This past year, with all the discussion about church planting going on, I have heard a question raised that I think is a very good and extremely important one.

The question is, “Why should we spend the time, invest the money, and make the effort to plant another church in this valley when we already have four churches now?” As I have listened to the concerns behind this question, they seem to fall into three areas:

1) “The four CRC congregations in this valley all have lots of room- shouldn’t we be filling the buildings we have before we go and start a new church?”

2) “At best, our CRC congregations are holding their own or actually getting smaller, so another church is just going to take away from them. Is it really wise to take another slice out of an already shrinking pie?"

3) “It’s not just that our CRC congregations are holding their own or getting smaller, it seems like we are struggling. Wouldn’t we be better off putting all that money and energy into church renewal instead of church planting?”

I hope I am being fair and honest in stating the concerns accurately, and I hope we all share in these concerns because I think each of them is excellent. It is good that such concerns are being raised. As churches that seek to be obedient to Christ, faithful to the Word of God, and true to the Great Commission, first of all let us consider a few facts to get the whole picture.

The Barna Group in their research studies “reveals that one out of every three adults is classified as unchurched” (they have not attended a religious service of any type during the past six months). That means an estimated 75 million adults in our country are presently unchurched. When teens and children are added, the number is roughly 100 million. Since 1991 the adult population in the United States has grown 15 percent. During  that same period, the number of adults who do not attend church has nearly doubled, rising from 39 million to 75 million – a 92 percent increase (see www.barna.org). Roughly half of all churches in America did not add one new person through conversion growth last year (Clegg and Bird, Lost in America, page 27). In America, it takes the combined effort of 85 Christians working an entire year to make one new disciple (ibid, p. 29). And, perhaps saddest of all, the facts regarding our own young people should be alarming. The Baylor Religion Survey (page 9) found “Persons aged 18-30 are three times more likely to have no religious affiliation (18.6 percent) than are persons aged 65 or older (5.4 percent)”. From what we can tell, our children are jumping ship faster now than at any other time in American history. As our society becomes more secularized and as the church becomes more marginalized in North America, can we at least acknowledge that something must change to reverse these trends? That we need to start doing some things we haven’t been doing, and we must stop doing some things that we have been doing? Can we all agree that if we continue to do the same things the way we’ve always done them we should reasonably expect to get the same results? All of this brings us back to our question and concerns. Despite the fact that statistics show and, simple observation confirms (have you seen or heard how Journey is doing lately?), that new churches are far more effective at reaching new people groups, new residents, new generations, and the unchurched than established churches.Why plant another church if we need to reverse these trends and revitalize the four CRC congregations? Well, let me suggest four reasons for why planting another church is the answer to our question and concerns.

1) New churches bring new ideas, insights, and understanding into the whole body of Christ. New churches have been historically, and are even more so today, the R & D (research and development) arm of the church. Change is often very hard in older churches; “We’ve never done it that way before” and “We’ve always done it this way”, can be formidable arguments in most established congregations. But in a new church (ready to reach new people for Christ to survive) they are usually much more open to new ideas that, honestly, may or may not work. So, if you are an established church, all you have to do is R & D (rob and duplicate) the ideas that work. And if a new idea is reaching new residents, new generations, new people groups, and the unchurched in a new church, that certainly helps to overcome the “that will never work” argument.

2) New churches raise up strong, creative, effective leaders for the whole body. New churches tend to attract people who don’t like the status quo and who are risk takers, creative, have strong future orientation, and desire to be in step with what God is doing no matter how outside the box it may seem to others (something God has had a tendency to do throughout history). Plus, new churches that are being effective at reaching out beyond Christian circles tend to be places that exhibit “messy spirituality”. The leaders that are developed and raised up in that kind of environment can often be a blessing for the whole church. And, as wise, experienced, stable leaders from older established churches interact with them, the relationship is frequently beneficial for both.

3) New churches can cause older established churches to evaluate and define themselves. It is not uncommon for older established churches to get a true sense of themselves as a community of believers in the process of being involved in starting a new church. Sometimes it is simply by way of contrast to the new work. Sometimes it is because the new church has such a clear and dynamic vision and mission that people in the older church start asking, “What is our vision and mission?”. Sometimes it is because the new church does something that the Lord really blesses and folks in the older church say, “Well, why can’t we do that?”. However it works, it can often be extremely revitalizing for an older church in ways that just don’t seem to happen any other way.

4) New churches are feeder churches for older churches. The reality is that new churches are not for everybody, be they mature or brand new believers. The stability and well-developed programs of older established churches will always look more attractive to some people than the messiness and intensely missional character of new churches. Therefore, inevitably, for a variety of reasons, new churches usually reach some people that will end up in older established churches. New churches and older churches need each other. For either one to be in a situation without the other is not very healthy.

As I said earlier, I believe this question and these concerns that are being raised are excellent. However, I think honest answers to them and a proper understanding of our times are not arguments against planting another church but are actually the best reasons for why we should. As the pastor of an older established church and as someone who has been in church planting, I can say I am truly concerned and have a heart for both. I truly believe that if we sincerely want to see the four CRC congregations revitalized and renewed, the best way is not to get them more focused on themselves but to get them more involved in the mission Christ gave to the Church. The issue here is not whether one way is right or wrong; ‘are new churches more faithful than older churches’, or ‘are new churches watering down the Gospel compared to older churches’ or even if ‘one way is better than another’.

New churches are just different than older established churches. The four established CRC congregations are meeting the needs of hundreds of people in our valley. Praise the Lord! The issue is, are we willing to reach out and seek to make disciples from the thousands of people in our valley who are not following Christ. The question is not ‘should we revitalize older established churches’ versus ‘should we plant a new church’ because we should so both. The question is, ‘can we faithfully do one without faithfully doing the other?’.