Indigenous church?
Defined: that which is culturally relevent, self-supporting, self-propagating, self-governing and biblically sound. There may be some better definitions but I believe this one pretty well says it.
Finally, we are beginning to see indigenous churches being planted overseas. American missionaries are now training national pastors in their own local areas to plant churches. These native pastors are being supported by their own people on their own economy and not with US dollars.
Don't you think it is time to start indigenous churches in America? It used to be so a generation or two ago. A man called of God, burdened about souls in a certain location, would take his family and move to where God called him. Then, while working a full time job he would win souls and meet in his home or some other place until enough people were joined together to begin to subsidize his salary. Little by little the new church (baby) would begin to set funds aside and giving would increase and they would rent a larger facility. Without the financial help of a sponsoring church, association, or anyone else, baby churches like this would most likely take ownership and grow into a healthy church.
I agree that it would be nice to have some assistance to get a church started, however, it appears that many prospective church planters are really wanting it too easy. It is essential that the church planter and his wife (team) be fully committed to planting a new church and be willing to make the necessary sacrifices to do the work. The rewards always come later when the church begins to grow.
It is worthy to note here that one of the reasons more churches are not being started is the prohibitive cost of not only supporting the church planter but the expectation that the sponsoring church will have to be responsible for purchasing land and building a facility. This is most unfortunate.
Would you or your church be more apt to get involved with starting a new church if you knew it would be an indigenous church from the beginning? Leave your comments.
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5 comments:
One of the issues I have with the whole church planter idea is that I see a lot of our churches focusing on building buildings. I see that this is set as a bench mark for many missions before they set about paying a man a full time salary, setting up a retirement plan for that man and his wife, setting medical plans for that man and family and being able to attract a Pastor should the then Pastor be injured, die or become incopasitated. Most of our cities have extensive industrial building that can be rented, leased, borrowed or if need be bought. But we buy expensive land, build expensive building and run 50-70, yet can't pay a guy what he is worht for being on call 24/7 and beyond. Maybe we need to set the bench marks in better locations,
1. Numerical growth
2. Pastoral care growth
3. Mission outreach growth
These are often much more attainable than buildings and make a church even without a building. This would take one less burden off guys, a burden that is really not necessary to bare. The money used by small churches to build empty buildings can go towards securing the pastor, his family and the church's outreach.
Sean
I would be likely to support this kind of church planting. I don't understand the desire to focus on buildings and not people
On the latest IMD fund voting list there are 9 missions looking for money to specifically pay off debt remaining on their new buildings.
Of these 9 missions I speculate that their combined mission attendance on a Sunday Morning is about 500. The total debt of the 9 missions was somewhere close to $2,000,000.00 and they are all desperately seeking votes for a twenty thousand dollar check.
Think about how more rapidly we could grow new churches if missions first focussed on growth and paying their pastors salary and then buying building and land that they can afford. You might say well that would take twenty years to accomplish. Yes it would but the whole time they would be focussed on building a congregation and not a building, winning souls and not winning IMD votes.
How many votes do you think someone would get if they said they were running 50 in services and they weren't buying land or building but wanted to use the money to fund specialized outreaches to win their community to Christ? Now there's a concept!
Being a Church Planter, Missionary, or whatever you want to call it has it's own set of struggles.
From the very beginning of our new church we have tried to emphasize to the churches (who support us) that we are trying to teach our people that they are responsible for buying land, purchasing a building, paying the pastors, etc.
Many times as a church planter I feel like the walls are closing in on us. We have been on the field for 3 1/2 years. We have no land, no building (besides the Theatre which we meet in on Sundays), and not enough money to buy land or buildings in Morgantown, WV. That is, unless, we want to be out in the country 30 miles from Morgantown (and even that is expensive).
So, what do you do? It is a catch 22! If you do it (buy land and a building), then you will be recognized by most of our churches as a SUCCESS! But, you'll be in debt up to your eyeballs! If you do not, then you are a failure.
We would love to have a place of our own, but honestly, we can't even reach budget yet! We are thankful for the churches in our Association who support our salaries, but should we expect them to pay for our $500,000.00 - $1,000,000.00 Land and Building. I don't think so (even though it is definitely tempting)!
I believe Bro. David's words ring loud and true! As prices of land and buildings increase, we must find creative ways to meet together. Brethren, pray for us! Our heart's desire is to honor God and do whatever HE wants us to do!
It appears to me that when the apostles went in to a new town, village and city they had the signs and wonders to attract a large crowd of unbelievers and then begin to evangelise them, eventually they would form a new church some in as littel as a few weeks, then the task of teaching the church to do the work began. Today we don't have signs and wonders, but we have church planting tools, advertising tools, outreach tools that can make an even bigger first impact on a city just like any other business or company would to get people out to the first day of business, then the company goes about satisfying the steady and regular customers, while continuing to do outreach. Churches need to do the same thing, we need to make a splash, make our names known, do the modern day 'signs and wonders' with the technology that the would even blow the apostle's minds, make a splash like them, then win from the crowd. Just a thought.
Sean
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