20 years, in 2045, there'll be no majority ethnicity in the United States.
• 7:20
  Loren Richmond Jr (14:09)
• 7:24
  Yes.
• 7:28
  Mm-hmm.
• 7:32
  Yeah.
• 7:36
  Len Tang (14:29)
• 7:40
  according
• 7:44
  to demographers and Pew Research. And we are just not set up to ⁓ identify, recruit, train, and equip the diversity of planters for this new reality that we're facing, demographically, culturally, and otherwise. So I think it's kind of, that's the exciting project that I've committed to is like, how do we, ⁓
• 7:48
  empower, you know, like, you know, in my work at Fuller, our mission is, you know, to implant, empower planters from every culture for every context. And to me, that's really exciting is like all the different kinds of planters, ⁓ to reach all this, this amazing kaleidoscope of context that, are happening. So, ⁓ but that's not going to be easy to do to retool.
• 7:52
  Loren Richmond Jr (15:08)
• 7:56
  Yeah.
• 8:00
  Yeah.
• 8:04
  I mean, this is my next question then, because certainly that, that creates quite an exciting opportunity to, to reach people outside these kind of like stereotypical planting models. But also I think the inverse of that, correct me if I'm wrong or tell me more here is that there's, there's no like go to models. Like you, you referenced in the past of like, let's just, you know, build a church in the suburbs.
• 8:08
  you know, hire an attractive young white male and like see it grow.
• 8:12
  Len Tang (15:56)
• 8:16
  Yep, yep.
• 8:20
  Loren Richmond Jr (15:58)
• 8:24
  So, I mean, what is even like... How does that even look like right now? Or will it look like, I suppose.
• 8:28
  Len Tang (16:07)
• 8:32
  Yeah, yeah, I think we're in the early stages of that. I there is already a lot of church planting that's happening in ⁓ very diverse context, but it doesn't sort of tend to make its way into denominational surveys necessarily, you know, sort of certain kinds of statistics. But like, ⁓ for instance, like the Assemblies of God is planting a ton of Latino churches, like right now. ⁓
• 8:36
  Loren Richmond Jr (16:23)
• 8:40
  Mm-hmm.
• 8:44
  Mm-hmm.
• 8:48
  Len Tang (16:34)
• 8:52
  Some of them are formal. Some of them are Bible studies that are kind of off the radar. There are ⁓ multiple denominations that have ⁓ ethnic-specific church planting wings. The vineyard has lavinia to plant Latino churches. ⁓ There are ⁓ small boutique church planting networks for ⁓ African Americans.
• 8:56
  And so what we're trying to do kind of in our work at Fuller is to try to identify who's already doing that work. How can we learn from them and how can we kind of pour fuel on what's happening? How do we diversify the the all that we call them tracks and in church planting tracks kind of refers to these like five functions of what church planting networks and denominations do. So tracks is an acronym.
• 9:00
  that stands for T is for training, R is for recruiting, A is for assessing, C is for coaching, and S is for support raising. So we kind of need to reimagine new tracks, new ecosystems for this whole diversity ⁓ of planters that need to be raised up and equipped. So yeah, it is not.
• 9:04
  There's not a straightforward blueprint, but that's also what's kind of exciting about it. We don't really know how we're going to fund this because a lot of these are to be able to plant in the urban core. Where's the money going to come from? The funding piece. So I don't know the answers to those, but I'm excited to find out and to look for creative ways that planters can engage in starting.
• 9:08
  Loren Richmond Jr (18:17)
• 9:12
  Right.
• 9:16
  Len Tang (18:30)
• 9:20
  nonprofits and for-profits alongside church plants to help fund, you know, for us to creatively come alongside them. So it's a new world and we're, it's a brave new world.
• 9:24
  Loren Richmond Jr (18:33)
• 9:28
  Yeah.
• 9:32
  It is. do. I'm glad you brought up funding because that was certainly something I want to ask about thinking about funding and sustainability. You know, I'm thinking again about Nick Warnes, who's done in my conversations with him a lot around non-profit creative, being creative with nonprofit structures. Certainly there's been some movement around social entrepreneurship. What are you seeing right now? Do you think that might be hinting, you know, that might be
• 9:36
  can't think of the word, hinting at what's coming more in the future, a world developed.
• 9:40
  Len Tang (19:15)
• 9:44
  Yeah, yeah, I mean, I think there was a wave of coffee shops that got started by church planters, right? That was sort of like the default way. And it made sense, like how do you both generate income, create third spaces, build relationships? So it made sense that those sort of expressions were there. I think a lot of planners found out it's a lot of work to run a business alongside planting a church.
• 9:48
  Loren Richmond Jr (19:26)
• 9:52
  Right.
• 9:56
  Mm-hmm.
• 10:00
  Yes. Yes.
• 10:04
  Len Tang (19:45)
• 10:08
  ⁓ And I think, you know, I've heard, ⁓ you know, a story of some planters, I think at Atlanta area, who started a coffee roasting business that went really kind of viral. And that wasn't like running a storefront, but it was creating ⁓ a brand that came out of their own story and engagement with coffee. ⁓ And so there was both the product, but also the story behind that.
• 10:12
  Loren Richmond Jr (20:10)
• 10:16
  Hmm.
• 10:20
  Len Tang (20:16)
• 10:24
  So there's been some creative, again, for-profit expressions. ⁓ Other, ⁓ I think being bivocational has long been normative in minority communities. So that's, in a sense, that's not new. And we need to think more about how do we help planters find something that's in their own sweet spot that can make ⁓ a good hourly rate.
• 10:28
  Loren Richmond Jr (20:26)
• 10:32
  Yeah.
• 10:36
  Right.
• 10:40
  Len Tang (20:45)
• 10:44
  Some folks I know are trying to leverage AI to do just that, that they can take their own ministry resources and reformat them for use or potentially for sale. How do we equip planters with those skill sets so that they're engaging with their unbelieving neighbors, they're adding value to their community? Some people do practical things like just be power, you know, they...
• 10:48
  get power washing equipment and that's their side gig and they meet people in the community that way. Again, starting a nonprofit, like as you identify what are the needs in our community and is there a way that a nonprofit can apply for grants and government funding in a way that a church might not be able to. So again, there's like lot, know, partnering with churches that have an existing, you know, using an existing facility and using it for rentals to build affordable housing.
• 10:52
  Loren Richmond Jr (21:14)
• 10:56
  Right, right. Yeah.
• 11:00
  Len Tang (21:42)
• 11:04
  That's kind of now a bigger need now that churches where they're building affordable housing and that rental income helps the church. So a lot of existing churches are going, are closing and those, the properties, know, that need to be thought about in very creative ways to steward that, you know, the resources of the property.
• 11:08
  Loren Richmond Jr (22:09)
• 11:12
  So I'm thinking about, I want to think, I'm thinking about as we name these realities of biovocationality or social entrepreneurship or what have you, do the expectations, whether, you know, the expectations from the church planter themselves, you know, around their own expectations, do the external expectations from a coach or network or what have you, do those need to change and to be more ⁓
• 11:16
  Like I've almost thought about like in some context, we, we not, do we need to think of a change the language rather than from a church planter to almost like a missionary. And I know that that language has some cultural baggage in some contexts and for, for good reason in some scenarios, but to think like that building a church as we think of like the traditional, like, I'm going to open up the doors and have 50, 100, 150 people.
• 11:20
  is very unrealistic in certain cultural contexts, whereas can they, I don't know, ⁓ toil, not toil the soil, but prepare the soil, if that makes sense, to talk more about expectations in these new changing landscapes we're in.
• 11:24
  Len Tang (23:19)
• 11:28
  Yeah, no, I think that that's a really important adjustment that needs to happen. ⁓ Like we were saying on the funding side, the typical pattern funding pattern before was you would get like a denomination might fund you for three to five years until you become self-sustaining. And now I think in in many contexts, we need to stretch that out much further and think, OK, maybe it's going to be less money, but it's going to be over seven years or even 10 years ⁓ because
• 11:32
  Loren Richmond Jr (23:28)
• 11:36
  Right.
• 11:40
  Right.
• 11:44
  Right, right.
• 11:48
  Len Tang (23:49)
• 11:52
  the economics don't, you know, just don't work, particularly in certain socioeconomic contexts. So I do think, you know, and in terms of size and so forth, we're still probably living in the shadow of the church growth movement, right? Which was popularized at Fuller and maybe sort of in many ways, those, principles were taken out of context. But for many planters, you know, particularly who are older, they,
• 11:56
  Loren Richmond Jr (24:06)
• 12:00
  Yeah.
• 12:04
  Len Tang (24:19)
• 12:08
  growth was the only metric and it led to some real distortions. There was a lot of heartache and unrealistic expectations for planters themselves and for funders and so forth. And as I was kind of alluding before, healthy living things, they're born, they grow. If they grow indefinitely, we call that cancer, right?
• 12:12
  Loren Richmond Jr (24:21)
• 12:16
  Right.
• 12:20
  cancer. Yeah. Yeah.
• 12:24
  Len Tang (24:46)
• 12:28
  Now I'm not saying growth is bad. There's you there
• 12:32
  Loren Richmond Jr (24:48)
• 12:36
  Right.
• 12:40
  Len Tang (24:48)
• 12:44
  can be healthy growth but healthy growth itself must be managed right. It cannot go without appropriate infrastructure and accountability. And we've seen some of the scandals that result from unhealthy growth. So I'm not against growth and I'm not against large churches. I think we actually need ecosystems of large and small churches to you know to to actually serve communities. They each have a role.
• 12:48
  But for me, I have shifted in terms of my own sense of metrics or success. I kind of think of it firstly as being, ⁓ is a church plant faithfully contextualized in the gospel to reach the people that God has given them a burden for? So is the expression of the gospel appropriate for the context? And again, history has shown us lots of ⁓ inappropriate and unhealthy expressions of the gospel.
• 12:52
  Loren Richmond Jr (25:39)
• 12:56
  Mm.
• 13:00
  Len Tang (25:46)
• 13:04
  that imposed a particular cultural kind of perspective. And so, you know, having the theological savvy and the cultural intelligence to appropriate the gospel for a neighborhood or a city or a people group, to me, that's like the first measure of, if you wanna use the term success or fruitfulness, like is this, you know, I love, know, like Eugene.
• 13:08
  Loren Richmond Jr (25:46)
• 13:12
  Mm-hmm.
• 13:16
  Len Tang (26:14)
• 13:20
  Pearson's translation of John one, you know, the word became flesh and moved into the neighborhood. Like, are we moving into the neighborhood in Jesus like incarnational ways? So to me, that's like a first expression. And then the second is, we making disciples, right? Are people actually like coming to faith and then growing into maturity who can then turn around and
• 13:24
  Loren Richmond Jr (26:19)
• 13:28
  Yeah.
• 13:32
  Yeah, that... yeah.
• 13:36
  Len Tang (26:42)
• 13:40
  make disciples themselves, right? Are we making disciple making disciples? And ⁓ that can happen at any size. I work with a planter here in LA named Jared who's just planted about a year and a half ago. The church itself numerically is quite small, but their disciple making impact is quite large. That they're training like the vast majority of their people to be able to lead
• 13:44
  Loren Richmond Jr (27:07)
• 13:48
  Mm-hmm.
• 13:52
  Len Tang (27:12)
• 13:56
  discovery Bible study and to disciple a handful of people. And those people are like, even when they've moved out of the area, they are going on to ⁓ gather their friends and their family members into a discovery Bible study to be introduced to Christ and to learn how to pass on their faith to the next generation. To me, that's a fruitful ⁓ church plant and they probably will grow numerically as a result of what they're doing. But the first fruits
• 14:00
  Loren Richmond Jr (27:35)
• 14:04
  Absolutely.
• 14:08
  Len Tang (27:42)
• 14:12
  so to speak, of that are that they're actually making disciples who can make disciples. And so that's, yeah.
• 14:16
  Loren Richmond Jr (27:49)
• 14:20
  I mean, if anything, yeah,
• 14:24
  I'm sorry to cut you off. I'm just going to say like, if anything, that's not, it's hard to do all that in, you know, three years and, you know, become sustainable. Just practically speaking. I do want to ask about thinking about the planter per se. Again, we've kind of talked about how the stereotypical young white male is no longer at least the standard, right? For what a church planter.
• 14:28
  Len Tang (28:00)
• 14:32
  Yeah.
• 14:36
  Loren Richmond Jr (28:19)
• 14:40
  should be.
• 14:44
  What are some characteristics you think that are essential in a church planter? Obviously, regardless of the demographic characteristics. But, you we think the scripture, God looks on the heart, not the outward appearance. I imagine you have to do a good bit of trying to look at someone's heart. What do you look or try to find in that potential planter?
• 14:48
  Len Tang (28:45)
• 14:52
  Yeah, one helpful biblical frame for that is ⁓ that Alan Hirsch has popularized as the emphasis on Ephesians four and the apest gifts, right? ⁓ Apostle, apostle, prophet, evangelist, shepherd, teacher. And in a broad sense, ⁓ church planters tend to be apes, A-P-E's, while established pastors tend to be S-T's, shepherd, teachers. ⁓
• 14:56
  Loren Richmond Jr (28:57)
• 15:00
  Yeah, yeah.
• 15:04
  Okay.
• 15:08
  Len Tang (29:12)
• 15:12
  Hirsch and others would say actually every leadership team should be represented by the five-fold gifts. That's a healthy team where each of those leadership functions is represented and active and healthy. ⁓ But typically planters are very strong in the A, the apostolic, right? Where they're breaking new ground for the gospel. So a typical question for a church planter is
• 15:16
  Loren Richmond Jr (29:37)
• 15:20
  Mm-hmm.
• 15:24
  Len Tang (29:42)
• 15:28
  ⁓ What ministries have you started inside and outside the church? Is there sort of a track record of breaking new ground and ⁓ both, again, new ministries in an established church and particularly like an outreach Bible study or you're sharing, you're coaching your kids' soccer team and you're sharing Christ with those parents. Like usually that manifests itself in those forms. I remember ⁓
• 15:32
  Loren Richmond Jr (29:46)
• 15:36
  Hmm.
• 15:40
  Yeah, yeah.
• 15:44
  Len Tang (30:11)
• 15:48
  When I was, you know, as a newer Christian, there were things that just kind of seemed natural to me of like starting a dorm Bible study, doing a summer mission project, you know, reaching out to our campus. And people would say to me, you know, after a while, they'd say, hey, have you ever thought about church planting? Which I didn't even know what that was, but it was like they could see that there was this missional impulse and the willingness to start new things. So that's usually kind of for, you know, what I and other
• 15:52
  Loren Richmond Jr (30:18)
• 15:56
  Mm-hmm.
• 16:00
  Right.
• 16:04
  Len Tang (30:40)
• 16:08
  others who do more formal assessment are looking, you beyond the foundational aspect of spiritual maturity, you know, of their relationship with Christ. But in terms of their gifts and their wiring, that apostolic piece is typically present. They've started new things.
• 16:12
  Loren Richmond Jr (30:48)
• 16:16
  Right, right.
• 16:20
  Let me ask about spiritual maturity. didn't put that as a question, but it brings to mind something that's been a common theme in conversations I've had and things I've read. Certainly that there's a not good history, at least recently, in Christian circles of platforming charisma over character. certainly
• 16:24
  Len Tang (31:18)
• 16:28
  Mm-hmm. Yeah.
• 16:32
  Loren Richmond Jr (31:21)
• 16:36
  I think we would both agree like you've got to have someone you've got to find someone who can like interact with people, you know, and you know, knows how to to to be around people and engage people. What are those some how do you how do you make sure you're discerning well to not platform charisma over character?
• 16:40
  Len Tang (31:45)
• 16:44
  Yeah, that's a great question. obviously from, know, we've seen these high profile falls, not just of pastors, but of planters more specifically, who, and again, Tim Mori in his book, he says we have this distorted sense where when someone is aggressive and ⁓ takes power, we reward them with more power, right? ⁓
• 16:48
  Loren Richmond Jr (31:53)
• 16:52
  Right.
• 16:56
  Yeah If only
• 17:00
  if only we needed if only we needed a relevant example of what that looks like right now, I I can't think of any
• 17:04
  Len Tang (32:16)
• 17:08
  Exactly, yes, I can't think of it, right?
• 17:12
  Yeah, and that is, you know, that reveals our lack of discipleship, you know, of being intimately acquainted with the way of our savior. So I do think, you know, when I've talked, you know, I have friends who work at Stadia, which is kind of one of the largest sort of.
• 17:16
  Loren Richmond Jr (32:28)
• 17:20
  Yeah.
• 17:24
  Yes.
• 17:28
  Len Tang (32:45)
• 17:32
  organizations that does church planter assessments. So quite a few denominations will outsource their assessment process to stadia. And ⁓ I think they are, you know, maybe are learning there, you know, they have learned their lesson to exactly as you said, platforming charisma over character. And so there's a greater attentiveness to what people around that person are saying, not just with how the planter presents, but you know, people around them are saying and ⁓
• 17:36
  Loren Richmond Jr (33:09)
• 17:40
  Yes, yes, yes.
• 17:44
  Len Tang (33:14)
• 17:48
  their ability to also build a team, a healthy team that again kind of functions in a collaborative and mutually accountable kind of way. So I think the, you know, the launch large model, you know, someone with a like very, very charismatic, great communication gifts, sort of that, that stereotype. Again, I think there's still a place for that and we, shouldn't disqualify people, you know, based on the bad experiences we've had, but
• 17:52
  Loren Richmond Jr (33:30)
• 17:56
  Mm-hmm.
• 18:00
  Len Tang (33:44)
• 18:04
  when someone does have that kind of persona, we need to do greater due diligence in terms of, are they teachable? ⁓ Do they demonstrate, are they responsive to constructive criticism? ⁓ How do people who have had conflict with them in the past experience them? So those obviously are some warning signs and litmus tests for the health of their heart.
• 18:08
  Loren Richmond Jr (34:00)
• 18:12
  Mm-hmm.
• 18:16
  Len Tang (34:14)
• 18:20
  and the humility of their posture.
• 18:24
  Loren Richmond Jr (34:19)
• 18:28
  Yeah. Yeah. Good points there. I want to, I want to talk a little bit about failure. Certainly you have hinted at it already that, you know, things never last forever. And maybe from my own experience in church planting, I used to joke with others like that. I felt like the most important quality of a church planter was someone who could like get out of bed on, on Monday morning.
• 18:32
  Len Tang (34:45)
• 18:36
  Yeah. Yeah.
• 18:40
  Loren Richmond Jr (34:47)
• 18:44
  How do you coach,
• 18:48
  you know, cause nothing, I mean, I'm of the opinion, maybe this is just my own bias from my own experience, like, failure is inevitable in some regard. How do you train church planters to be able to deal with not necessarily just failure, but the emotional highs and lows I think that come. like, you know, just again, speaking from my own experience, like you have a Sunday that just like, are all these people coming from? Right.
• 18:52
  Len Tang (35:16)
• 18:56
  Mm-hmm,
• 19:00
  mm-hmm.
• 19:04
  Loren Richmond Jr (35:17)
• 19:08
  And then you
• 19:12
  have a Sunday where like, w w you know, I put in so much. Yeah. The bottom falls out.
• 19:16
  Len Tang (35:21)
• 19:20
  bottom falls out.
• 19:24
  Yeah, yeah, the role we try to tell don't try not to get on the roller coaster, right? The intense one. So yeah, I think maybe there's there's I kind of hear two pieces in your question. One is how do we train ⁓ planters resilience? You know, how do we how do we form them? And that's actually like the training that we do at Fuller. You know, we said there's three pieces, there's theology, formation and mission. And so formation is like one of the three things that we like.
• 19:28
  Loren Richmond Jr (35:30)
• 19:32
  Yes.
• 19:36
  Right.
• 19:40
  Len Tang (35:53)
• 19:44
  really, really emphasize. And, ⁓ you know, in Tim Morey's denomination, they would begin their church planter training saying, what got you here won't get you there. Like, even like the spiritual practices, the relationship, relational style that brought you to the point of saying, okay, we think you'll be a good planter. It actually won't, most likely won't sustain you for the demands that are ahead of you. And so it's saying, okay,
• 19:48
  Loren Richmond Jr (36:05)
• 19:52
  ⁓
• 19:56
  Len Tang (36:22)
• 20:00
  You're not going to just need to function differently in your ministry, but you will actually have to deepen the the the faith, you your your your faith in Christ to new levels. You you're going to have to have it. need a stronger foundation for the tremors and the earthquakes that are going to come. And so, you know, we do focus around spiritual practices. They obviously come with some. But how do they deepen the ones?
• 20:04
  Loren Richmond Jr (36:35)
• 20:08
  Mm-hmm.
• 20:12
  Mm-hmm.
• 20:16
  Len Tang (36:51)
• 20:20
  So for instance, we talk about the ability to lament as a practice, to healthily grieve with God all the losses, the people you thought were with you and then bailed out, the person who, the leader who stabs you in the back, you like you name it, if you can't healthily bring that to God, it's gonna fester and poison you from the inside out.
• 20:24
  Loren Richmond Jr (36:56)
• 20:28
  Yeah. Yeah.
• 20:32
  Yep.
• 20:36
  Len Tang (37:19)
• 20:40
  being able to absorb those losses, to go to God with them, know, silence and solitude, also Tim Mori talks about, you know, just getting away with God. And then of course the ability to build ⁓ healthy support structures, to ⁓ be in community ⁓ outside of your church, like through a church planting network or denomination, to have potentially, and this is an affordability issue, having a coach.
• 20:44
  Loren Richmond Jr (37:41)
• 20:48
  Mm-hmm.
• 20:52
  Yeah. Yeah.
• 20:56
  Len Tang (37:48)
• 21:00
  and or a therapist safe
• 21:04
  places outside of your church you can process those losses and those joys. Sometimes success actually is equally destructive right. They both loss and success can distort the soul. So how do we process those and build what we call just your social base that network of relationships around you. And you know as when I coach planters I try to actually have a list kind of like okay
• 21:08
  Loren Richmond Jr (37:58)
• 21:12
  Yes, yes, yes.
• 21:16
  Yeah.
• 21:20
  Len Tang (38:18)
• 21:24
  who's on your leadership team, I wanna know their names, and who's in your social base, how strong is that foundation? So those are ways that we can kind of help surround and ensure that planters are staying healthy, you know, with Jesus and with their community. And then just, try, when a church plant does come to an end, I try not to use the language of failure ⁓ because that's ultimately, like that's ultimately God's call.
• 21:28
  Loren Richmond Jr (38:20)
• 21:32
  Okay.
• 21:36
  Hmm. Yeah.
• 21:40
  Yeah.
• 21:44
  Len Tang (38:47)
• 21:48
  The church closed, it's no longer going, but failure is a judgment that's beyond us. Maybe they were doing exactly what God wanted them to do for however long they did it. And in their own formation and in the formation of those people, you know, something happened that needed to happen. And we are not sovereign, so we don't have access to all that. So trying to reframe what happens when a church closes. Because otherwise it's kind of like,
• 21:52
  Loren Richmond Jr (38:47)
• 21:56
  Yes. Yes. Yes.
• 22:00
  Yeah.
• 22:04
  Len Tang (39:16)
• 22:08
  It's like the scarlet letter, like I am a fail, you as a minister, I am a failure. Like that's no, no. You know, like you took a risk. You went in the arena. You know, let's not penalize people for doing that, ⁓ but help them find their next call. ⁓ And even just the court leaders and the attenders for not for them to not think, I just wasted three years of my life. Like, no, you know, something happened. And that was part of your formation for the next chapter.
• 22:12
  Loren Richmond Jr (39:39)
• 22:16
  Yeah.
• 22:20
  Well, let me say it this way. Before I started a church or while I was in the early beginning of starting a church, I spoke at a church closure that had been around 150 something, something like that years. And I, and I shared the sermon. Nothing is ever wasted in God's economy. It was a lot harder to even utter those words to myself when it was my church that was closing, you know, so, uh,
• 22:24
  Those are very important words and I thank you for sharing them. Let me ask you one more question before we take a break for some, closing questions. I've sort of chuckled at myself thinking about this and I'm curious your perspectives. Like I think I see sometimes folks who've been burned out in a, in a long church or had a rough go of it in a, in a established church. Like the next move is to start a church.
• 22:28
  And like full disclosure, like that was kind of my move. I just wondered like, well, how healthy is that really?
• 22:32
  Len Tang (40:47)
• 22:36
  Uh-huh.
• 22:40
  ⁓ to go, you mean to feel frustrated in an established church and then to start something new. I mean, the phrase we use most often with church planters in uncovering their call is the idea of holy discontent. You may know that. And I think there's actually a necessary part of discontent, of frustration with what is, that there, as we say, there's like a burr in your saddle.
• 22:44
  Loren Richmond Jr (40:59)
• 22:48
  Yes.
• 22:52
  Hmm.
• 22:56
  Okay.
• 23:00
  Len Tang (41:23)
• 23:04
  a splinter in your mind, something that's like, this is not right. This is not actually what God intends. There is a more faithful way. And so really, I do think the discontent is what drives us out to start something new. But then we say it needs to be a holy discontent because if it's just frustration or like, you know, I'm just going to stick it to the man or we're going to do things differently, we're going to do it the right way. If that doesn't
• 23:08
  Loren Richmond Jr (41:23)
• 23:12
  Okay.
• 23:16
  Yeah.
• 23:20
  you
• 23:24
  Len Tang (41:52)
• 23:28
  become, if that's not humbled and holy and refined, then it's just discontent, you know, and God does not want to build a church on discontent, right? He's got to be, the Holy Spirit has to be refining us into a godly and biblical vision. But, so we hold those intention, like the discontent, God can use that, but it can't only be discontent.
• 23:32
  Loren Richmond Jr (42:04)
• 23:36
  Yes. Yeah.
• 23:40
  Yeah, this is such good stuff. ⁓ Gosh, anything else? I feel like I need to ask you like one other like anything else like the stereotypical you want to say about church playing that we have not covered, I guess. Before we take a break.
• 23:44
  Len Tang (42:34)
• 23:48
  Yeah. Yeah, church planting is not a silver bullet. It's not for everyone. ⁓ It's not gonna solve the problems of the American church, ⁓ but it is a healthy and normative expression of the Missio Dei, of the mission of God at work. so people kind of tend to be, church planting kind of tends to be polarizing.
• 23:52
  Right? You're really like all for it you're kind of against it. And both of those are probably unhealthy reactions or overreactions. We need to normalize church planting. We need to find and identify ⁓ people with apostolic gifts to encourage them to take a next step. I just had a conversation yesterday with ⁓ a Fuller staff person, ⁓ Latina woman who, she was just telling me her testimony and her story. And I was like, have you ever thought about church planting?
• 23:56
  Loren Richmond Jr (43:00)
• 24:00
  Yeah. Yeah.
• 24:04
  Len Tang (43:30)
• 24:08
  You know, just because she was, I started this, I started this, and these women are responding to this. And she was like, well, actually, yeah, me and my husband have thought about that. And so just, you know, wherever we are, there's an opportunity to help someone take the next missional step. They may not end up as planters. Maybe they start a Bible study at the local YMCA, whatever that is. But the church desperately needs people to use their gifts in the church in the world to not be afraid of risk.
• 24:12
  Loren Richmond Jr (43:30)
• 24:16
  Hmm.
• 24:20
  Len Tang (44:00)
• 24:24
  and the vulnerability of it. And so I want to encourage people to not only think about formal church planting, but to think about the whole variety of missional expressions that God may be calling us to, and to release people to that. Some of those people will plant, and that's great, but all of God's people need to be involved in all of God's mission.
• 24:28
  Loren Richmond Jr (44:23)
• 24:32
  Well, this is fabulous. I really appreciate the conversation. Let's take a quick break and we'll come back with some closing questions.
• 24:36
  Okay, we're back with Reverend Len Tang. Really, really have appreciated this conversation. So, closing questions we always take, tell folks you can take these as seriously or not as you'd like to. ⁓ We do always ask if you're Pope for a day. So, can you relate that somehow to church planting? Like if you had a, you know, sort of universal authority over Christendom, what would you do that day?
• 24:40
  Len Tang (44:58)
• 24:44
  I...
• 24:48
  I guess going back to my sense of call to ⁓ help plant multi-ethnic churches, which is, we consider to ⁓ include immigrant church planting, ethnic-specific church planting, and multiracial church planting. I would want to awaken the capital C church to the opportunities and possibilities and to say, let's reallocate our resources.
• 24:52
  to enable all these different kinds of church plants to flourish. And in their flourishing, you'll find your own flourishing. That the interactions that we find with diverse peoples that we is so desperately needed for our own formation. And so that would be the gift that I would want to give by kind of ⁓ re-energizing and re-imagining, you know, multi-ethnic church planting.
• 24:56
  Loren Richmond Jr (45:37)
• 25:00
  Yes.
• 25:04
  Yeah, awesome. Thanks for sharing that. A theologian or historical Christian figure that you'd want to meet or bring back to life.
• 25:08
  Len Tang (46:07)
• 25:12
  Well, I just earlier this year, I read Dietrich Bonhoeffer's biography. And so I just was ⁓ particularly in this political moment found him so prophetic and prescient. So ⁓ he might not be like the main person, but just in at this moment in time, I guess he's the person I'd want to learn from and talk to.
• 25:16
  Loren Richmond Jr (46:11)
• 25:20
  Mm-hmm.
• 25:24
  Yeah, absolutely. What do you think history will remember from our current time and place?
• 25:28
  Len Tang (46:38)
• 25:32
  ⁓
• 25:36
  I guess it's, you know, they say that every 500 years there's been these massive changes in society and culture. And so people are wondering, are we at one of those apoccal shifts, you know, that are about to happen where, you know, a lot of what we're doing, we're kind of deconstructing evangelicalism and will it survive and what's the new thing that God is doing that will take its, not take its place, but.
• 25:40
  Loren Richmond Jr (46:56)
• 25:44
  Yeah. Yeah.
• 25:48
  Len Tang (47:11)
• 25:52
  but ⁓ come out of the Reformation, the present day Reformation of the church. So I don't, I guess I don't, I don't know what, I don't know what history will remember, but I feel like even this current political theological moment is a sign that all is not well and that something new will need to take its place.
• 25:56
  Loren Richmond Jr (47:17)
• 26:00
  Right, right.
• 26:04
  Yeah, that's wise. It's a very wise way of saying it. What do you hope for the future of Christianity for church planting in America, in the world? Feel free to take that as you want it.
• 26:08
  Len Tang (47:51)
• 26:12
  Yeah. Well, I, you know, at the beginning, I told my conversion story that it happened from reading the gospels and being captivated with the person of Jesus. And even just doing, you know, I'm doing a discovery Bible study with some Caltech students right now in the gospels. And I, I still am captivated with the person of Jesus. And to, to see
• 26:16
  Loren Richmond Jr (48:16)
• 26:20
  Hmm.
• 26:24
  Len Tang (48:19)
• 26:28
  these young adults be captivated with the person of Jesus, you know, like that just never gets old. And so my hope for the church is that we would be captivated with the humility, the gentleness, the power under submission that Jesus demonstrates, that the most powerful person in the world did not exploit that, but yielded it and gave himself
• 26:32
  Loren Richmond Jr (48:47)
• 26:36
  Yes.
• 26:40
  Len Tang (48:48)
• 26:44
  even to death on a cross, know, Philippians too. And I think that vision is we need to be recaptivated by that in a day where Christians seem to be so captivated by power and by political power. And I really believe we need to repent of that. ⁓ I wrote a brief theological statement inspired by Bonhoeffer at ⁓ faithfulresistance.com.
• 26:48
  Loren Richmond Jr (48:51)
• 26:52
  Thanks be to God.
• 26:56
  Hmm.
• 27:00
  Len Tang (49:18)
• 27:04
  just little one page thing to try to say something about ⁓ walking more in the way of Jesus and less in the way of power. So that would be my hope.
• 27:08
  Loren Richmond Jr (49:18)
• 27:12
  Hmm.
• 27:16
  Well, thanks for sharing all that. I'm trying to scratch down here, faithfulresistance.com. want to, I want to share that in the show notes, if anything. And, ⁓ as I like to say, like that will preach that will preach what you just shared. So thank you for sharing that. Where can people find out about you connect with, ⁓ connect with the show, ⁓ or not the show connect with Fuller, get an assessment, all that stuff.
• 27:20
  Len Tang (50:00)
• 27:24
  Yeah, yeah. My personal social media, which I'm not great at, to be honest, is at Len.Tang on Instagram and Facebook. And then Fuller, the website for the Fuller Church Planting Initiative is, it's churchplanting.fuller.edu, kind of all one, churchplanting.fuller.edu.
• 27:28
  Loren Richmond Jr (50:24)
• 27:32
  Well, this has been a great conversation. really appreciate your perspectives and all that you have shared here. We always leave folks with a word of peace. So may God's peace be with you.
• 27:36
  Len Tang (50:35)
• 27:40
  Amen. Thanks for having me, Loren Appreciate it.
• 27:44
  Loren Richmond Jr (50:37)
• 27:48
  Yeah,