Pittsburgh Church Planting
In my next few posts I am going to examine the topic of Chuch planting, and more specifically examine why more people should consider Church planting in Pittsburgh.
Church planting is a term that describes the process of creating a new local church community. In the last decade more people have come to recognize the importance of perpetual church planting. Though there has been a renewed interest in the topic, people estimate that 80% of church plants fail in the first year. Church planting is by no means an simple thing to do. In fact creating a new worshiping community might be one of the most challenging things that a Christian can participate in. Additionally there is no one proven way of planting, what worked in Town A might fail in Town B. In the following posts I am going to examined many of the ideas that surround planting in an urban context.
There are many questions that people might ask regarding church planting, ie why are new churches a good thing? Why not just renew existing churches? If you are new to the topic or undecided on the importance of church planting I would suggest you read a short article written by Tim Keller, Pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in NYC.
My Perspective
Everyone has their own leaning which shapes why and how they think.
I would associate myself with Reformed Protestantism. I am a minister in the Presbyterian Church in America and more closely I am influenced and encouraged by the Harbor Presbyterian Church, Redeemer Presbyterian Church, Citynet, and other similar churches. Important voices to my understanding of Church planting are Harvie Conn, Tim Keller, Jack Miller, Ed Clowney, Ed Stetzer, Rolland Allen, Manuel Otiz and others.
Much of what I am going to say is going to be geared toward the PCA, but I think that most of my arguments will not exclude other Christians. I understand that If you arent a Christians church planting will probably seem silly, and you probably wont care much about the next few posts.
In my next few posts I am going to cover the following topics:
- Challenges to church planting in Pittsburgh
- Why people should plant in Pittsburgh
- What might be done to see more churches planted in Pittsburgh
- Models that could be followed in Pittsburgh