The Most Important Ministry of a Church Planter

Acts 20:28, Take heed therefore unto yourselves, and to all the flock, over the which the Holy Ghost hath made you overseers, to feed the church of God, which he hath purchased with his own blood.

Recently I had the privilege to encourage a young church planter over the phone as he made preparation to plan out his new church plant. He asked a lot of questions, but one stuck out in my mind. He asked, “When you were eighteen months out from your start date what did you do?” The truth is that we didn’t have eighteen months to prepare. And in reality, eighteen months is too far out to get a lot done. So I encouraged him that this would be the perfect time to begin the very first ministry of his new church plant—the one where he learned the spiritual task of ministering to himself.

David knew loneliness. Out of jealousy, Saul spent the latter end of his life trying to kill David. David was driven from his home, his family, and his friends. Living from cave to cave, David no doubt felt the loneliness of choosing to do right and to serve the Lord. His situation worsened when he and his men went to war with the Amalekites in 1 Samuel 30. The women and children of Ziklag, including David’s wife, were taken captive. This distressed David, and his troops decided to encourage their leader by stoning him. Yet in the midst of such dismay, the Bible gives us the source of David’s continued strength in 1 Samuel 30:6, “…but David encouraged himself in the LORD his God.” David was not dependent upon anyone else to meet his spiritual need as a leader.

Oh, don’t get me wrong, I love to be encouraged by a loving leader. When I get a letter in the mail from my pastor, I read it a dozen times, analyze every word, and nearly have it memorized before I put it down. It always helps me, but my spiritual life cannot be dependent upon the encouragement of another. As a man of God, I must be able to get alone and encourage myself in the Lord.

Paul and Silas had been beaten, bound in stocks, and thrown into the inner prison in Philippi after faithfully preaching the gospel and lovingly freeing a young woman of her demonic possession. There was no pastor to visit them, no care group leader to pray for them, no deacon to meet their needs, no secretary to order flowers for them. No one came to their side—they were alone. But the Bible says in Acts 16:25, “And at midnight Paul and Silas prayed, and sang praises unto God: and the prisoners heard them.” Paul and Silas could not depend on anyone else to lift their spirits. They would have to minister to themselves if they were going to maintain spiritual momentum during a dark and painful time in ministry.

As a church planter your first ministry is to yourself. If you cannot minister to yourself, how can you minister to your wife? To your children? To your church family? To your community? In those moments of loneliness and despair God has given you two important spiritual tools:

A Season of Prayer

Paul and Silas began their internal ministry by spending a season of prayer in prison. The power to start or maintain a church has never and will never come from you. God is the the power source, and prayer is the plug that connects us to the power of God. If you are feeling used up, beaten up, and ready to pack up, maybe you have neglected to power up by keeping yourself prayed up. Before you flee, bend the knee.

A Song of Praise

There is nothing better than a soul-stirring, Christ-centered song of praise to lift a despairing heart. Before their relationship turned sour, David’s sweet music was the only cure for King Saul’s ailing spirit, “And it came to pass, when the evil spirit from God was upon Saul, that David took an harp, and played with his hand: so Saul was refreshed, and was well, and the evil spirit departed from him” (1 Samuel 16:14). Let’s just be honest for a moment—you are going to get down. Very difficult days lay ahead for the faithful church planter, but a song in the heart is a wonderful way to connect with the Saviour’s refreshment.

One of the first medical lessons the Marine Corps taught me was how to take care of my wounds. They gave me large bandages, and I practiced over and over again tying, wrapping, and setting staged wounds on my body. The commanders knew that there would be times on the battle field when no one would be there to tie a tourniquet correctly on my arm to keep me from bleeding to death. As a Marine on the front lines, my life depended upon my ability to tend correctly to my own wounds. Men, as church planters, our spiritual lives will depend upon our ability to tend to our own spiritual wounds. When your spirit is wounded, tend to it with prayer and praise, and let the Spirit of God revive and refresh you for the great work He has called you to do!