"Church planting? What is that?" I still get asked that question, even after a couple years in. Any way you slice it the idea of church planting is often either misunderstood or, literally, unheard of. The questions are many, including:

• Why plant a new church in a city already filled with other churches?
  
• Why not focus instead on helping existing churches grow?
  
• Won’t starting a new church merely take people away from other churches?
  
• Shouldn’t we focus on cultivating better churches, rather than adding churches?

These are valid concerns that stem from a fundamental misunderstanding/ignorance of the complexities of revitalization, organizational life-cycles, demographic diversity, theological distinctions, leadership styles, evangelism, and general philosophies of ministry within existing churches. It’s more complicated than we may at first realize.

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