Plans & Validity

A lot of the recent articles on this blog about Connections have been "newsy." However, one of the intentions behind this blog is to reflect upon the process of church planting for the edification of ourselves and others.

Yesterday I met someone who is involved with an emerging church/fresh expressions/church planting network. One of the points of conversation revolved around the issue of validity.

One of the purposes of having such networks is to provide the blessing of validation. A key struggle in the early years of Connections was battling external perceptions with regard to our validity - were we a valid church, a valid congregation, validly Anglican etc. etc.?

I vividly remember our first baptism, some months after starting, where afterwards there was the sense of "I don't know what we are, but we're something." We had encountered a sense of validation, and this has only increased as we find ourselves being included, recognised, supported and growing. In a network, because we have been given validity, we can give that to others as well.

Soon after this conversation I found this concept of validity creatively colliding in another conversation with some musings about how churches should be organised and managed and the importance of having "mission and ministry plans for a local context." I found myself perceiving an implied demarcation between "valid" churches/congregations that are able to produce such a plan, and "invalid" churches/congregations who can't.

That is a flawed demarcation.

Why? Because the ability to develop a plan is not a good (sole) indicator of church vitality. For instance, in some “dying” loci the plan is easy - “sustain palliative care as long as possible.” For some “emerging” loci the plan is more difficult because they would be in the middle (or the beginning) of a process which is asking “Who are we? What can we do?”

I would say that enforcing young church plants or fresh expressions to develop a “plan” too early can end up killing them. It's like asking a 12 year old to have the self-awareness of a 30 year old resulting in them feeling trapped in the decisions they were forced to make too early. You don't force 12 year olds into mapping out their life, but you do talk goals, ambitions, heart and allow them to explore, fail etc.

All this shows is that church growth is primarily organic in nature (because it is relational), not bureaucratic (like a machine).

What validates a church, no matter how old or young? Evidential commitment to grow as a local Christian community. No matter how ill-defined the trajectory, that is the true heart.