When God called my wife and me to plant a church, we were ready to give our all. And that’s exactly what we did. But we had no idea what that meant. I worked non-stop for nine months before the church launched. Leading up to our public launch I clocked 67 hours between Thursday and our Sunday morning launch service. And then I preached that morning! We personally incurred several thousand dollars in debt over the first two years just from added costs of planting the church. I was physically spent and emotionally washed up. After three and a half years the church was going great. But even after we began to make changes, I reached a point where I had no more to give. What I wanted more than anything else I could not do. My prayers changed as I cried out for God to do something. I gave up, surrendered myself for God to do whatever He wanted. This had always been my prayer. But how God answered this prayer would radically change my life.
Throughout the scriptures God calls people to serve His purpose. Ezekiel 22 records the prophet’s account when he looked on a city in utter ruin because the people had forgotten God. As he recounts how great the destruction and the people responsible, he poses a sobering reality. God sought for a man who would stand in the breach and re-build the wall, but found none. Amidst the ruin no destruction was more devastating than the absence of anyone who would take spiritual responsibility to represent God in the city. God calls men to give up our lives to labor for gospel redemption in the cities of our world.
A breach is any point where a city remains vulnerable to the enemy, and means certain loss of the city. Most cities don’t have walls today, but there is a greater breach within every city that means certain loss if someone will not stand in it. The breach in the human heart gives sin a point to ravage and destroy lives. We are hopeless and helpless in the face of sin without someone to stand in the breach. God wants to fill the breach and save his people. He still searches for those who will stand in the breach. But I want to be clear about what this means.
God isn’t looking for a man who will give his life to save the day. The breach of sin leaves every person vulnerable, helpless and hopeless. God sent Jesus, who gave his life as the only One who could stand in the breach to save people. Jesus, who was given and gave his life, is the good news for which we can give up our lives. God calls people to give up their lives to tell the world of the One who gave His life to save, Jesus.
I offer three motivations for why Christians must plant churches that disciple people to give up their lives to point people to Jesus.
The Gospel is our first motivation to plant churches that disciple people to give up their lives.
Paul ‘un-ashamed’ hope in the power of the gospel must define our same confident hope. The gospel is still God’s power to save. That ruined city Ezekiel looked upon is the state of every soul without Christ. There is no safe haven where one can run and no defense one can muster to deter their demise. Every person needs a Savior to act in their behalf.
Salvation is God’s free gift that makes people new. Christians know the gospel’s power by personal experience. Everything changes when God makes a person new. New life means new meaning and purpose. This new purpose leads to one, motivating conviction: God saves people by faith through the gospel of Jesus Christ.
Obedience forms the second motivation to plant churches that disciple people to give up their lives.
When my life serves King Jesus, His commands are my first priority. Jesus clarifies our command in the Great Commission, “go and make disciples”. Paul explains that our commission means we’ve been entrusted to serve and share this message of God’s reconciliation in the world. Obedience to serve the Great Commission is the highest honor for every Christian.
Salvation leads every Christian to live in obedience under Jesus’ Kingly rule. Dietrich Bonhoeffer, German theologian from the WWII era, famously stated, “When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die”. This is not true for a specially trained few. Complete surrender is the norm for every person who claims the name of Christ. Jesus himself said, “IF ANY man would come after me, he must deny himself, take up his cross daily and follow me.” (Luke 9:23) The person who trusts Jesus as Savior knows that He is worthy to be Lord of all of life. Living in obedience forms our first missional strategy. Living as the church to make disciples means obedience makes the biggest difference in church planting.
Mission forms the third motivation to plant churches that disciple people to give up their lives.
Acts 13:2-3 records, “While they were worshipping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, ‘Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.’ Then after fasting and praying they laid their hands on them and sent them off.” Acts 13 is not an exception to but a paradigm for gospel mission. This is not a record of what Holy Spirit did, but what He does. When the gospel works among God’s people, Holy Spirit sends His church to preach the gospel and plant churches. Church planting is not “a” method of gospel mission, but “THE” paradigm for all gospel mission. Obedience to God’s command “go and make disciples” comes with Holy Spirit authority that commissions us to go.
Impact forms the fourth motivation to plant churches that disciple people to give up their lives.
Every city in the Bible where the gospel made a significant impact was ravaged with idolatry, just like the city Ezekiel looked upon. And like with Jonah, the darker the city often meant the bigger the transformation. Our culture, cities and country are all in desperate need. Only the Gospel can make an eternal impact. Every study and statistic tells us that church planting is the best strategy to impact people with the gospel. Ed Stetzer and Warren Bird cite Tim Keller when they make this point in Viral Churches.
“New churches best reach new generations, new residents, and new people groups. The vigorous, continual planting of new congregations is the single most crucial strategy for the numerical growth of the Body of Christ in any city, and for the continual corporate renewal and revival of the existing churches in a city,” he says. “New church planting is the only way that we can be sure we are going to increase the number of believers in a city and one of the best ways to renew the whole Body of Christ.”[1]
When God wants to impact a city, he sends His people by Holy Spirit to plant churches. When a church gets planted, a Jesus-filled people share and serve the gospel to point people to Jesus. God calls his people to give up their lives to tell the world of the One who gave His life to save, Jesus.
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[1] Stetzer, Ed and Warren Bird, Viral Churches, (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2010), p69, 71-72. Stetzer and Bird cite Tim Keller from Why Plant Churches?, February 2002.