Through my work with the Acts 29 Network, I get the privilege of assessing a number of potential church planters each year. I also get to hear about dozens more from fellow pastors as well. When I guy comes in to get assessed, by the time he gets to the interview stage he’s already submitted a lot of paperwork. Resumes. Plans. Budgets. Demographic Analysis. Dental history. (Ok, just kidding on the last one).Read the rest.
And as I’ve looked at some amazing plans from church planters, I’ve started to notice a trend. They all sound the same.
It seems as the unique vision that God’s given so many church planters is almost identical. Phrases like “gospel-centered”, “missional”, and “cultural renewal” are littered throughout their proposals. It seems that the phrase “In the City. For the City.” or some variation of such has become church planting boilerplate.
Not only is the language the same, but so is the target group. It’s amazing how many young pastors feel that they are distinctly called to reach the upwardly-mobile, young, culture-shaping professionals and artists. Can we just be honest? Young, upper-middle-class urban professionals have become the new “Saddleback Sam”.
As a member of Acts29 now, I can understand where Bill gets these thoughts. Obviously this is a generalization, but oftentimes generalizations become so for good reason. I think it's simply raw sociology at play here. People want to be united to those who are like them. The number one identifying marker of culture is language. Thus, A29 guys learn to speak the language if they want to be "in" and identified as part of the team. Who doesn't want to be on the team?
We all do this is some form or another depending on our sphere of relationships and interactions, but the Gospel should challenge us to push back against this ingrained tendency that we all share, that is, seeking homogeneity in our mission, vision, and relationships.
4 comments:
i give a lot of the credit to Total Church. seems that people who read this book all of the sudden develop a new language. Of course, it's everywhere now, but this just shows that people are pulling from the same pool of resources.
oh, and the "Young, upper-middle-class urban professionals" mentality maybe comes from Tim Keller, who rightfully points out that culture in made in the city. But, not all of us live in truly urban environment. Seems a lot of people also need to get excited about reaching people who are older then them, "boring" compared to the YUCUPs, family-oriented types!
I'm reminded of something that Kevin DeYoung posted on his blog a little over a year ago. (http://thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/kevindeyoung/2009/01/29/jesus-came-to-save-grimace-and/)
As he often does, Kevin hit the nail on the head.
Why would a church have a specific target audience anyway, shouldn't every church be targeting everybody? Just my humble observation.
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