For years, Angie’s Bible study with a few other friends had been a blast. Rotating among their homes to make it easy on everyone, they always had fun, and Angie always felt like she came away with an inspiration. But recently, things had turned serious. Several others had left their church over serious disagreements with its direction. And Angie and her friends were discovering in their Bible study that they, too, fundamentally disagreed with their church’s direction based on their scripture study. None of them wanted to talk about it, but it seemed like they couldn’t help but talk. The discouraging thing was that they knew they had nowhere else to go. But then one evening, to everyone’s surprise, they began discussing whether maybe they should start a new church.
Beginnings
Churches, big and little, have beginnings. They begin in several different ways, for several or even many different reasons. But they all have a beginning in some event or series of events, under some founder or group of founding members. And the beginnings can be quite important. A church’s beginning can continue to set the church’s tone, mission, and direction for years, even for decades. The plan or cause for the church’s founding, the vision and character of the founders, and their tradition or denomination can all give the church its liturgy, doctrine, culture, and identity into the future indefinitely, perhaps for as long as the church survives. The church’s members may forget their history, but the patterns the founders established may still live on. And the beginning that a church’s founders give a church may well determine whether the church survives and grows at all. As many as three quarters of new churches survive for ten years, but few grow much beyond their initial size. Make a good beginning, in the right way and for the right reasons, and your church may not only survive but also thrive.
Reasons
To start a church properly, have the right reasons. God considers your motives, whether in your prayer or actions. Starting a church might in the abstract look like always a good thing. But starting a church primarily to avoid tax on income or real estate, or to profit from manipulating the poor, likely won’t draw God’s favor. Starting a church out of pride or for power won’t provide a solid foundation for the church to grow. Much of what we do has mixed motives. When starting a church, ensure that your motives are pure. Ask what God would honor. For example, starting a church where none exist might bring a witness to a spiritual desert or give a church home to the isolated. Starting a church around a soup kitchen might give those whom the ministry feeds a spiritual meal, too. Starting a church in a community where all the churches are full, are of the same tradition, don’t encourage new believers, or don’t welcome seekers might open new doors to the kingdom. Pray that God would reveal your true intentions, purify your heart, and equip you with the right motives. Start a new church for spiritual growth and guidance, a new community of believers, gospel outreach, and loving service.
Assessment
The prior paragraph suggests that assessing the community in which you desire to start a church might be a good idea. If starting a church is something you feel that God placed on your heart, you might not need any other reason. You might not need to know the church landscape in your area or know the reasons to start or not start a church. Yet the natural heart is deceptive beyond cure. Christ himself warns that when going to war or building castles we should first count the cost. Learn the church terrain before you start. If your area already has abundant, vibrant churches seeking new members, while welcoming all with rich worship, outreach, care, and teaching ministries, then you might be starting in the wrong location. If you’re new to the area, ask others who know the local church community to share their insights. Whether they encourage or discourage you, you might learn something key to why, what, and how you should start a church.
Splits
Church splits are a common cause for groups to establish new churches. In the case of a church split, the new churches aren’t entirely new. They’re more like new leadership over a separate part of an old church. And in that case, the reasons for the church split may for a long time color the form and direction of the new church. Churches split for both good and bad reasons. They split over financial mismanagement, power struggles over the pulpit or other leadership roles, doctrinal disagreements, and disagreements over whether and how to keep pace with social or cultural change. Let’s call those bad reasons, although good may come from those situations. Whole denominations split for similar reasons, with dozens, hundreds, or even thousands of churches leaving one denomination to start a new denomination, join another denomination, or become independent. Yet churches also split on better terms, recognizing that the body may grow in a faster, surer, or healthier way by becoming two bodies. Church splits need not be acrimonious, even when doctrine or other difficult issues are the cause. Disagreements can spur growth, which may at root be the point and purpose of the disagreement. Pray over whether leaving your church with other members to start a new body is the Lord’s will. Seek the guidance and support of your current church’s pastor and leaders.
Plants
A church plant, with one body seeding a new body, can be a good reason to start a new church. A fine line runs between a church split and church plant. Churches do grow to the point that they feel able to establish a sister church, even if the church doesn’t have any division driving a split. Having an established church behind a sister church plant can help the new church get off the ground, with financial support, staff support, preaching, and an instant body of new members. If you’re part of a group within a church feeling the urge to start a new body, explore a church plant with your church’s leadership. A church plant can excite and invigorate the parent church, while greatly aiding the new church. Denominations also make intentional plans over church plants. If your church feels ready for a plant, check with your church’s denomination, if it has one, to see what financial, legal, technical, administrative, or other assistance the denomination may be able and willing to supply. You may also find family foundation or even corporate foundation support for church plants, whether connected with a denomination or not.
Campuses
Adding campuses to an existing church may not exactly be starting a new church, but a separate new campus has features of a new church and may be the right solution to satisfy your interest. No matter how closely the central campus may hold its satellites, a separate campus still has its own location, building, and regular attenders, looking very like its own local church body. Even in a joint worship service streamed from the central campus, satellite campuses may have their own announcements, communion, baptism, weddings, and memorial services. They may also have their own associate pastor and staff, and soon their own traditions and culture. Satellite campuses can also in time become church plants or church splits, with their own preaching, leadership, and corporate form, as the campuses grow and diverge in their needs, capacities, preferences, and interests. Pray and investigate to discern whether your new church should be a satellite campus, at least initially.
Denominations
As briefly mentioned above, denominations can be intentional about planning for new churches, especially in a time when the denomination is growing. If your group has an interest in starting a new church and is already aligned with a denomination, investigate the denomination’s plans and resources for a church plant in your area. You might want to start a new church because your denomination is actively supporting your initiative. Some denominations have substantial funds for church plants or have associated foundation funding on which they can draw for new church land acquisition and facility construction. Don’t miss out on those resources. If your group is not already connected with a denomination, investigate whether such a connection makes sense from the standpoint of doctrine, traditions, commitments, and culture. Denominational recognition can ease the administrative burden of proving to the IRS, local assessor, and others that your initiative is a church and should be free from commercial regulation and taxes.
Bodies
New churches need bodies, both literally and figuratively. Another reason to start a new church is that your group is ready to form as a body or is already formed as a body. If you have eight, ten, twelve, or more friends and acquaintances who are like-minded about starting a new church, then that fact alone may be a good reason to start a new church. You don’t really have a new church until you have a church body. If you already have a church body, then maybe you should go through the steps of recognizing the body as a church. Getting started should be especially attractive if you can see that more would soon join you if you did form a new church. If instead it looks like the new church would remain only you and your six best friends, then maybe you should remain a friendship group rather than become a church. Having a body that looks like it would soon grow may be the key reason to start a new church. Without that prospect, you may only be dreaming. Pray for discernment over what your new church’s body would look like and the direction from which it would come.
Populations
Another good reason to start a new church is to make the fellowship accessible to new populations. Churches naturally serve their own memberships. But outside of a church membership, the community may grow and change. As a church membership ages, younger members of the community may not find the church as welcoming and current as they’d prefer. New churches tend to incorporate new and current forms, whether in facility design, liturgical forms, music styles, and the dress of worship leaders, church leaders, and attending members. New churches naturally tend to draw younger memberships. New churches may also be appropriate to reach immigrants or other shifting demographics. New churches may be more sensitive to bilingual participants or participants not speaking English at all, and may offer services or scripture studies in another language. And new churches can do more than just reach the young or the immigrant. They can also be more inviting for singles, single parents, and other non-traditional families, individuals with physical or mental disabilities, the homeless or impoverished, and others who might feel as if they would unduly stand out in a mature, long-standing congregation. Pray that your new church would reach an underserved, unchurched population.
Leaders
New churches also need leaders. If you have a group of confident, skilled, and experienced leaders ready to start a new church, you may not need a ready-made body. Skilled and experienced leaders can be effective in discerning how to attract new members to a new body. Leadership may be just as important of an ingredient for starting a new church as any of the other above advantages. You may not have denominational support, a parent church providing plant support, or a large group of friends and acquaintances ready to join you. But if you are a skilled church leader and have other leaders ready to move with you, then you may have all the reasons you need to proceed. Pray for discernment whether your leadership has the right intentions and is doing as God desires.
Preaching
New churches also need preaching. Preaching may initially come in the form of a satellite broadcast from another church. Preaching may initially come in the form of a lay minister serving temporarily in the pulpit. Or preaching may come in the form of a retired pastor stepping in on a temporary basis. But if you are a skilled preacher or have a skilled preacher available to serve in your new church, then you may have another good reason to start a new church. Talented, Spirit-filled new pastors can find it hard to locate an open pulpit. That’s another role that a new church can fill, to give a new pastor an opportunity to fulfill God’s call to preach. If the Spirit fills the pastor, the body of believers may soon come, and so may the leaders, finances, facilities, and other things a new church needs to mature in its ministry. Pray to discern how preaching may influence your decision to start a new church.
Apostles
Your calling as a modern apostle may be another reason to start a new church. Apostles go where none have gone before to plant and lead new churches, before moving on to repeat the cycle. You may not be part of a group ready to form a new church body. You may instead be alone in your desire, called by God to strike out on your own or with just one or two partners in a new direction. Apostles don’t necessarily look for any of the above advantages, although keep in mind that even the great apostle Paul eventually had the backing of the church leaders in Jerusalem. If you have denominational support or the support of a church body to plant new churches, then welcome that support as a confirmation of your calling. But if God has called you to start a church, and you’re sure that it’s God and not your pride or some other deception, then answer the call. Just think carefully about how to communicate your calling to others, especially those on whom you may depend to get your new church started.
Reflection
What is your motivation for considering starting a new church? Are your motives pure of things of which God would disapprove? What is the church landscape where you intend to start a new church? How will your new church relate to the other churches in your area? If your church is facing a split, do you have a prospect for making it an amicable plant instead? Would a satellite campus make sense, at least for a time? Do you have denomination support available for your new church? Do you have a body of believers joining you, or can you discern a body likely to join? Do you have skilled leaders joining you? Do you have a Spirit-filled preacher available to lead your new church? Has God called you as an apostle to found new churches, whether you have any advantage in doing so or not? How has God communicated or confirmed your calling?
Key Points
The beginning of a church can heavily influence its shape and destiny.
Ensure that your reasons for starting a new church are sound.
Learn the local church landscape before starting your new church.
Church splits can be appropriate times to start a new church.
Church plants can be especially effective in starting a new church.
Satellite campuses can be another way to start new churches.
Denominations also plan, fund, and support new churches.
A body of like-minded believers can be a reason to start a new church.
New churches can reach new and underserved populations.
A group of skilled leaders can be another reason to start a new church.
An available Spirit-filled preacher can be a reason to start a church.
Your calling as an apostle may be the reason to start a new church.