Small Church Plants and Slow Growth

One of my favorite church planting writers is Ralph Moore.  I just read his post, “When Things Seem Slow.”  Here is a guy who is an expert in church planting and has fathered and grandfathered over 700 churches.  Yet in his latest endeavor he is experiencing slow growth and a smaller than expected launch.  I have often heard Ed Stetzer talk about the five churches he started and how some succeeded and others died.  So if it happens to the experts is it a surprise when it happens to a first time church planter?  I regularly see church planters who wrap up their identity and sense of self worth in the size of their launch.  If that’s you, here’s a great quote from Moore’s blog that might help put things in perspective.

“Still don’t know why it hasn’t grown faster, and don’t really care. Slow and steady has been the story of my life and a dozen people gathered on a September Sunday in 1971 has turned into 700+ churches around the world.

I’ll take slow and steady any day.”

It’s taken 40 years to reproduce that number of church and to start a movement that’s grown so much they can’t keep track of how many churches have been started.  If you are small at launch, keep the big picture in mind and no that the size of the church today is not the end of the story of its impact and that it doesn’t define you.

Thanks for the reminder, Ralph.