Go to the communities Jesus want you to go to.
Jesus told us how to choose the communities in which to plant new churches. In Luke 10 Jesus sent out disciples to find the persons of peace who could assist in starting new churches. Luke explains the process this way:
After this the Lord appointed seventy-two others and sent them two by two ahead of him to every town where he was about to go.” Luke 10:1
Jesus has been working in communities before you get there. He is preparing the person of peace to be discovered by you and his Holy Spirit is already working in people’s hearts calling them to Jesus. Everything is prepared and waiting for you to go to the places and the people in which Jesus is working.
You are surrounded by communities where Jesus wants to go. As you pray and create your maps with communities targeted for first and second generation churches, you will discover that Jesus is sending you to every town that he has targeted. Please take the time to go to these communities.
Build a prayer team
I was reading Matthew 17 this week in the NIV. The translation of this chapter in the NIV is remarkable for what it leaves out. It moves 17:21 to the footnotes. As you recall the disciples were unable to cast a demon out of a young boy. In 17:21 Jesus says: “But this kind does not go out except by prayer and fasting.” I have no intent on arguing the decisions of the NIV editors, but we can all affirm that there is in fact spiritual work to be done that can only be done through prayer and fasting. Finding persons of peace and planting new churches is work that moves beyond our skill levels. It requires supernatural assistance.
It really is imperative that you gather a group of people around you who will intercede for the success of your church planting work. I would suggest that you start with at least three people who you know that when they say they will pray for you, they will do it. Then you can expand this team as God leads you. Perhaps we can begin to share stories together of how we have put together a prayer team.
Plant new churches by obeying 2 Timothy 2:2
We will move into church multiplication when we accept that 2 Timothy 2:2 is a command that needs to be obeyed. We are to entrust what we have learned to faithful people who are qualified to teach others. I consistently hear stories about pastors who feel as if they have invested a lot of time and energy in people who were the wrong people. While it is good they have invested in people, the biblical command is to invest in people who can teach others. Training the right people to train others is the only way to get the church to multiplication.
Be with Him
Here are a few more words from A. E. Day about being with Him in a way that leads to obedience:
“Here is where so many lost the sense of the Presence. There come to them hints, suggestions, directions, even inspirations about new ways of thinking or feeling or about new relationships, or about their vocations. Perhaps at first they are startled, are inclined to dismiss the whole matter and to keep on just as they have always. Maybe they do give it a second thought, begin to feel it might not be so bad after all, may even develop a bit of enthusiasm over it. There are even moments when they feel something good is about to happen. They may even make it a matter of prayer. They realize the Presence has been good to them and they really should be more responsive to Him. It is almost like beginning a new conversation with Him.
But the dialogue does not get very far. Other interests intervene. Other persons get into the picture. The inner glow dies down. The sense of the Presence fades. Nothing happens. Nothing is done. They have not followed the gleam. They wander in the twilight of what now seems to be His absence but it is really only their absence from Him. Disobedience is the great deafener.”
Four weeks ago you heard His voice to plant churches. Pray and work against the “great deafener” in your life. Refuse to give into it.