Why do people plant churches?
Colin Baron
"God will use many reasons to get us on the move"
Just as God uses all kinds of people to plant new churches, he also gives people a variety of reasons for doing so.
Sometimes churches are planted as a result of God calling someone specifically for that task. For example in Acts 13:1-3 we see the church leaders in Antioch praying and fasting, and strategically sending out Paul and Barnabas to plant churches.
Chapter 16:6-10 shows Paul going to Macedonia as a result of a vision:
‘…a vision appeared to Paul in the night: a man of Macedonia was standing there, urging him and saying, “Come over to Macedonia and help us.” And when Paul had seen the vision, immediately we sought to go on into Macedonia, concluding that God had called us to preach the gospel to them.’
The New Testament even gives examples of how people plant churches for reasons that don’t look particularly spiritual – in chapter 11, the church in Antioch was started because Christians from Jerusalem were fleeing for their lives!
God will use many reasons, such as job moves, redundancy, the opportunity for education, retirement and illness as well as more overtly ‘spiritual’ reasons such as prophetic words and dreams to get us on the move.
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Colin's Profile
Colin leads Christ Church Manchester (CCM), a new church on the east side of the city birthed out of a passion to see significant churches planted in each of the ten boroughs of Greater Manchester.
Colin also travels internationally for the Newfrontiers team, encouraging and equipping church planters as well as coaching leaders and developing teams in established churches.