Church Planting Is for Wimps (Redesign) E-Book

Mike McKinley

• Herausgeber: Crossway
• Kategorie: Religion und Spiritualität
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 173

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2017

Beschreibung

This book tells the story of the revitalization of Guilford Baptist Church in northern Virginia. Weaving together scripture and biblical principles with humor and personal anecdotes, author Michael McKinley asserts that a pastor's faithful exposition of God's Word, passion for sharing the gospel, and care in the training of other godly leaders are more important than the size of his church. McKinley honestly shares his own fears and rookie mistakes, along with encouraging stories of how God moved at Guilford Baptist. We are reminded that God uses weak and fearful pastors in plants and revitalizations; church planting is indeed for "wimps." For pastors and seminarians considering a church plant and those already struggling in their own fledgling congregations, this book is a thoughtful and encouraging resource.

Leseprobe

Thank you for downloading this Crossway book.

Sign up for the Crossway Newsletter for updates on special offers, new resources, and exciting global ministry initiatives:

Crossway Newsletter

Or, if you prefer, we would love to connect with you online:

Church Planting Is for Wimps

Other 9Marks Books

Church in Hard Places: How the Local Church Brings Life to the Poor and Needy, Mez McConnell and Mike McKinley (2016)

The Compelling Community: Where God’s Power Makes a Church Attractive, Mark Dever and Jamie Dunlop (2015)

The Pastor and Counseling: The Basics of Shepherding Members in Need, Jeremy Pierre and Deepak Reju (2015)

Why Trust the Bible?, Greg Gilbert (2015)

Who Is Jesus?, Greg Gilbert (2015)

Nine Marks of a Healthy Church, 3rd edition, Mark Dever (2013)

Finding Faithful Elders and Deacons, Thabiti M. Anyabwile (2012)

Am I Really a Christian?, Mike McKinley (2011)

What Is the Gospel?, Greg Gilbert (2010)

Biblical Theology in the Life of the Church: A Guide for Ministry, Michael Lawrence (2010)

It Is Well: Expositions on Substitutionary Atonement, Mark Dever and Michael Lawrence (2010)

What Does God Want of Us Anyway? A Quick Overview of the Whole Bible, Mark Dever (2010)

The Church and the Surprising Offense of God’s Love: Reintroducing the Doctrines of Church Membership and Discipline, Jonathan Leeman (2010)

What Is a Healthy Church Member?, Thabiti M. Anyabwile (2008)

12 Challenges Churches Face, Mark Dever (2008)

The Gospel and Personal Evangelism, Mark Dever (2007)

What Is a Healthy Church?, Mark Dever (2007)

Building Healthy Churches Edited by Mark Dever and Jonathan Leeman

Discipling: How to Help Others Follow Jesus, Mark Dever (2016)

Church Elders: How to Shepherd God’s People Like Jesus, Jeramie Rinne (2014)

Evangelism: How the Whole Church Speaks of Jesus, J. Mack Stiles (2014)

Expositional Preaching: How We Speak God’s Word Today, David R. Helm (2014)

The Gospel: How the Church Portrays the Beauty of Christ, Ray Ortlund (2014)

Sound Doctrine: How a Church Grows in the Love and Holiness of God, Bobby Jamieson (2013)

Church Discipline: How the Church Protects the Name of Jesus, Jonathan Leeman (2012)

Church Membership: How the World Knows Who Represents Jesus, Jonathan Leeman (2012)

Church Planting Is for Wimps

How God Uses Messed-Up People to Plant Ordinary Churches That Do Extraordinary Things

Mike McKinley

Church Planting Is for Wimps

Copyright © 2010 by Michael McKinley

Published by Crossway1300 Crescent StreetWheaton, Illinois 60187

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher, except as provided for by USA copyright law. Crossway® is a registered trademark in the United States of America.

Cover design: Faceout Studio, www.faceoutstudio.com

First printing, 2010

Reprinted with new cover, 2016

Printed in the United States of America

Scripture quotations are from the ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

All emphases in scripture quotations have been added by the author.

ISBN-13: 978-1-4335-5704-0ISBN-10: 1-4335-1497-4ePub ISBN: 978-1-4335-2464-6PDF ISBN: 978-1-4335-1498-2Mobipocket ISBN: 978-1-4335-1499-9

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

McKinley, Mike, 1975–

 Church planting is for wimps : how God uses messed-up people to plant ordinary churches that do extraordinary things / Mike McKinley

  p. cm. (A 9Marks book)

Includes bibliographical references and index.

 ISBN 13: 978-1-4335-1497-5 (tpb)

 ISBN 10: 1-4335-1497-4 (tpb)

 ISBN 10: (invalid) 1-4335-2464-6 (ebk)

 1. Church development, New. I. Title.

BV652.24.M37   2010

254'.1092—dc22  2009031789

Crossway is a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.

2022-03-03 11:45:32 AM

For Karen,

God’s gift to me on this journey

Contents

Acknowledgments

Introduction: Justify Your Existence

1 Church Planting—Slightly Preferable to Unemployment

2 So, How Exactly Does One Plant a Church?

3 One Thing Is Necessary

4 Cleaning Out the Sheaves

5 God Always Gets His Way

6 How to Ruin Everything

7 No Offense, but You’re Doing Everything Wrong

8 Redefine Extraordinary

Appendix 1: Church Planting Memo Prepared by Mark Dever for the Elders at CHBC

Appendix 2: Men’s Discipleship Training Syllabus: Grace Community Church (Ashburn, Virginia)

Acknowledgments

I owe a lot of people a lot of thanks. Please allow me a moment to express my gratitude at the outset.

A great deal of thanks is owed to my friends at 9Marks. Jonathan Leeman has been both an excellent friend and an excellent editor. Matt Schmucker and Mark Dever have taught me the gospel in word and deed for fifteen years. I am very grateful to God for you all.

Many thanks are due to the brothers and sisters at Guilford Baptist Church, who are a source of true joy and encouragement to me. Special thanks are due to my friends Gail Smith, Tim Fanus, Paul and Lisa Emslie, and Aaron Pridmore for their partnership in the gospel work at Guilford. I also must draw attention to some of the long-time members of the church, particularly Nancy Higgs, Doris Jenkins, Lem Jordan, Sharon Brown, and Lee Thompson, who trusted God enough to hand their church over to a twenty-nine-year-old who didn’t know what he was doing. Being your pastor is one of the greatest honors in my life.

Finally, I am grateful for the wonderful family with which God has blessed me. My in-laws, Virgil and Susie Andrews, have been far kinder to me than I plan to be to the man who steals away my only daughter. My brother and sister-in-law have been generous with their prayer and encouragement. I also owe great thanks to my parents, whose love and support I’ve never doubted.

Without my children, Kendall, Knox, Phineas, and Ebenezer, life would have far fewer adventures, smiles, and joys. Thanks for giving up “family fun day” for a season so that I could write this book.

And to Karen, whose love and service I do not deserve . . . words fail me. Thank you for everything.

Introduction

Justify Your Existence

The history of my life will say to the world what it says to me—There is a loving God, who directs all things for the best.

Hans Christian Andersen

One online e-zine has a regular feature called “Justify Your Existence.” The gist of the feature is this: they take a band that you probably haven’t heard, and they put to them the supreme challenge. They ask the band to convince the readers that it’s worthwhile to grant them a hearing.

Well, I am aware at the outset that I bear the same burden. You haven’t heard of me. There’s no obvious reason you’d want to read anything I have to say. I don’t pastor a large church. Despite what my mom thinks, I am probably not destined to be a famous preacher or conference speaker. I don’t have a particularly brilliant methodological insight that will transform your life or ministry. But maybe that’s all okay. I am not writing this book to help you build a giant church or to advocate a technique that guarantees wild success.

What’s in This for You

Instead I want to share with you my story of planting a church (well, kind of planting a church . . . we’ll get to that later). It’s not a particularly original way to present this material, but I think it is appropriate, because Christians are people in the middle of God’s story. The small victories and slow progress of the gospel in our lives and churches are actually spectacular evidence of God’s grace and exactly the things that make up part of his wonderful story of redemption.

So I hope that my story overlaps with your story in a way that’s encouraging and helps your ministry. I have learned that God uses messed-up people like me and you to plant churches that look utterly unremarkable to the world. The marvelous thing is that, in his kindness, God does amazing things through those churches. My hope is that my testimony to God’s everyday amazing grace will

inspire some people to become church planters,encourage others who are in the middle of the church planting journey,spur pastors of existing congregations to invest heavily in church planting,and give all church members a better sense of how they might love and pray for church planting teams, especially if God sends them on one.

It would be my joy if, by the time you are done reading this book, you’re thinking, If God can use this moron, surely he can use me as well!

To that end, I’ll make a deal with you: I’ll be transparent about my failures and struggles, which are legion, if you promise to be amazed by God’s kindness. Do we have a deal?

The Quick Bio

First, what do you need to know about me? I was raised outside of Philadelphia, so I have anger issues. You would too if you were an Eagles fan. My parents were brought to Christ through a painful family experience when I was about nine or ten years old, and they began dragging my brother and me to a large evangelical church in our town. One Sunday God showed mercy to me by giving me ears to hear the gospel, and I turned from my sin and trusted in Christ.

Even though I was serious about my faith growing up, I had what people today kindly refer to as “issues.” My grades were good, and I didn’t get into trouble with girls or drugs, but my soul was a mess. I was proud and judgmental, pretty much convinced that everything and everyone else was idiotic. I was a jerk, and I didn’t know it. Had someone told me, I wouldn’t have listened. Let’s face it, as long as teenagers in the church are not getting into trouble with girls or drugs, no one is going to bother them. So I was left to grow more proud and more angry at other people.

As I grew older, church fit me less and less. Instead I found an outlet for my anger in punk rock music. Punk rock music sees the stupidity of the world pretty clearly without trying to give meaningful answers, and it gave me a vocabulary for my dissatisfaction. I appreciated its honesty, so I adopted its look and attitude. Besides, I looked good with tattoos. And still do.

Suddenly I didn’t feel like I fit in with most Christians. I didn’t want to be a Republican. I didn’t want to spend my whole life pursuing a big house and a car. And I didn’t want to wear khakis. Though I loved Jesus, I decided that I didn’t need to be like everyone else in order to follow him.

My college years took me to Washington, DC. I thought I went there for an education, but God had two transforming experiences in store, neither of which had anything to do with my classes. First, I met my wife-to-be, Karen. Like me, she loved Jesus and punk rock, and still does. I knew right away that I would marry her, and as this story unfolds, you’ll discover why she’s the real hero of our saga.

The other transformative encounter was becoming a member at Capitol Hill Baptist Church (CHBC), pastored by Mark Dever. Even though a vast majority of the church were over seventy years old, they warmly welcomed the green-haired guy in the kilt and combat boots. CHBC quickly became my spiritual home. My soul flourished under Mark’s preaching, pastoral care, and friendship. And God used Mark’s work of revitalizing the church to spark my own love for the church.

After college, Karen and I were married and moved back to Philly so she could continue her education and before I would attend seminary full-time. To support us, I worked as a full-time cubicle jockey selling insurance for cell phones. And we started cranking out kids, which also brought its full-time demands. (To jump ahead in the story line, we now have four children—Kendall, Knox, Phineas, and Ebenezer. Just thinking about them makes me smile.)

When seminary wrapped up, the congregation at Capitol Hill Baptist asked me to come back to Washington to join the church staff as a planter. So we had another baby, Karen shaved her head as a graduation gift for me, and we moved back to DC. We spent a little over a year on staff at Capitol Hill Baptist and then planted a church called Guilford Baptist Church with seven other people thirty miles away in Sterling, Virginia. Actually, it would be more accurate to say that the seven of us went to reform a church called Guilford Fellowship that already had twelve members, but I’ll explain all this as we go.

That, gentle reader, is how this all began.

1

Church Planting—Slightly Preferable to Unemployment

Slums may well be breeding grounds of crime, but middle-class suburbs are incubators of apathy and delirium.

Cyril Connolly

By the spring of 2003 I was tired. Really tired. I was working forty hours a week as a manager for an insurance company. This involved talking to unhappy customers who cared a little too much about replacing their cell phones as well as supervising entry-level employees who were either impregnating or hitting one another. I was also taking a full load of classes at Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia, driving back and forth from work to school a couple of times each day.

Every morning I was in the office by 6:30. Every evening, at the close of the workday, my wife Karen would meet me in the parking lot of my office building to hand over the baby. She then went to work as a nurse at the local hospital’s emergency room, while I headed home to study. Add in renovations and repairs on a hundred-year-old house, and not much time was left for sleep.

Want to Be a Guinea Pig?

So when my former pastor from Capitol Hill Baptist, Mark Dever, called one morning and asked me to meet him that day on the seminary campus, I felt reluctant. I was happy to meet with Mark, but doing so meant staying late at work. It also meant skipping my fifteen-minute afternoon nap, which was often the only thing lying between me and the abyss. But Mark has boundary issues and a way of getting what he wants, so later that day I chugged a jumbo-sized cup of gas station coffee and slumped down on a bench outside the seminary library, waiting for him to arrive.

When he did, we started with a few moments of chitchat, but he turned to business pretty quickly. Capitol Hill Baptist was growing out of its meeting space, he said, and the cost of making significant renovations to their old building was exorbitant. The elders of the church had decided to implement a strategy to plant churches in the surrounding suburbs. Mark was here to float a trial balloon: would I be interested in returning to DC after seminary to be CHBC’s guinea pig church planter?

I would eventually say yes, of course. Mark is a made man in the Reformed Mafia. He has a giant Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals logo tattooed on his back. He has J. I. Packer’s home phone number in his contact list under “Jim P.” You don’t say no to a guy like this.

But even if it wasn’t Mark who was asking, the last seven years in the cell phone insurance biz left me willing to take a job as an assistant manager at Wendy’s, the fast-food hamburger chain. In fact, I had tried, and they turned me down, but that’s a tale for a different book. Since many of my seminary friends had spent three years and thousands of dollars on classes but were struggling to find a full-time ministry opportunity, I wasn’t about to forfeit an opportunity like this. So I told him that I would talk to Karen, who I didn’t think would be excited about moving, and get back to him.

Planting for Hipsters

I had already received a few other offers to plant churches, but I had turned them down. I had never thought of myself as a church planter. Seminarians often talk about church planting as if it requires an indelible mark on the soul. “Are you a church planter?” they ask in hushed tones. The truly gifted men can recall thoughts of planting from their time in their mother’s womb. I, on the other hand, had checked my soul twice but never found any indelible marks, at least not of that kind.

Still, several organizations had approached me about planting churches in the trendy part of the city where all of the wealthy young professionals live and drink. The idea, I think, was that I would be the tattooed pastor in the punk rock band T-shirt with a church full of twenty-somethings, all of whom wore plastic black eyeglasses. We would meet in a warehouse on Tuesday nights, followed by a trip to the local brew-house. Good theology. Loud music. Maybe a trendy church name taken from a Greek or Latin word that will sound cool for five or six years.

Can you see the picture? Let’s face it—it would have been a lot of fun. I could have met cool people and done some good ministry.

But it seemed like a really bad way to build a church.

Don’t get me wrong—I can see how such a scenario presents an effective way to draw a crowd. People favor people who favor them. They favor goods and services tailored to their tastes and how they want to perceive themselves. Niche marketing works. So plant a church that gives off an intelligent, slightly rebellious, funny, hipster vibe, and you will attract pre-wealthy twenty-somethings, since that’s how they want to feel about themselves. If you do it artfully, you may attract lots of them. Hopefully you’ll be able to help those twenty-somethings you’ve attracted: lead them to Christ, teach them a lot about Jesus, equip people to care for the city. I’m not knocking it. That would be great! But . . .

I don’t think you would have a very healthy church. The Bible seems to assume that a church will express diversity in age. As just one example, think of Paul’s instructions to his protégé Titus:

But as for you, teach what accords with sound doctrine. Older men are to be sober-minded, dignified, self-controlled, sound in faith, in love, and in steadfastness. Older women likewise are to be reverent in behavior, not slanderers or slaves to much wine. They are to teach what is good, and so train the young women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled, pure, working at home, kind and submissive to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be reviled. Likewise, urge the younger men to be self-controlled. (Titus 2:1–6)

Here Paul has instructions for the old men (be temperate and worthy of respect) and the young men (be self-controlled). He even has things for the old women to teach the young women about how to be godly wives and mothers! It’s hard to see how that happens if everyone in the church is the same age, right? Are the twenty-seven-year-olds supposed to teach the twenty-two-year olds how to be godly at that stage of their life? I don’t know about you, but I was pretty pathetic when I was twenty-seven (full disclosure: I’m still pretty pathetic).

In fact, if you look at what the Bible says on this subject, you’ll see that one of the glories of the gospel is that it reconciles people that could never be reconciled without it. In Ephesians 2, Paul describes the glorious display of God’s wisdom in the church as different kinds of people come together (specifically, Jews and Gentiles). In John 13:35, Jesus tells us that the world will know we are his disciples because of our love for each other. But if we only hang out with people who are the same age, who like the same kind of music, and who share our taste and politics and preferences, how are we any different from the world? Doesn’t every non-Christian you’ve ever known hang out with people who are just like him or her (Matt. 5:47)?

Love in the church should be at least partly inexplicable to the world. The elderly ladies at Capitol Hill Baptist who, in 1995, invited the guy with the stupid hair and safety pins in his face to their homes for lunch after church—they