Missionaries and Church Planting

November 17, 2008 – 4:31 pm

Excellent article concerning church planting on the mission field from Steve Davis:

“Why Some Missionaries Don’t Plant Churches”

Andrew Walls states that “one of the few things that are predictable about third-millennium Christianity is that it will be more culturally diverse than Christianity has ever been before” (Walls, p. 68). If Walls’ assessment is correct, then greater attention must be given to preparing cross-cultural workers for the complex challenges they face in effectively crossing cultural boundaries with the gospel. The divine dimension of missionary preparation can never be objectively studied and measured. The human dimensions can and must be examined in order to ensure that churches do not enter into the Great Commission task haphazardly.

I hold in high esteem those who have left hearth and home to brave the obstacles encountered in cross-cultural ministry. Far from me to discourage God’s servants from taking the gospel to the ends of the earth. We need more missionaries, not fewer! Yet over the years as I have traveled, taught, and lived overseas, I have reflected on the dearth of church planting that takes place in many regions of the world where missionaries have labored for years. Of course, there are exceptions where churches have multiplied. In some places there is a greater openness both to the gospel and to the Americans who bring it. In some regions missionaries cannot engage directly in church planting due to government restrictions. Yet in many countries where freedom to evangelize and disciple new believers is available, missionaries often have little fruit to show for their labor.

As already mentioned, a divine component to this discussion must not be ignored. Ultimately God as the Author of salvation must do a regenerative work through the Holy Spirit. Faithful preaching of the Word does not guarantee fruit. Thus we applaud faithful missionaries who have persevered in the face of meager results. However, I feel that we often neglect the human component and ignore biblical models in choosing and sending missionaries. We too easily accept at face value someone’s subjective call to cross-cultural church planting without giving due weight to the objective giftedness and effectiveness of the individual.

To put it bluntly, churches and mission agencies send out many missionaries who are not equipped or qualified to plant churches. They may be good, godly men, but they are not gifted for the work of planting churches. They have not been discipled in a church planting atmosphere, and they come from churches that have never planted another church. They have never proven themselves in effective ministry before leaving for a foreign field. They have insufficient training and experience in organizing a church in their own culture, much less a foreign culture with added complexity and complications. They have little idea of the challenges of learning a language and adjusting to life in conditions they never imagined. They are with mission agencies that control rather than coach in order to reproduce clones of North American churches.

I have lost count of the missionaries who have said to me, “Why didn’t anyone tell me what it would be like?” or “I wish I had received more theological training before I left for the field. I am in way over my head” or “I didn’t know it would be so hard to learn a language.” Yes, many missionaries never plant churches, but part of that responsibility lies at the door of churches and mission agencies that sent them unprepared. The problem is compounded when churches count on mission agencies for candidate evaluations but the evaluators do not have cross-cultural experience themselves.

Entire article.