A God-Planted Church

HOW DOES GOD PLANT A CHURCH? CHURCH PLANTING is something like what a farmer does, he plants the seed, cultivates the seed, fertilizes the seed and then patiently waits for it to grow.

Church planters basically do the same thing. They have to plant the seed (Gospel), cultivate the seed, fertilize the seed and patiently wait for it to grow. Like the farmer, when it grows they get excited!

There are three things that have to be considered before there should be any planting, cultivating and fertilizing. Such as:

(1) IS THERE A DEMAND FOR A NEW CHURCH?

A farmer is not going to plant a crop when there is an abundance of food already. IT IS CALLED SUPPLY AND DEMAND! If there is no DEMAND, then he does not plant. And the same should be true for any church planter.

Illus: For example, in one of the real estate magazines there was an article that was dealing with the problem of builders overbuilding apartment complexes in Atlanta, Ga. Builders began to build thousands of apartments without determining if there was a demand for more apartments. THERE WAS NOT! And now they have the problem of having more apartments than they have renters.

The problem is, they built these apartments when there was NO DEMAND FOR THEM TO BE BUILT.

Illus: A city can only accommodate so many:

• Restaurants

• Hotels

• Colleges and Universities

• Real Estate agencies

• Service stations

• Walmart and K-mart stores

When people are unwise and build when the need is not there, they are going to suffer a great loss.

Likewise, in church planting there has to be a NEED FOR A NEW CHURCH TO BE PLANTED. When you go into a town and they have churches on almost every corner, and these are not filled, it would be foolish to build another church.

• Some have planted churches where there was a need, and the church began to grow rapidly

• Some have planted churches where there was no need, and they struggled to survive

What is THE DIFFERENCE? Many times churches are flourishing because they planted when there was a DEMAND. Naturally these churches began to grow immediately.

(2) IS IT THE RIGHT TIME TO PLANT A CHURCH?

You can ask any farmer, and he will tell you that one of the most important things about planting is the TIMING. In fact, he will tell you that to plant at the wrong time, will almost guarantee failure.

This is also true of church planting. You might go down a road and see a large field that would be ideal to build a church on, but there are no homes for miles. The land might be right, but the timing isn’t.

Ten years from now, you might drive by that same piece of property, and there are homes all around this piece of property, perhaps then would be the right time to build a church.

Church Planting asks, “IS THERE A DEMAND” and “IS THE TIMING RIGHT”, but also-

(3) IS THE SOIL THE RIGHT KIND OF SOIL?

For example, suppose some Bible-believing preacher is going to Salt Lake City, Utah to build a strong fundamental Bible-believing church. If he is wise, he will take into consideration the fact that that the Mormons have permeated this area with false teaching, and the soil is not going to be conducive to church growth. He might be able to plant a church there, but it is going to be very difficult.

He might consider that if he spent the same time and resources to do this somewhere else, he could win more souls to the Lord.

Thank God for all the Bible-believing pastors who are willing to sacrifice their lives to PLANT BIBLE-BELIEVING, BIBLE-PREACHING CHURCHES.

The apostle Paul was a CHURCH PLANTER. In Acts 17, we see Paul’s trip to Thessalonica. Notice:

• He went to the crossroads of the Roman Empire. All roads came to this point, so it was a key place to win people to Christ and start a church

• Paul started with the Jews but it spread to the Gentiles also

With the working of the Holy Spirit, Paul won many folks to Christ.

Look at Acts 17:4, we read, "And some of them believed, and consorted with Paul and Silas; and of the devout Greeks a great multitude, and of the chief women not a few."

In a short time, Paul was used of God to PLANT A GREAT BIBLE-BELIEVING CHURCH. Later when Paul left, in his writings in 1 Thessalonians, Paul is wondering about those who had been saved.

He had heard about some of the difficulties they were running into. He did not know all that was going on in the church, but he knew that a growing, thriving church was there. Their faith was widespread through the entire area where the church was.