The Stuff Legends are Made of

Church planters are notorious for thinking that a great dream + hard work + insight = a thriving church. But church planters fail all the time with this formula.

What's missing is spiritual fertility. Every area has an established degree of receptivity to the Gospel, which can make or break a chruch plant before it ever gets off the ground. I'm not saying we shouldn't plant churches in difficult areas. I'm saying that in these cases, we should change our primary activity from planting an organization to cultivating relationships.

If you've read The Purpose Driven Church, you know that Rick Warren prayed for a church to pastor for the rest of his life. You know that he scoured maps in his basement, looking for the fastest-growing areas across the country and discovered Orange County. And you know that he sent a letter to a California missions director at the same time that director sent a letter to him.

Now that's the stuff legends are made of. And it's enough to send tens of thousands of church planters charging head-long over the cliff. What we fail to consider is that before Rick planted Saddleback Commmunity Church, he attended and then taught at California Baptist University in Riverside, California for years. But get this - he preached over 100 revivals throughout the Riverside area, which is just a 30-minute drive from where the Saddleback campus currently sits.

Now do you think... that just maybe... he might have helped cultivate this area for a church plant? I'm thinking it might have been the true first base.

I write this because I have a huge heart for the struggling church planter. I think they need to know about spiritual fertility and how it impacts whether a church plant will work.

Just finished a book on this subject, which will hopefully be out by spring. More to come...

Comments

[Bill Streger]

Looking forward to the book, Ben. I appreciate so much your heart for struggling church planters. It's difficult when you pour your life out for a vision only to see that it is coming to pass MUCH slower than you imagined.

It's disheartening when all we hear are stories for success and rapid, explosive growth. It's even more discouraging when you hear other pastors assert that if you're not growing it's probably due to one of two things:

1. You weren't really called in the first place.
2. You're not working hard enough - stop being lazy

Thanks for being a voice of encouragement to the other 98% of us.

[Steve]

Ben,
I started a Bible study 10 yrs ago that became a church plant somewhere down the line. We are here in OK, a very gospel saturated part of the U.S. There are 177 churches in our small county, but yet we have not really seen a dynamic, innovative, cutting edge church develop in a town of about 30,000 people. I have read your posts about the spiritual fertility of an area being important. My wife and I talked about this. Can an area be Gospel saturated and not fertile? Any insight?

[Paul Stewart]

Ben,

So this is what your mysterious book is about! Can't wait.

I love the spiritual fertility concept. If you are looking for anyone to preview the book and blog about it, let me know. I would be honored.

Paul

[Dennis Wells]

Really enjoyed the concept of spiritual fertility...wish I had known that principle before we planted our last church.

[kc]

YEP! Right on. We've seen so many guys come and go in our area (Boulder, Colorado) exactly because on this reason.

[Ben]

Steve, how is your church doing?

I've seen spiritual heritage play a huge role in cultivating communities. If you're having difficulty, I'd have to ask a whole lot more questions to figure out what's going on.